[Music]
hi everyone my name is Joanne and I live
in a van Hagen suburb of Stockholm just
south of Stockholm this is where I’m
having my home I’m living in a classical
Swedish Road house which was built in
the 40s and my kids they go to school
you know one kilometer away from where I
live my work is 15 kilometer away from
there and this is really the place where
I go when I go home when I go to
research you know to relax you know and
to spend time with family and friends
and van Hagen and this didn’t draw dish
that we’re having is of course a very
dear place in a very important place of
my in my professional life I’m working
with and for Refugees and people who are
displaced by conflicts and natural
disasters we are today in the world
having 65 million people displaced a
number that is growing year by year
about 10 million of these people they
are living in temporary settlements in
camps camp like situations and often and
before I started to work in this area I
thought of humanitarian aid as a
temporary measure something to protect
for the short term but average time of a
refugee situation is today almost 20
years and many of the camps where we are
working today refugees have stayed for
years and generations if we are looking
forward and we’re looking at the trends
going back in time or the last ten years
the number are not very encouraging we
can see that the humanitarian needs they
grow years by years when I started to
work in health wash with this there were
some 42 million people displaced now at
65 million less than eight years after
so the
needs to grow but the budgets the
humanitarian budgets the bodies are
available to aid these people they are
not growing in the same pace and that
leads us with a funding gap that we
cannot really help the amount of people
that we would like to support and seeing
this is of course it’s it’s makes I
think any one of its you know sad and
you’re feeling a bit helpless about the
situation what what can we do to change
this I think I’ve had the opportunity I
think that abroad with two opportunities
to work with one I said I have an
opportunity to work a lot with the
United Nations and with NGOs both local
ones and international NGOs seeing the
work that they are doing working with
very very limited resources to helping
people that gives a little comfort and
strength and and it gives sort of some
belief in humanity and the other part of
my job is the benefit that I have is
that I’m also working in spending time
with refugees in camps and often when
you see this development you see the
conflicts you see the natural resources
that are escalating and still what often
when I’m in camps what I’m shocked about
it’s not the hardship that is very
shocking but it’s more that the often
I’m invited for tea I’m invited for
lunch by refugee family who have fled
and left everything and this guest here
from them that has affected me and and
really given me a lot of energy in the
work that I’m doing and my hope here
today is basically to share some of the
lessons learned that we have had
working with Jim eternal innovation and
design some of the obstacles that we
have been through and hopefully I would
like to you know if I could inspire some
of you to venture into this area because
this has been a fantastic journey for me
myself and for our company so very short
I’m not here to talk about our product
today you can see it here it’s a very
simple product it’s a house that you
assemble you know you ship it in a flat
box
a piece of Ikea furniture you assemble
it on-site with anything without any
tools you know compared to many
emergency situation it lasts for three
years it can also be integrated into
transitional shelter program so you can
extend the lifespan and Link the
emergency that you’re having here more
to more development aid so that’s that’s
about what we’re doing but here today I
would like to tell you about the pro
system we have been through and some of
the lessons learned and what I’ve learn
about that even though I’m a product
designer trainers cons you know by
training I would love to tell you all
about you know the product and how
fantastic it is it’s not the product
that I’ve made our project work I think
what has made our project work is that
we have had the opportunity to work with
amazing people that really have
supported us throughout our journey and
we have had been driven by a great
compassion all of us in the team and all
our partners both in private secretary
material sectors have contributed with a
lot of energy to our project so since
2015 we have deployed more than 16,000
shelters we are partners with IKEA
Foundation and the UNHCR and looking at
this is retrospect I think people you
know we often tend to think that this
has been quite a smooth ride that we
have been in for because we are having
these great partners that we are working
with it has been everything but a smooth
ride I will ensure you that the project
started in 2008 when I was called by
Penta saponin who was the politician in
hell laughs oh Sh
embarrass login in Sweden and had his
Foreman shoes you know where which was
an initiative to promote sustainable
design and also was initiative to see
how sustainable site could help hel
lavash as a community to find a new
meaning you know now when sort of the
mining is close to moved away from
health wash and it told me that hey we
had this project we made a figure bow
