The Ikea effect - Why do we value things we build more than things we don’t?
In the 1950s General Mills introduced instant cake mixes. All you had to do was add water, pour the batter into a pan, and bake. You could bake a perfect cake in minutes. Their research and focus groups had predicted it would be an instant hit.
But sales soon plateaued.
Confused, General Mills brought in psychologists to understand why.
Their insight? The process was too easy.
Baking the cake felt impersonal. There was no sense of effort or ownership. People didn’t feel like they had made something; they felt like they had just reheated it.
The Fix: They removed powdered eggs from the mix, so bakers had to crack a real egg and mix it in themselves.
And here’s the extra clever bit - they also marketed it with icing and layers, so the cake mix became part of an intricate creation. A creation that their customers designed and built themselves.
Cake mix sales took off.
People don’t just want things done for them - they want to feel they did it themselves.
When you contribute to creating something, you value it more. Nowadays, it is known as “The Ikea effect”
The IKEA effect is a cognitive bias where people place disproportionately high value on things they build or contribute to themselves, even if the result is imperfect or effortful.
LABEL: People value furniture they’ve built (even if it is built badly), higher than furniture they haven’t.
Why the IKEA effect matters in leadership and the workplace
Involvement drives ownership. If you let people co-create, they’ll be more engaged in the outcome. Just telling people what to do often leads to lower levels of engagement.
Leveraging the IKEA effect to create better wellbeing policies
Most companies send out employee engagement surveys. They get the results, management interprets them and then a number of well-intentioned policies are rolled out to combat the areas of low engagement. Usually, to the surprise of the management team, they have little or no effect.
Companies who involve their teams in the process:
Create action plans much more aligned with their employees´ actual needs and
See much higher levels of engagement in any policy changes
Why?
Employees give context and meaning to the survey results
As employees are involved in the process, they are much more invested in the outcome
Vibrant Talent is a great example of how to put this into practice. As part of their Vibrant Workplace programme, they run engagement surveys and then create “Mooqis”, small groups within each team that help shape team and company wellbeing policies.
Tip of the week
Next time you have to decide a policy / procedure that will affect your team. Ask them to contribute. The more they are involved, the more engaged they will be in the outcome.
Remember how proud you were of that first IKEA shelf you put together all those years ago? That’s how your team will feel, if they get to help in major company decisions.
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