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The tiny easy chair Mikael Axelsson is holding in his hands—a dollhouse-size combination of bent wire, hand-carved foam, and hot glue—has been a white whale for the Ikea designer since he first modeled it back in 2014. The concept was simple, or at least he thought it would be: Build a frame of metal, fill it with a balloon-like cushion, and reinvent novelty 1990s blow-up furniture into a modern home furnishing.
But after trying to take the Barbie-size model he’d built and expand it into a full-scale piece of inflatable furniture, he had two major problems. First, he could never quite figure out how to make an inflatable cushion that didn’t feel like an exercise ball. Second, he couldn’t convince his bosses that inflatable furniture wouldn’t be the total failure it was when the company first tried it in the late 1990s.
“It’s been standing on my shelf since then,” he says.
A little over two years ago, Axelsson pulled the model off the shelf at his desk in the design department at Ikea of Sweden, the global retailer’s headquarters in the small town of Älmhult, Sweden. Axelsson and the roughly 20 other designers on staff had been called to participate in an experimental design sprint in late 2023. They had two days to come up with boundary-pushing concepts for the newest edition of Ikea’s PS collection, a recurring furniture-centric product drop of Scandinavian designs that will launch this May.
Axelsson saw the chance to revive his inflatable easy chair. This time, in the spirit of throwing everything at the wall, he got the go-ahead to at least explore the idea. He immediately started welding. He ended up building about 20 different versions of the chair, with varying tubular chrome frame configurations and bulbous hand-sealed inflation chambers. Several of these iterations were on display when I walked into Ikea’s headquarters in early April.
I was there to visit Ikea’s secretive prototype lab—the place where conceptual designs get mocked up, refined, refined again, and eventually optimized for the large-scale production that will flatpack and distribute them to Ikea’s estimated 915 million annual in-store customers. Ikea invited me as the first journalist to see the space, the creative heart of the company, which pumps out 1,500 to 2,000 new products every year for markets all over the planet.
To see how the space works, and to understand why it’s so important to Ikea’s $52 billion in retail sales in fiscal 2025, Fast Company has been given an exclusive look inside the prototype shop. Products being prototyped there are often two to three years away from making it to the shelves of one of Ikea’s 500-plus stores, and some experimental design ideas being tested there may never materialize.
“You are basically in the future here,” says Johan Ejdemo, Ikea’s global design manager.
The prototype shop is where that future gets gut checked. From top-level feasibility to aesthetic refinement to the minutiae of assembly fittings and stitch choices, products get built and rebuilt in the prototype shop to continually test whether they’re meeting the Ikea standards for functionality and affordability.
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How to use AI to strengthen teams instead of destroying them
It’s tempting to think that stacking a team with top talent guarantees results. Add AI, and you’ve got supercharged individuals. But star performers don’t automatically create high-performing teams—and AI can make things worse.
Duke dean and professor Scott Dyreng saw this firsthand. His M.B.A. students worked in teams, with the option to “break up” for the final project. Before AI, about 5% did. After AI, over half went solo, he writes in The Wall Street Journal. Dyreng found that AI disrupted core teamwork skills, like negotiating and reaching agreements. But instead of banning it, he used AI strategically—for meeting analysis, summarizing discussions, and reporting participation. The tools didn’t replace communication—they strengthened it, encouraging more human interaction.
The lesson for leaders: it’s not whether to use AI, but how. Misaligned dynamics can neutralize even top talent. The best teams focus as much on how they work together as on who’s on the team—and they use AI to enhance, not replace, that collaboration. Here’s how.
Form balanced teams for each project
I’ve long been a proponent of cross-functional teams. At Jotform, employees work in small groups—usually a senior developer, front-end developer, back-end developer, designer, CSS developer, and sometimes a project or product manager. This structure creates a natural equilibrium where each person brings their distinct expertise to the table.
With each new project, roles shift. Different team members take the lead depending on the work. Understanding individual strengths and weaknesses helps ensure teams stay balanced and that the right person leads each project.
AI tools can help leaders gather these insights. Meeting analysis, for example, can reveal who takes the lead on specific topics. Communication trends can show where people excel across a project timeline—who initiates, who organizes, and who shines during execution. And if an employee is struggling—say, someone scrambling to manage deadlines—AI can help develop tailored learning solutions that fit their individual schedule.
Used strategically, AI can help organizations lean into team members’ strengths and address weaknesses where needed.