tie and it was good but we didn’t manage
to you know get the manufactured it was
no business out of it but we thought it
was this tsunami now
this was in 2005 so maybe we could use
them for emergency shelters and I
thought okay I’d be happy to to work
with you on such a project idea but I
don’t know anything about you ten eight
so but it sounds interesting started to
work from there
my mom my first initiative was like me I
need to understand what are these people
going through and we didn’t have any
budget for this this was a very scarce
uh budget and a part-time employment I
had a telephone so what we did was that
we went to Fisk seta and a librarian
there who supported us to get encounter
with the Somali community and they came
from Dadaab which is a big refugee camp
in Kenya with Somali refugees and these
people have been living in these camps
and they told us a lot of stories that
of hardship that I could only imagine
and as a designer I was very shocked
that why are we putting people in a camp
that has been here for twenty years why
are we putting them in in temporary
shelters why can we not mean something
meaningful why can not transfer them to
a durable solution or you know transfer
you know to other countries you know why
are we doing this so that gives a lot of
energy to basically to pursue this
project but again we had the problems
with resources we partner with a few
universities that made prototypes
together with us
none of these prototypes worked but we
got stuff happening we started two
things and what was good about working
in hella for Shanna politicians there is
that they all connected you know even
the Social Democrats and mood wrote and
I you know they have met that all this
you know youth arrangement so they know
each other and and we managed somehow to
get the Minister of Defence the untold
for sure you know we moved a lot and
pent it was a social democrat but he
managed to get him there we got national
media to cover this and all of a sudden
people think ok but they have you know
they have a project there to have a good
product we didn’t have a products at
that time but it was enough for us to
get the connection to Ikea and to say
that okay let’s let’s you know and we
asked him you should do this project you
know we have done some ideas but you
should do this and I can’t no this is
not our business idea we’re doing what’s
inside the four walls we’re not doing
the walls but go and talk to our
philanthropic foundation IKEA foundation
with we started talking with them we get
a small project we started to do
warranty and we went around to different
small medium-sized companies mostly
family companies embarrassed again to
make a prototype and that prototype
eventually led us into a partnership
agreement with the UNHCR
and that’s when its own is a very
separate in a very long bumpy story but
that’s what happened
and working with development what we did
when we were you know fresh we were very
idealistic in what we wanted to achieve
we didn’t really think about constraints
and we didn’t think about intellectual
property rights that was not a term that
I knew at the time and I came to be
painfully family we didn’t name IP or
intellectual property rights it took us
six months to develop a prototype that
the UN said okay we would like to we
would want this and if it works we will
potentially like to scale it and when
that happened all of these family
businesses and some of big sized
companies we have been working with in
Darnley everybody did own the idea and
it was you know and then we was fighting
starting and the UN say that we want to
buy it from open-source because we
wanted to benefit the many so what we
learned from here and it took us nine
months to resolve this IP issue compared
to six months of developing a prototype
and our legal extensive they were as
high as they are any expenses that we
have had so I think my advice for NW
starting out in this is to do ensure to
have an IP policy when you set out
resolve these issues there’s no problem
with IP in the beginning when you’re
having no interest but when you’re
getting a commercial interest that will
bite you in the back and that happens to
us and it did set us back you and we now
have a very I think we have a good
agreement with you in HR that offers a
win to UNHCR we are it offers a win to
the refugees its offer also win for our
suppliers we have found a model but it
took me some time to get there the other
issue is time you know the perception of
time in the UN headquarters in
is very different of the perception of
time in in Vance Pro advanced Proheat
reforming you know it’s very very
different and expectations are our
difference and I think for good reasons
because what the UNH are doing I mean
they’re caring about the refugees the
people are helping that’s the that’s
their core business not and it should
not mean it’s not you know the small
innovation project that we are running
in Sweden this is it so and also in UNH
you’re for good reasons they have to be
very prudent about how they make
decisions it’s not one woman or man who
can file decision it needs to be
together and there are all of these
requirements on decision making which
takes time this has led us to one
problem is that a lot of the small and
mid-sized companies we worked with
initially they couldn’t afford to stay
within this long journey because it took
too long time to move forward and only I
