It is endlessly fascinating to me how people and organizations decide to live their values--and I include myself here. How we choose to express ourselves through our work matters. We make a difference in how we choose to show up, whether we like it or not.
We are guided by our values. In the classes I teach, the talks I give, and the clients I work with--to a person--most people do not know their values...and I mean really know them. I will extend that notion to organizations as well. They come up with values, but rarely incorporate them in their ongoing decision making.
IKEA remains in my #PantheonOfInterestingCompanies - a category of posts I'll add to over time - because of how they reckon with their values. The hold tension between both poles - waste and conservation - much like us individuals. And they try, hard (imo), to do the right thing. What attracts me most is their pursuit of elegant problem-solving resulting in learning that is valued and integrated into the company's culture and eventually its products.
Every year, Ikea Group and INGKA Holding (the holding company that controls the majority of Ikea’s retail stores) publishes a research report on how people live in and relate to a specific aspect of their homes. Since 2014 it’s dealt with morning routines, food and kitchens, and disagreements at home. This year, it takes on a more existential tone–dealing with loneliness, belonging, and the effects of living in cities.
Two years ago, the company asked thousands of people about where they felt “most at home.” At the time, 20% of subjects said it wasn’t the space in which they lived. Two years later, they asked again, and found the number has risen by 15% among people who live in cities. In other words, 35% of people who live in cities don’t feel at home in their house or apartment.
“Almost half of Americans (45%) go to their car to have a private moment to themselves,” the company reports in a new survey of 22,000 people in 22 countries."
There is a huge amount of research and theory going back to the early 1900s on changing definitions of home. But what’s fascinating about Ikea’s report is that Ikea, simply by being the largest furniture retailer on earth, has a role to play here. The corporation has more than 400 stores in 25 countries. It reported 936 million visits to its stores last year. One favorite faux-factoid, which, obviously, can’t be verified, claims that 1 in 10 Europeans is conceived on an Ikea bed. We are increasingly renters rather than owners, which makes inexpensive and disposable furniture a necessity. ...the idea of “home” has become less permanent and more transient than ever, and, as a result, we’ve stopped thinking of our homes as “self-expression.”
Full article here.
#ProblemSolving #creativity #sustainability #home #innovation #Values #ethics #learning