think the bigger supplier that had more
muscle actually could manage swedish
which i think is a shame because it was
these small companies that in beginning
that made the innovation that the basic
i would say 80% of our solution and i
think the solution i mean to this going
forward is of course if you’re a small
company be mindful of the time it takes
but also if you’re unitary organization
or a donor organization I think it’s
very wise to have some part of your
funding a percent to two percent for
innovation that should be able to be
released on basically a fast-track basis
for promising initiatives and that
doesn’t need to be innovation on
products that can be in programs in
anything but you need to have some
agility their third learning I think we
have had is language we have been
working with Swiss plastic engineers in
how to develop a material that would
withstand the Sun in the desert and
getting them the Swiss engineers to
understand the requirements in the
desert out this is in Botswana and to
understand those requirements there is
no international humanitarian standard
like we have big nods coder building
codes in Sweden and how we resolve this
was to work a lot with prototypes we
have our designers and our developers
including myself we have spent a lot of
time in the field to work with refugees
to work with shelter practitioners and
to learn and we try to translate this
knowledge you know into standard that
our suppliers can understand and that
has been very critical for us and I
think it would be impossible if you will
have been working on a sort of doing
basis like we’re about to achieve a
standard by discussions and talking I’ve
seen these initiatives and they rarely
do work in this context it is a lot by
doing and learning together and final
learning is failure all innovation
includes some degree of failure and that
is what we must embrace that what we
must learn from this is from da lado in
Ethiopia on the border to Somalia where
we did the first prototypes when we came
back after three and six months people
were starting to mount our wall panels
upside down so all the windows were
tilting down and of course we were why
are you doing that you’re ruining our
design there were so as you well I mean
your design it’s way too hot for this
climate so we’re just doing what you
always do we put the windows further
down because you get some fresh air
inside and further mover has some
plastic flooring that no one used
because the mud flooring that they had
was much better because it works as an
air conditioner compared to ours and for
us I think that was just to design it
okay but this is a great learning let’s
integrate that in our design going
forward where is that for for some of
our colleagues in the UN that were seen
as a product failure and that can be
painful because failing in humanitarian
programs can be sensitive towards donors
and also because we’re working with
people who are not here voluntarily and
we need to have a great respect to that
and we are doing our utmost to do all
testing we can in labs separate before
we do it in the field but we have to
embrace some failure and I think this is
also with the humanitarian world I think
have some challenges because many of the
colleagues we are working with their own
short contracts you have a field
contract for one or two year now you’re
rotating contract so if you’re working
with innovation for you know two-year
program you will not be there to harvest
the fruits of your innovation you will
only be held accountable for all the
failures all the windows that have been
mounted upside down that’s what you will
be accountable for so there’s no benefit
in innovation for that and I think that
is a systemic challenge that we have to
work through and the only way we have
been able to do that is really to work
with top management as Howie we can and
to teach people to embrace failure as a
part of an innovation process so I think
that with this said and done what what
we have been through humanitarian
innovation I think it is not the only
but it’s one key element to bridge this
gap that I’ve talked about in beginning
between you know the unitary needs and
the budgets that are available because
if we can do solutions that have a
longer life span that provide the you
know more effective spend of funding
that is what can help us bridge this gap
and to do so I think more of people who
like me are not traditionally work we’re
working in the Unitarian world I think
we have a lot of benefit to ship in we
really can support here and I would
strongly encourage that because we do
always get and all of us the team
working a lot of payback four days in
compassion and in energy when we’re
seeing to work that we have done and
that has driven us and these are show
you a few other sort of stumble blocks
that we have experienced I I hope that
you will be able to you know avoid some
of them should you want to go this way
we are just in the beginning of this
process you know and this is fairly new
not innovation in the sense that
Unitarians new meeting rooms I have
always done innovation and we’re very
good at it but unitary innovation
together with private sector that is
still relatively new and we are learning
a lot and we are really in the beginning
of this so there’s a lot more that can
be done so with that I hope to inspire a
few you and thank you very much
[Applause]
[Music]
hi everyone my name is Joanne and I live
in a van Hagen suburb of Stockholm just
south of Stockholm this is where I’m
having my home I’m living in a classical
Swedish Road house which was built in
the 40s and my kids they go to school
you know one kilometer away from where I
live my work is 15 kilometer away from
there and this is really the place where
I go when I go home when I go to
research you know to relax you know and
to spend time with family and friends
and van Hagen and this didn’t draw dish
that we’re having is of course a very
dear place in a very important place of
my in my professional life I’m working
with and for Refugees and people who are
displaced by conflicts and natural
disasters we are today in the world
having 65 million people displaced a
number that is growing year by year
about 10 million of these people they
are living in temporary settlements in
camps camp like situations and often and
before I started to work in this area I
thought of humanitarian aid as a
temporary measure something to protect
for the short term but average time of a
refugee situation is today almost 20
years and many of the camps where we are
working today refugees have stayed for
years and generations if we are looking
forward and we’re looking at the trends
going back in time or the last ten years
the number are not very encouraging we
can see that the humanitarian needs they
grow years by years when I started to
work in health wash with this there were
some 42 million people displaced now at
65 million less than eight years after
so the
needs to grow but the budgets the
humanitarian budgets the bodies are
available to aid these people they are
not growing in the same pace and that
leads us with a funding gap that we
cannot really help the amount of people
that we would like to support and seeing
this is of course it’s it’s makes I
think any one of its you know sad and
you’re feeling a bit helpless about the
situation what what can we do to change
this I think I’ve had the opportunity I
think that abroad with two opportunities
to work with one I said I have an
opportunity to work a lot with the
United Nations and with NGOs both local
ones and international NGOs seeing the
work that they are doing working with
very very limited resources to helping
people that gives a little comfort and
strength and and it gives sort of some
belief in humanity and the other part of
my job is the benefit that I have is
that I’m also working in spending time
with refugees in camps and often when
you see this development you see the
conflicts you see the natural resources
that are escalating and still what often
when I’m in camps what I’m shocked about
it’s not the hardship that is very
shocking but it’s more that the often
I’m invited for tea I’m invited for
lunch by refugee family who have fled
and left everything and this guest here
from them that has affected me and and
really given me a lot of energy in the
work that I’m doing and my hope here
today is basically to share some of the
lessons learned that we have had
working with Jim eternal innovation and
design some of the obstacles that we
have been through and hopefully I would
like to you know if I could inspire some
of you to venture into this area because
this has been a fantastic journey for me
myself and for our company so very short
I’m not here to talk about our product
today you can see it here it’s a very
simple product it’s a house that you
assemble you know you ship it in a flat
box
a piece of Ikea furniture you assemble
it on-site with anything without any
tools you know compared to many
emergency situation it lasts for three
years it can also be integrated into
transitional shelter program so you can
extend the lifespan and Link the
emergency that you’re having here more
to more development aid so that’s that’s
about what we’re doing but here today I
would like to tell you about the pro
system we have been through and some of
the lessons learned and what I’ve learn
about that even though I’m a product
designer trainers cons you know by
training I would love to tell you all
about you know the product and how
fantastic it is it’s not the product
that I’ve made our project work I think
what has made our project work is that
we have had the opportunity to work with
amazing people that really have
supported us throughout our journey and
we have had been driven by a great
compassion all of us in the team and all
our partners both in private secretary
material sectors have contributed with a
lot of energy to our project so since
2015 we have deployed more than 16,000
shelters we are partners with IKEA
Foundation and the UNHCR and looking at
this is retrospect I think people you
know we often tend to think that this
has been quite a smooth ride that we
have been in for because we are having
these great partners that we are working
with it has been everything but a smooth
ride I will ensure you that the project
started in 2008 when I was called by
Penta saponin who was the politician in
hell laughs oh Sh
embarrass login in Sweden and had his
Foreman shoes you know where which was
an initiative to promote sustainable
design and also was initiative to see
how sustainable site could help hel
lavash as a community to find a new
meaning you know now when sort of the
mining is close to moved away from
health wash and it told me that hey we
had this project we made a figure bow
tie and it was good but we didn’t manage
to you know get the manufactured it was
no business out of it but we thought it
was this tsunami now
this was in 2005 so maybe we could use
them for emergency shelters and I
thought okay I’d be happy to to work
with you on such a project idea but I
don’t know anything about you ten eight
so but it sounds interesting started to
work from there
my mom my first initiative was like me I
need to understand what are these people
going through and we didn’t have any
budget for this this was a very scarce
uh budget and a part-time employment I
had a telephone so what we did was that
we went to Fisk seta and a librarian
there who supported us to get encounter
with the Somali community and they came
from Dadaab which is a big refugee camp
in Kenya with Somali refugees and these
people have been living in these camps
and they told us a lot of stories that
of hardship that I could only imagine
and as a designer I was very shocked
that why are we putting people in a camp
that has been here for twenty years why
are we putting them in in temporary
shelters why can we not mean something
meaningful why can not transfer them to
a durable solution or you know transfer
you know to other countries you know why
are we doing this so that gives a lot of
energy to basically to pursue this
project but again we had the problems
with resources we partner with a few
universities that made prototypes
together with us
none of these prototypes worked but we
got stuff happening we started two
things and what was good about working
in hella for Shanna politicians there is
that they all connected you know even
the Social Democrats and mood wrote and
I you know they have met that all this
you know youth arrangement so they know
each other and and we managed somehow to
get the Minister of Defence the untold
for sure you know we moved a lot and
pent it was a social democrat but he
managed to get him there we got national
media to cover this and all of a sudden
people think ok but they have you know
they have a project there to have a good
product we didn’t have a products at
that time but it was enough for us to
get the connection to Ikea and to say
that okay let’s let’s you know and we
asked him you should do this project you
know we have done some ideas but you
should do this and I can’t no this is
not our business idea we’re doing what’s
inside the four walls we’re not doing
the walls but go and talk to our
philanthropic foundation IKEA foundation
with we started talking with them we get
a small project we started to do
warranty and we went around to different
small medium-sized companies mostly
family companies embarrassed again to
make a prototype and that prototype
eventually led us into a partnership
agreement with the UNHCR
and that’s when its own is a very
separate in a very long bumpy story but
that’s what happened
and working with development what we did
when we were you know fresh we were very
idealistic in what we wanted to achieve
we didn’t really think about constraints
and we didn’t think about intellectual
property rights that was not a term that
I knew at the time and I came to be
painfully family we didn’t name IP or
intellectual property rights it took us
six months to develop a prototype that
the UN said okay we would like to we
would want this and if it works we will
potentially like to scale it and when
that happened all of these family
businesses and some of big sized
companies we have been working with in
Darnley everybody did own the idea and
it was you know and then we was fighting
starting and the UN say that we want to
buy it from open-source because we
wanted to benefit the many so what we
learned from here and it took us nine
months to resolve this IP issue compared
to six months of developing a prototype
and our legal extensive they were as
high as they are any expenses that we
have had so I think my advice for NW
starting out in this is to do ensure to
have an IP policy when you set out
resolve these issues there’s no problem
with IP in the beginning when you’re
having no interest but when you’re
getting a commercial interest that will
bite you in the back and that happens to
us and it did set us back you and we now
have a very I think we have a good
agreement with you in HR that offers a
win to UNHCR we are it offers a win to
the refugees its offer also win for our
suppliers we have found a model but it
took me some time to get there the other
issue is time you know the perception of
time in the UN headquarters in
is very different of the perception of
time in in Vance Pro advanced Proheat
reforming you know it’s very very
different and expectations are our
difference and I think for good reasons
because what the UNH are doing I mean
they’re caring about the refugees the
people are helping that’s the that’s
their core business not and it should
not mean it’s not you know the small
innovation project that we are running
in Sweden this is it so and also in UNH
you’re for good reasons they have to be
very prudent about how they make
decisions it’s not one woman or man who
can file decision it needs to be
together and there are all of these
requirements on decision making which
takes time this has led us to one
problem is that a lot of the small and
mid-sized companies we worked with
initially they couldn’t afford to stay
within this long journey because it took
too long time to move forward and only I
think the bigger supplier that had more
muscle actually could manage swedish
which i think is a shame because it was
these small companies that in beginning
that made the innovation that the basic
i would say 80% of our solution and i
think the solution i mean to this going
forward is of course if you’re a small
company be mindful of the time it takes
but also if you’re unitary organization
or a donor organization I think it’s
very wise to have some part of your
funding a percent to two percent for
innovation that should be able to be
released on basically a fast-track basis
for promising initiatives and that
doesn’t need to be innovation on
products that can be in programs in
anything but you need to have some
agility their third learning I think we
have had is language we have been
working with Swiss plastic engineers in
how to develop a material that would
withstand the Sun in the desert and
getting them the Swiss engineers to
understand the requirements in the
desert out this is in Botswana and to
understand those requirements there is
no international humanitarian standard
like we have big nods coder building
codes in Sweden and how we resolve this
was to work a lot with prototypes we
have our designers and our developers
including myself we have spent a lot of
time in the field to work with refugees
to work with shelter practitioners and
to learn and we try to translate this
knowledge you know into standard that
our suppliers can understand and that
has been very critical for us and I
think it would be impossible if you will
have been working on a sort of doing
basis like we’re about to achieve a
standard by discussions and talking I’ve
seen these initiatives and they rarely
do work in this context it is a lot by
doing and learning together and final
learning is failure all innovation
includes some degree of failure and that
is what we must embrace that what we
must learn from this is from da lado in
Ethiopia on the border to Somalia where
we did the first prototypes when we came
back after three and six months people
were starting to mount our wall panels
upside down so all the windows were
tilting down and of course we were why
are you doing that you’re ruining our
design there were so as you well I mean
your design it’s way too hot for this
climate so we’re just doing what you
always do we put the windows further
down because you get some fresh air
inside and further mover has some
plastic flooring that no one used
because the mud flooring that they had
was much better because it works as an
air conditioner compared to ours and for
us I think that was just to design it
okay but this is a great learning let’s
integrate that in our design going
forward where is that for for some of
our colleagues in the UN that were seen
as a product failure and that can be
painful because failing in humanitarian
programs can be sensitive towards donors
and also because we’re working with
people who are not here voluntarily and
we need to have a great respect to that
and we are doing our utmost to do all
testing we can in labs separate before
we do it in the field but we have to
embrace some failure and I think this is
also with the humanitarian world I think
have some challenges because many of the
colleagues we are working with their own
short contracts you have a field
contract for one or two year now you’re
rotating contract so if you’re working
with innovation for you know two-year
program you will not be there to harvest
the fruits of your innovation you will
only be held accountable for all the
failures all the windows that have been
mounted upside down that’s what you will
be accountable for so there’s no benefit
in innovation for that and I think that
is a systemic challenge that we have to
work through and the only way we have
been able to do that is really to work
with top management as Howie we can and
to teach people to embrace failure as a
part of an innovation process so I think
that with this said and done what what
we have been through humanitarian
innovation I think it is not the only
but it’s one key element to bridge this
gap that I’ve talked about in beginning
between you know the unitary needs and
the budgets that are available because
if we can do solutions that have a
longer life span that provide the you
know more effective spend of funding
that is what can help us bridge this gap
and to do so I think more of people who
like me are not traditionally work we’re
working in the Unitarian world I think
we have a lot of benefit to ship in we
really can support here and I would
strongly encourage that because we do
always get and all of us the team
working a lot of payback four days in
compassion and in energy when we’re
seeing to work that we have done and
that has driven us and these are show
you a few other sort of stumble blocks
that we have experienced I I hope that
you will be able to you know avoid some
of them should you want to go this way
we are just in the beginning of this
process you know and this is fairly new
not innovation in the sense that
Unitarians new meeting rooms I have
always done innovation and we’re very
good at it but unitary innovation
together with private sector that is
still relatively new and we are learning
a lot and we are really in the beginning
of this so there’s a lot more that can
be done so with that I hope to inspire a
few you and thank you very much
[Applause]
[Music]
Please follow and like us: