Appendix E: Interview transcripts

Appendix E: Interview transcripts

(Master Thesis)

(Designing for the FutureIntegrating sustainability into the design process of Electrolux ) (Elias Kronberg & Charlotte Lftman)

(Division of Machine Design Department of Design SciencesFaculty of Engineering LTH Lund University 2015)

(Integrating sustainability into the design process of Electrolux )Designing for the Future

Elias Kronberg & Charlotte Lftman

Division of Machine Design Department of Design Sciences

Faculty of Engineering LTH Lund University 2015

Division of Machine Design, Department of Design SciencesFaculty of Engineering LTH, Lund UniversityP.O. Box 118SE221 00 LundSweden

ISRN LUTMDN/TMKT 15/5534 SE

Preface

We wish to thank the following people for their involvement, advice and encouragement over the course of this project.

Lars Erikson for giving us the opportunity to get to know Electrolux Group Design and for his valuable input.

Dr. Mrten Karlsson and Prof. Olaf Diegel for their help and guidance as supervisors.

Prof. Conrad Luttropp and Mrs. Charlotta Szczepanowski for sharing their knowledge and experiences.

Josefin Jderberg, Victor Cronsby and Mathilda Wibom for their invaluable friendships, motivational encouragement and feedback.

Finally we also wish to thank all employees at Electrolux Group Design. Without their enthusiasm and input this project would not have been possible to do. A special thank you to the employees who let themselves be interviewed.

Stockholm, June 2015

Elias Kronberg & Charlotte Lftman

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Abstract

The purpose of this paper was to research how environmental concerns and sustainable thinking could be integrated into the design process of Electrolux, a Swedish home appliance manufacturer. The research will hopefully help the Electrolux industrial design department improve in the area and prove as a good case study for other companies or academic institutions.

Electrolux conducts much research aiming to optimize energy usage of its products. The industrial design department, however, is not involved in the work to improve environmental performance of said products. The focus of the project was to investigate if the industrial design department of Electrolux could contribute to this work, and if so, how this should be done.

The research was conducted through a literature survey, informal interviews, review of internal documents, an employee survey and in-depth semi structured interviews.

It was found that the employees of the department generally were positive to the idea of integrating environmental concerns into their work, but that there was a clear lack of knowledge in relevant fields to do so. To successfully integrate such concerns the highest priority should be education of employees with respect to their different work roles and tasks. Setting up common goals with strategies and milestones for reaching them was also found to be of great importance, as was communication of the initiatives taken to other parts of the organization. Using innovation as a means for motivating sustainable thinking was also found to be a key aspect for success.

In the light of the findings a set of recommendations were suggested, starting off with a new mission for the design department:

Use sustainability as a driver for design innovation to explore new business opportunities and support Electrolux global sustainability agenda.

The strategic guidelines suggested to accomplish the new mission were

Increase knowledge of sustainability and eco-design among employees

Use research as a means to improve innovative sustainable thinking

Increase collaboration across Electrolux departments

Commonly document sustainable findings, ideas and solutions

Suitable short and long term actions for how these strategies can be realised were also suggested.

Keywords: Sustainability, industrial design, eco-design, Electrolux, home appliances

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Sammanfattning

Syftet med den hr studien var att underska hur miljaspekter och hllbart tnkande kan integreras i designprocessen hos Electrolux, ett svenskt fretag som tillverkar hushllsmaskiner. Resultatet kan frhoppningsvis ge Electrolux industridesignavdelning en bra utgngspunkt fr frbttring inom dessa omrden och samtidigt fungera som en bra fallstudie fr andra fretag med liknande ambitioner eller inom den akademiska vrlden.

Electrolux innehar en ledarroll i miljinitiativ inom branschen och lgger mycket resurser p forskning kring hur deras produkter kan bli mer miljvnliga. I frsta hand r det energifrbrukning under anvndarfasen som man frsker minimera d detta str fr det mesta av produkternas miljpverkan. Industridesignavdelningen r i dagslget inte delaktig i arbetet med att frbttra Electrolux produkter ur miljsynpunkt. Projektets fokus lg drfr kring att utreda om det finns mjlighet fr designavdelningen att bidra till detta arbete, och om s r fallet p vilket stt detta ska gras.

Genomfrandet av studien brjade med en litteraturunderskning dr bcker och vetenskapliga artiklar inom relevanta omrden lstes. Framfrallt hllbar utveckling och miljanpassad design var tv koncept som utforskades. En inledande studie av designavdelningens aktiviteter samt Electrolux miljinitiativ utfrdes ocks genom informella intervjuer med nyckelpersoner och genomgng av interna dokument. Denna fljdes av en webb-baserad enkt vars syfte var att klargra de anstlldas kunskap, instllning och inflytande inom hllbarhet och miljfrgor. Baserat p resultatet frn enkten hlls sedan djupintervjuer med nyckelpersoner inom avdelningen. Intervjuernas syfte var att f en frdjupad kunskap om designprocessen och dess utmaningar, samt belysa vad som motiverar de anstllda och vilka miljinitiativ som kan vara lmpliga att genomfra. Upptckterna som gjordes analyserades och utgjorde grunden fr ett antal slutsatser som drogs. Utifrn slutsatserna och med std frn litteraturunderskningen togs en lista med rekommendationer fr avdelningen fram.

Det framgick frn studien att kunskap inom hllbarhet och miljfrgor, framfrallt med avseende p Electrolux egna initiativ, var mycket begrnsad hos de anstllda p designavdelningen. Trots detta fanns det en tydlig positiv instllning till mnet och mycket entusiasm riktad mot studien uttrycktes till frfattarna. Bristen p kunskap ansgs vara det strsta hindret mot en lyckad integrering av miljaspekter och sledes ansgs utbildning av personalen med hnsyn till deras olika roller och arbetsuppgifter som den viktigaste tgrden. Det uppdagades ven att en gemensam mlbild med tillhrande strategier och milstolpar r av stor betydelse fr att lyckas med integrationen. Kommunikation av initiativ till andra avdelningar r ocks av stor betydelse d frndringar hos designavdelningen i det lnga loppet kan komma att pverka andra avdelningar. Innovation upptcktes vara en stor motivationsklla fr designers p avdelningen och en nyckelaspekt fr att stimulera miljanpassad design.

Baserat p fynden som gjordes och den teoretiska grunden inhmtad frn litteraturskningen freslogs ett antal rekommendationer. P organisatorisk niv freslogs en ny grunduppgift fr designavdelningnen:

Att anvnda hllbarhet som drivkraft fr designinnovation fr att utforska nya affrsmjigheter och samtidigt stdja Electrolux globala hllbarhetsagenda

Fr att utfra denna uppgift freslogs fljande strategiska riktlinjer

ka kunskapen inom hllbarhet och miljanpassade design hos avdelningens anstllda.

Anvnd forskningsarbete som ett stt att frbttra hllbart tnkande p avdelningen

Frmja samarbeten med andra avdelningar

Dokumentera ider, lsningar och erfarenheter inom milj och hllbarhet gemensamt p avdelningen

tgrder fr att realisera dessa strategier frelsogs p kort och lngs sikt. Kortsiktiga tgrder innefattade

Utbilda personalen p lmpliga stt. Frelsningar, workshops, studiebesk och benchmarking av konkurrenter och andra fretag r frslag p lmpliga stt.

Fokusera olika arbetsroller p olika omrden. Exempelvis br industridesigners frdjupa sig i produkternas livscykler fr att frst hur produkterna de ritar tillverkas, anvnds och grs av med.

Integrera hllbarhet och miljaspekter i styrdokument. Inom produktutvecklingsprocessen anvnds idag flera olika dokument som reglerar ett projekt. I dessa finns goda mjligheter att utka frgestllningar relaterade till milj och hllbarhet.

Skapa en plattform fr spridning och delning av information. Plattformen ska vara tillgnglig fr alla anstllda.

Lngsiktiga tgrder

Skapa en ny yrkesroll p avdelningen, an ansvarig fr milj- och hllbarhetsfrgor.

ka avdelningens forskningsprojekt med inriktning p hllbarhet och milj

Skapa en vision av hur designavdelningen verkar i ett hllbart samhlle och hur Electrolux produkter genererar inkomst dr.

Utred miljpverkan frn Electrolux designstudios.

Table of Contents

1 Introduction9

1.1 Background9

1.2 Aims10

1.3 Demarcations10

2 Method11

2.1 Overview11

2.2 Literature survey12

2.2.1 Internal12

2.2.2 External12

2.3 Informal interviews12

2.4 Web-based survey13

2.5 Semi structured interviews13

2.6 SWOT-analysis15

3 Literature survey17

3.1 The earth and its resources17

3.2 Sustainable development18

3.2.1 Design and the environment19

3.2.2 Life-cycle thinking20

3.2.3 Eco-design21

3.3 Reasons for being an environmentally sustainable company21

3.3.1 Policy-makers: Laws and regulations22

3.3.2 Certifications23

3.3.3 Market23

3.4 Eco-design in practice25

3.4.1 Implementation in the process25

3.4.2 Implementations in the product31

4 Findings35

4.1 Electrolux35

4.1.1 Global Sustainability strategy36

4.2 Electrolux Group Design39

4.2.1 Product categories39

4.2.2 Competences39

4.2.3 Strategy at EGD40

4.3 The product innovation process41

4.4 The Design process43

4.4.1 Pre Development43

4.4.2 Design in the different product categories43

4.4.3 Design work in the different functions44

4.5 Current state of sustainability on EGD today45

4.5.1 SWOT46

4.6 Conclusions from findings55

5 Recommendations57

5.1 EGD sustainability mission57

5.2 The EGD sustainability strategy57

5.3 Action plan57

5.3.1 Short term57

5.3.2 Long term actions61

6 Epilogue63

6.1 Epilogue63

7 References65

Appendix A : Project Plan69

A.1 Reflection on the project progression69

A.2 Estimated time plan71

A.3 Actual project progression72

Appendix B : Web Survey73

Appendix C : Interview guide81

Appendix D : Survey results85

Introduction

The following chapter presents the background, aims and demarcations for the project

Background

Electrolux is one of the worlds leading home appliance companies. Their presence is global through different subsidiaries and recently it acquired the American company General Electric, further strengthening their position. Electrolux is based out of Sweden with its headquarters situated in Stockholm. As a socially conscious enterprise Electrolux is pushing for sustainability [1]. The vision of Electrolux is to be the best appliance company in the world as measured by customer, employees and stakeholders. CEO Keith McLoughlin has stated that this also means that Electrolux should be the sustainability leader of the industry. Sustainable development has been defined by UN in the report Our common future as following

Sustainable development is development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs [2].

Electrolux management has developed a global strategy for how sustainability should be improved. At Electrolux Group Design (EGD), the industrial design department of Electrolux, leadership feels the need to investigate how sustainability relates to the activities of the department and what benefits could be gained from improving sustainability. EGD is responsible for designing the physical shape, user interfaces and graphics of all Electrolux products. It consists of 9 offices situated around the world with a total of about 200 employees. Most of which are industrial desginers, but there are also experts within special areas. Decisions taken by these will affect the entire life-cycles of the products designed which is why the study is relevant for EGD.

The purpose of this paper was to research how environmental concerns and sustainable thinking could be integrated into the design process of EGD. The intention is to help EGD improve its operations within this area and as a result support the Electrolux vision to be the sustainability leader of the industry. Expected benefits of this will be . The project may also prove as a good case study in the topic for academic purposes.

1.1 Aims

The aims of this project are to

Clarify EGD employees' general viewpoint regarding sustainability aspects and issues, both personal and professional.

Map today's design process, both in theory and practice.

Interpret findings into a sustainable design strategy

Suggest an action plan describing how EGD can reach the sustainability strategy proposed.

1.2 Demarcations

This study is limited to the global design team of Electrolux, with focus on the main department in Stockholm. To be more specific the global teams were given an opportunity to provide the more general information and more detailed information was acquired from key employees at the headquarter. To get the bigger picture of sustainability initiatives and strategies at Electrolux the department for sustainability, Sustainable Affairs (SA), was consulted to some extent.

The area of research is sustainable development, with special focus on the ecological aspect. However, the ecological aspect cannot be totally isolated from the other parts of sustainability. The ecological area is also in closest relation with the education of the authors, which is focused on design and construction.

The thesis will focus on the strategic management level of how to integrate sustainability at the EGD department, revolving around operational implementations in the design process. Specific products and their environmental impacts were not investigated, nor were the impacts of daily work in the design studio.

This study was carried out specifically for Electrolux and cannot be generally applied to similar companies. This due to the link between the specific EGD design process and the findings from literature. The method and the findings, however, can possibly be used to investigate the area of sustainability in other companies.

The study was carried out during the spring of 2015 over a period of 20 weeks. No follow-up investigation was carried out.

3 Introduction

3 Chapter heading

Method

This chapter describes and motivates the work process and the research methods used in the project.

Overview

The project was planned according to a Gantt time-plan. In appendix A the planned progression of the project versus the actual time used can be found.

The research started with two parallel activities, a literature survey and informal interviews. These activities acted as a pre study to get a broad picture of sustainability and the company, which helped narrowing down the scope. It is important with pre-understanding in the area to be able to later on understand and analyze the data collected [3].

It was then decided to use a mixed method of research for data collection. A mixed method uses both quantitative and qualitative data collection [4]. The advantage of mixing these methods are that the quantitative part makes a general observation of a population while the qualitative part provides a more profound understanding of the problem, providing a wider base for drawing conclusions [5].

The quantitative part of the research was performed through a web-based survey and the qualitative part from semi-structured interviews with key employees of EGD.

All important findings were then summarized in a SWOT-analysis. Conclusions and recommendations based on the findings were then drawn and suggested.

Figure 2.1: Activities of the project

1.3 Literature survey 1.3.1 Internal

The Electrolux 2014 annual report and web page was studied to learn about the business of Electrolux. A lot of information on sustainability initiatives and strategies was found in this material. During the course of the project the 2014 annual report was released. The information gathered was therefore reviewed and changed if there were any major differences in the reports.

EGD introduction material was reviewed to get an overview of EGDs activities, the department, current general strategies, vision and mission . The process was carefully studied through the common brochure, Innovation Activation. This brochure contains the product development process communicated internally to all parts of the organisation, especially the ones involved in the process. To go in-depths in the process practical tools and documents were studied.

1.3.2 External

A literature survey was conducted within the area of sustainability. Starting out, the focus was broad and intended to educate the authors on the general principles of sustainable thinking and development. As the survey progressed its boundaries were narrowed down to sustainable development strategies, ecological design and articles on practical means to implement environmental concerns into design processes.

The broader knowledge was acquired through published books and for the more in-depth topics current scientific articles were reviewed. Most articles were found by using Google Scholar [6], a tool for searching for scientific papers.

1.4 Informal interviews

Parallel with the literature study informal interviews were held with key employees. The questions were also dependent on the person interviewed. From these talks much was learned regarding overall sustainability work at Electrolux, the product development process as well as other useful information about EGD. The talks were held with two design managers, for the information about EGD, and two representatives from Electrolux sustainability office, SA, for information regarding sustainability in the organization.

Two informal interviews were held to deepen the knowledge of the subjects and a more academic view on the complexity of sustainability. Conrad Luttropp, professor in eco-design at the Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm, provided valuable input to the theoretical base of the research. Charlotta Szczepanowski, sustainability officer of Riksbyggen AB, came with practical tips for how an organization can be more sustainable.

1.5 Web-based survey

When the theoretical base for the project was set a survey for the design department was constructed. The survey was intended to provide information on the current state of knowledge, attitude and influence regarding sustainability of the employees at the design department. The survey was created in Google Forms, a tool provided by Google to create forms of different kinds [8], and distributed to all design offices of Electrolux situated around the world. Basic questions were followed by questions regarding the earlier mentioned themes;

Knowledge

Attitude

Influence

181 employees were given the opportunity to participate. 98 of these took the survey. The answering rate slightly over 50% was not ideal, but considered adequate by Electrolux. It was brought to attention that employees situated in China was not able to participate due to censorship. The survey was anonymous hopefully providing more trustworthy answers in socially conscious questions. The questions were mainly in a scale format where participant was given a question or statement and asked to state his or her position. The scale had two extreme statements and an answering range from 1 to 5. For example 1 could be I fully disagree and 5 could stand for I fully agree. The survey in its entirety is found in appendix B. Before sending out the survey it was tested in a pilot study. Primarily to discover any uncertainties regarding the questions asked, but also to determine how much time the participants would need for completing the survey. To begin with the departments got one week to fill out the survey. This time limit was later on pushed forward due to a slow answering rate. The answers were later on compiled in diagrams to get a good overview. The average score of all scale questions were calculated for the answers to be easily compared. Starting out, the areas were analyzed separately. Later on links between different results were investigated. The result of the survey was analyzed and important conclusions were used to construct a protocol for deeper qualitative interviews.

1.6 Semi structured interviews

Semi structured interviews are often held with one person at a time searching for attitudes, feelings and experiences of the interviewee [3]. In this case 8 employees at the design department were chosen to be interviewed. The employees represented different roles to get a broad understanding of the work done at the department and ranged from management level to different types of design specialists.

Figure 2.2: Schedule showing the participants in the semi structured interviews. Area of focus and work role. ID = Industrial designer, CMF = Color material and finish, UI = User interaction.

The same questions were asked to all the interviewees. Depending on the progression of the interview follow-up questions were asked to further clarify interesting findings.

To give the interview a clearer structure an interview guide was constructed. The interview guide can be found in appendix C. The main purpose was to better understand how the design process varies in the different functions within EGD, but also get a deeper perspective of the interviewees position on sustainability. Based on the insights gained from the survey the interview guide held questions across four themes;

Design process

Challenges

Motivation and inspiration

Initiatives

The interview guide also contained criteria for the persons interviewed, tips on how to interview and rules for transcribing. Each interview was approximately 1 hour and was held at the Electrolux head quarter. The people interviewed were chosen by the department management and section managers from the criteria provided in the interview guide. The interviews were then transcribed word for word and analyzed by comparing the answers from each question.

1.7 SWOT-analysis

To summarize and interpret important findings strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats related to the entire study were identified. SWOT-analysis is a strategic method for evaluating these themes. Strengths and weaknesses were tied to internal factors of EGD, and opportunities and threats related to external forces. From these findings conclusions were drawn and recommendations addressing them suggested.

2 Method

2 Method

Literature survey

This chapter serves as the theoretical base for the project. Starting from a broad perspective on sustainability it goes over the basics and narrows down to more practical aspects of integrating sustainability into design.

1.8 The earth and its resources

For a long time the earth seemed like an infinite well of resources where anyone ambitious enough could take what they needed and turn a profit. The earth was also regarded as a universal waste bin where everything unwanted could be disposed of with no consequence. At the end of the 20th century the grim reality of what the last hundred years of consumerism had done to the planet became clear to the west. Pollution, deforestation and climate change are all results of mankinds successful conquest of the earth culminating with the industrial revolution.

The start of the industrial revolution marked a new chapter in history. Suddenly the speed which natural resources could be harvested by increased above the regenerative ability of the earth. This problem can be clarified by looking at our planet in separate layers. The outermost layer is the atmosphere which consists of the air and other gases that surround the earths surface. The surface of the earth consists of two layers. The hydrosphere, the water in our lakes, rivers and oceans which cover two thirds of the surface, and the biosphere which is all the organic material of our planet. The earths crust represents the lithosphere from where minerals, metals and fossil fuels are extracted. These layers contain all the planets resources and becomes the storage for all of our waste. The resources we use are refined and shortly afterwards becomes waste due to our societys consuming lifestyle. Especially materials harvested from the lithosphere end up as waste in the other three layers in a fraction of the time it took for the earth to create them in the first place. Naturally it is impossible for the earth to balance out these rapid changes at the same rate at which they are occurring. To put this in perspective it would take two additional earths to provide the entire worlds population with the western lifestyle [9]. It is a fact that we cannot continue consuming in this pattern. Globally we need to start thinking in terms of sustainable development.

1.9 Sustainable development

Stated by the United Nations in 1987s Our common future, also known as the Brundtland Report, is the global definition of sustainable development:

Sustainable development is development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs [2].

Furthermore there are, according to the integrational perspective, three categories of concern in sustainable development: economic prosperity, environmental quality and social equity [10]. These areas can sometimes be in conflict with each other, making the question of sustainability complex [11]. Take a manufacturing company for example. For it to be sustainable in every category compromises must be made. To be environmentally sustainable it has to spend money on, perhaps, green energy and recycled materials. To be socially sustainable labor conditions must be good. These actions may reduce the profitability of the company and will therefore be in conflict with economic sustainability. This complexity is often described by overlapping circles in the Venn diagram. The overlapping areas are the interaction parts of each sustainability category and the middle area symbolizes total integration of sustainability.

Figure 3.1: Description of sustainable development through a Venn-diagram. Economy, society and environment are linked together making the question of sustainability complex.

Although all categories are equally important to maintain a sustainable development it is argued that the economic and social activities must be considered in a large environmental sphere of influence [12].

Figure 3.2: It is argued that economy and society must be considered in an environmental sphere of influence for sustainability to be maintained.

1.9.1 Design and the environment

Natural resources are refined and used to create artefacts. An artefact is defined as an object made or given shape by man. Put in another way, an artefact is an object designed by man. In todays society we usually talk about products. A product can be both a good or a service. All products are made with, or make use of, material from the earths different spheres and therefore all have an impact on the environment. The link between designing of a product and a relative impact on the environment is by this logic, very clear. Choices made by designers throughout history have affected and will affect the world in the future since all products made by man somehow must decompose and return to the earth. A big issue in our society is the lack of perspective on products consumed today. We tend to see what is right in front of us in terms of products and their effects on the environment. What most of us do not know is that a vast amount of resources are consumed when a product is created, far beyond the materials ending up in the actual object. Cohen and Kennedy estimates that 90 percent of materials used in the creation of a product end up as waste[13]. This number is of course an estimation and surely varies for different products, but it is nonetheless an eye opener for most people. Take a vacuum cleaner for example. To fully understand how this object affects our environment one must understand how all events in its life-cycle have their individual impacts. Ranging from the energy used to manufacture its plastic components to the particles released during use, everything will leave a mark. When it becomes clear that design has such a great influence on products environmental impacts, one realises the power that is tied to it. Not only does design determine the shape and material of a product but also influence how the consumer relates to it and uses it. Seeing the big picture and knowing the origins of materials in the products we consume is therefore essential knowledge if we want to achieve sustainable development.

1.9.2 Life-cycle thinking

The life-cycle of any given product can be divided into different phases. Environmental impacts in each phase can be traced back to decision taken in the design process. Generally speaking there are four phases: raw material extraction, manufacture, use and end-of-life.

Figure 3.3: The four phases in a product's lifecycle.

In the first phase, raw material extraction, necessary material for creating the product is acquired from the earth. To do so energy and material are consumed adding to the environmental footprint of the material extracted. Next comes the manufacturing stage. Here the materials are refined and assembled into the finished product. The product is then distributed to consumers for the use stage. This phase can either have a very significant impact or almost a negligible one. An electrical device has arguably its largest environmental impact in the use phase. A chair, in contrast, has practically no impact in this phase at all.

When the product has reached the end of its functional, technical or aesthetic life the final phase begins, end-of-life. This phase determines what happens to the material when the product has served its purpose. Disposal is common and means that the material has no further value, it is considered to be waste and stored in landfills or incinerated. There are, however, many ways to utilize the materials in a product at the end of its useful life. Parts and materials can be reused or recycled to different extents. Usually material that is recycled have a lower quality than the original material because it can be hard to separate materials from each other. After a finite number of cycles the materials quality will be too low to use and disposed of. This is sometimes referred to as down-cycling, implying the deterioration of the materials quality [9]. Opposite of down-cycling is the concept of up-cycling. The idea is that recycling a material should enhance its quality and concentration making it recyclable indefinitely. McDonough and Braumgart closely examines how this can be realised in their book Cradle to Cradle - Reinventing the way we make things. In short the book discusses a new way of looking at recycling of materials. The authors suggest that materials we consume should be divided into a biological and technological cycle. When a product reaches its end of life its materials should be easily separated, the biological ones returned to their proper places in the environment and the technological ones reused for new products [14].

1.9.3 Eco-design

The idea of considering the entire life-cycle of a product when designing it evolved from green design. In green design the environment would be considered in single aspects such as substituting virgin material with recycled. Eco-design goes further and considers a product as a part of a system where each phase of the products life-cycle affect the environment [15]. The design outcome is thus intended to have the least harmful effect possible on the environment. That being said, eco-design is not achieved overnight and is not something that has a clear goal. One has to start with an existing design process and evaluate it along with the products it should produce. Eventually a higher grade of environmental sustainability can be reached. There are, as of today, a great number of tools and strategies for this purpose to be found in literature. They have, however, a highly individual level of applicability for different companies. Implementing eco-design in a company does not only mean better environmental performance in the products. It will in the long run extend consumer benefits and economic performance [27].

1.10 Reasons for being an environmentally sustainable company

It can be argued that every companys main reason for existence is profit. As mentioned earlier economic sustainability seems, at a glance, to be in direct conflict with acting responsibly in social and environmental matters. Looking deeper many companies have realised that a strong link between competitiveness and environmental responsibility exists [16]. External and internal forces are demanding increased environmental performance from manufacturing companies. These include investors, consumers, employees, organisations, competitors and policy-makers. New customer needs and tougher environmental legislation force companies to push innovation further or fall behind. Eco-design innovations can provide benefits such as:

Cost-cutting. Energy and waste management, among other things, can be expensive for a manufacturing company which is why financial motives can be the reason for eco performance.

Market opportunities. The opportunity for entering or creating new markets by focusing on eco-products.

Differentiation. A company can seize opportunities by improving the eco-performance of its products, and thus offer more to the consumers than competitors.

Image branding. Showing the world that you are responsible means good PR and may have positive effects on business.

These benefits are included in a framework for helping managers how to decide on environmental strategies, developed by Orsato [17]. It was created for the purpose of showing that a well crafted environmental strategy can lead to great competitive advantages.

The gap between theory and practice is not always easy to close. Short-term, companies must react to new regulations and customer needs. Long-term the challenge is greater because a pursuit of sustainability will probably result in changes in functions across the entire company.

1.10.1 Policy-makers: Laws and regulations

Regulations are set to ensure that companies take responsibility for their activities. Since the philosophy of many companies is just to live up to environmental legislation, the importance of policies is naturally great.

In Europe, for instance, the European Union has set laws and regulations regarding products and product development. These regulations are mainly focusing on materials and resource regulations. In the directives given companies are pushed to find sustainable alternatives to exhaustible materials, minimize chemicals and hazardous substances together with product responsibility in the end of life phase. As well as enforcing policies the EU has set up a program for labeling electrical and water-consuming products. The labeling is intended to show the potential environmental impacts of the products during their use phase. In conclusion regulations are leading the companies in the right direction and labeling is helping consumers make an informed choice.

The most notable directives related to home appliances are

The ROHS directive, a directive for restriction of hazardous substances in electronic devices and equipments [18].

The WEEE directive, short for waste of electrical and electronic equipments, has the main reason of ensuring that companies take responsibility for the safe return of their products into the environment [19].

The REACH-directive aims to improve the environmental and human impact of chemicals through the four processes: registration, evaluation, authorization and restriction [20].

1.10.2 Certifications

As a response to legislation the industry have developed its own environmental standards. Having a standards of its own can simplify compliance and guide companies to better environmental performance, as well as improving their image. The ISO 14001 is such a standard. Internationally accepted it is a standard for environmental management intended to reduce an entire companys environmental footprint [21].

1.10.3 Market

Besides legislation the market itself is a driver for influencing companies strategic directions. Major forces affecting the market are trends, consumers and competitors.

Understanding the changes outside the market, as well as inside it, is crucial to anticipate what consumers are and will be looking for.

1.10.3.1 Micro and macro trends

There are a lot of trends indicating that an increased concern for the environment is something that companies need to focus on.

One large scale trend supporting this is the worlds growing population. As we are growing in numbers, the resources of the earth will have to be utilized in a more responsible way to fulfill the needs of the world. This is one of the strongest arguments for sustainable development.

Improving conditions for many people is resulting in a growing middle class [22], [23]. These people will all of a sudden be able to consume similarly to westerners who, as stated earlier, are consuming way above a sustainable level.

Climate change and its effects are scientifically proven [24]. Not only are the effects themselves reason enough for pro-environmental initiatives, but as people of the world become more aware of the state of the earth they will probably be more inclined to support companies with environmental profiles.

Globalisation and information technology is constantly making sharing of information quicker and simpler, allowing people to educate themselves in areas such as sustainability.

Lately a demand for organic food products have been rising in Sweden [25]. This can be considered to be a green trend.

1.10.3.2 The consumer

Due to the enormous amount of products that large manufacturing companies bring to the market they have a great responsibility in assuring the quality and function as well as the environmental impact of a product. With that being said consumers role in this should not be forgotten. The big companies are designing for a market where consumers ultimately decide which products will be profitable.

When it was recognized that consumers took an interest in the environment companies have been trying to define what characterizes the green consumer. The first thing that comes to mind to many when asked to define what a green consumer is could be something like a person who bases his or her purchases on the environmental performance of a product or its manufacturer. This definition is true in some cases but the motive for buying green products can vary quite a lot. Apart from environmental motives a green product may be bought for economic or technical reasons, or simply, in the case of food, for the taste.

One thing many green purchases have in common are that they are compromises for the consumer. Increased eco-performance may result in increased production costs or just higher price in general depending what market group is targeted. Paying extra is the most common form of compromise, but there can also be technical ones where eco-performance comes with lower technical performance or consumers having to go to special distribution channels for these products.

The majority of consumers are hopefully concerned for the environment and therefore willing to accept the compromises eco-friendly products may come with [26]. They will, however, only do so if assured that the environmental issues involved are of importance, eco-performance is up to par with competitors and that the purchase will make some sort of material difference for the consumer. Just because a product is marketed as green does not mean that it will be regarded as such by the market. It is hard to measure eco-performance and tell green products from dirty. As a result, products being marketed as eco-friendly can be met with suspicion by consumers, and the companies that make them deemed untrustworthy. The term green washing derives from this and means marketing oneself with an environmental profile but not walking the talk in practice. Companies should be cautious of misleading, intentionally or unintentionally, consumers regarding its eco-performance. They are, ultimately, the ones who decide who is successful and who will fall short [26].

1.10.3.3 Competitors

Keeping up to par with competitors is a good reason to improve environmental initiatives. Through benchmarking and competitor analysis a company can investigate if market shares can be gained by improving environmental performance versus competitors [26].

1.10.3.4 Stakeholders

A companys stakeholders consist of different groups. The most immediate ones can be said to be its shareholders and investors, as they are directly affected by the companys financial performance. But many others are affected indirectly by said company and are therefore regarded as stakeholders too. Customers, suppliers, employees and business partners are just a few that will be affected by a companys actions. They will all, therefore, have influence over the company to different extents. This influence can be used to pressure a company into increasing environmental concerns which is why stakeholders play an important role in improving the sustainability of companies [26]. According to Charlotta Szczpanowski pushing for sustainability can be harder in an incorporated company because of shareholders demands for profit.

1.11 Eco-design in practice

In literature different frameworks for eco-design can be found both relating to the design process and the product itself. Process-related frameworks highlight important activities for improving sustainable thinking within an organization. Product-related frameworks focus more on areas of importance for improving eco-performance of a product. What can be said about these types of frameworks is that they often cannot be directly applied to a companys design process or products. Since most companies have different conditions frameworks will have to be customized to fit their individual needs.

1.11.1 Implementation in the process

Literature states that there is a big gap between the theoretical statements and the daily practice of eco-design. This gap shows that it seems to be easy to talk eco-design and hard to successfully apply it. This can depend on culture and approach differences between industry and academia or lack of testing. Some other aspects can be lack of communication, lack of simplicity and lack of a clear target group [28]. Actual eco-design, on a large scale, will only take place if there is internal knowledge and skills in the area of sustainability, as well as well formulated strategies and goals [28]. By including environmental goals as a primary input in the design process, designers will recognize potential environmental problems early in the design stage and this will influence process decisions regarding material, component selection and disposal techniques [16]. The holistic view is of big importance.

The company must also be willing and able to apply tools and methods of eco-design in the daily work of designers. When starting an implementation of eco-design designers and project managers must be encouraged to an innovative culture regarding environmental questions [27]. In the end it is not harder to succeed with eco-design than succeed with regular product development. It is a matter of time and being willing to adopt. In a couple of years eco-design will most likely be the same as product development [29].

1.11.1.1 Organization

If eco-design is to be implemented it is not only the designers that have to make changes. Almost every part of an organization has a role in realising the products which it distributes. This means that for eco-design to be successful the different branches of the organisation has to work together to improve its products. Design, engineering, marketing and purchasing are a few functions that are directly connected to the environmental performance of a product. If they do not cooperate and communicate well, the resulting product will reflect that.

Some organisations have a special department for environmental questions. Seemingly this is a good way to gather issues and deal with them in one place. It can, however, be argued that such a department takes away the responsibility from the rest of the organisation, which effectively ignores all environmental issues and renders the department toothless [16].

Leadership

Responsible for cross-functional cooperation and communication is mostly top management. It is safe to say that a successful implementation of eco-design therefore relies heavily on its commitment. If top management cannot provide sufficient incentive, structure and motivation for the organisation to act more responsibly towards the environment, it will probably fail to do so [16].

To effectively implement eco-design into the organization management can use the same measures that it does in its usual work. Setting up goals for improvement, monitoring progress and providing feedback are examples of normal management tasks that can support environmental work [30].

The design managers have a key role in eco-design since the designers ca not decide on environmental improvements on their own. When discussing eco-design other aspects must be taken into account, for example economy and legislations. It should also be the manager's role to lift the question to a higher level so it can be put into the business agenda and strategic planning [31].

Knowledge

Environmental competence is essential to succeed with eco-design and the requirement of knowledge is not limited to the designers. It is of importance that all people involved in the design process have their specific competences. To clarify this includes designers, managers and environmental specialists. Designers need basic knowledge in the area of sustainability and according to research a good network with environmental specialists [31]. It is important to understand the environmental impacts to later on be able to do good assessments [27]. It is stated the designers should not be environmental specialists due to the fact that this can minimize the focus on other important parts of the design core. The departments environmental specialist should have profound knowledge in the area together with knowledge in sustainable tools such as LCA, checklists and ISO-standards. The main assignment should be the transformation of environmental requirements into operational design requirements. This should be done with a connection to economics, legislations and purchase [31]. For a department to be successful they should have easy access to an environmental specialist that is well informed on how the department process is constructed. The specialist should be there to answer questions on daily basis [32].

Implementing eco-design into the design process its important to know the weak points of the product. The design team should be given a broad understanding of all lifecycle stages at the beginning of the product development process. This is of big importance because most of the relevant planning and decision making is done in the early developing phase [27].

Documentation

Another important factor is documentation. If an organization lacks routines for documenting, it will be hard to keep track of good ideas and solutions. Conserving and utilizing knowledge and insights from previous projects and key individuals are great measures for improving environmental performance. Over time, accumulated knowledge can be refined into checklists and tools which will facilitate eco-design for the entire organization [31]. Designers in particular need access to quick and easy-to-use information regarding environmental aspects, so that their work is not slowed down or inhibited by bureaucracy [28].

Eco-design tools

There are many different tools that can be used in the process for improving sustainable thinking and, hopefully, ecological performance of products. To succeed in implementing these tools in the everyday work they should be simple and tailor-made to be able to solve the environmental bottlenecks of specific products and industrial sectors [28]. The tools used can have a strategic or a more general approach to the environmental issues designers are faced with. Though some tools cover the whole design process it can be argued if the amount information needed for this type of analysis is hard to handle. Tools can differ in structure and complexity [31]. However, it is stated that the tools must be easily applied in the daily work without much training for designers to be effective [28].

The visionary approach

An organizational tool for improving sustainability is creating a vision of the role of an organization in a completely sustainable setting. This strategic approach can help the organization finding future potential solutions beyond todays standards [33]. Once a vision has been created the organization can start analyzing its activities and brainstorm changes in them to realise the vision. This method is often the best way to start if an organization really wants to adopt sustainability since it starts at the top of the organization and trickles down to the operational levels of it. An example of where this process was used to boost sustainability was at Riksbyggen, a Swedish construction company. Lead by their sustainability officer Charlotta Szczepanowski the initiative helped the entire organization coming together and striving for the same environmental goals.

LCA

LCA is short for life cycle assessment and is an analytical tool that have the potential to point out environmental aspects of a product throughout its whole lifecycle. LCA is, however, known for being a both time and cost intensive procedure [27]. There is a lot of information to be collected and sometimes external experts has to be consulted. It can be argued that consumer communication in form of environmental product declaration is one of the major reasons for performing and LCA [27]. Depending on the purpose of the analysis and the scope of a specific project the result can differ a lot. Internal assumptions, data sources, variation in process etc. are major reasons for the different outcomes. Due to this it is stated that comparison of different studies are in general not valid [34]. In terms of eco-design LCA analysis can be used as a means for educating employees about environmental impacts of a companys products.

MET-matrix

MET-matrix stands for materials, energy and toxicity matrix. It is a simple, yet useful, tool for evaluating a product both qualitatively and quantitatively. It focuses on the three mentioned aspects throughout the life-cycle of a product, resembling an LCA analysis but less in-depth. The MET matrix is a quick and easy tool for pinpointing the major environmental problem areas of a product [35].

Figure 3.4: A typical layout of a MET-matrix [35]

Eco-design road map

An eco-design road map is a way of analyzing and evaluating attributes of a product using environmental design aspects. By ranking the products performance in the different areas the developer gets a holistic picture of the environmental weaknesses and strengths. This method can be used both to assess the properties of an existing product or when deciding the properties of an upcoming product. To visualise this the ranking is plotted and presented in a value curve. Using the curve it will be noted that changes in the ranking of the parameters ends with trade-offs. There is no such thing as the perfect product. For ex a change of material can mean greater costs. However moving as many parameters as possible closer to the plus side is a big step on the way [36]. The example shown in figure 5.5 and 5.6 illustrates how the ten golden principles for eco-design [36], a framework developed by Prof. Conrad Luttropp, can be used as attributes for evaluating and improving a product. How a product is scored in an eco-design roadmap will have to be decided by the company itself.

(Figure 3.6: An improved version.of the previous product attributes. Finding the environmental weak points of a product s essential for improvement [36].) (Figure 3.5: A product evaluated according to the 10 golden principles (GP1-GP10) in an eco-design roadmap [36])

Checklists

Environmental checklists are developed to create a way of communicating during the project and to get a foundation for making valid decisions regarding sustainability. They can be constructed in a number of ways and a company can decide the content individually depending on the strategic goals set and the product in question. The environmental checklist can contain questions to be answered or criteria to be fulfilled in different steps of the process.

Material lists are a common form of eco-design checklists [31]. Such lists usually circle around materials or substances forbidden to use in products or processes due to legislation or company policy. Working further with the concept of material lists, a company can implement a grey list. Material on the grey list are potential candidates for the banning and it is therefore essential to try finding other alternatives for these in the future. The extreme and best way of applying this method is to have a white list containing materials that the company wishes to use in products. The proactive thinking using this list is a good way of stating that a company wishes to be good instead of less bad [14], [31].

1.11.2 Implementations in the product

When developing a product there are many aspects that have to be considered. Some need more attention than others, but it is important not to neglect any of them. This could endanger the product. The environment is not a crucial aspect for a profitable product, in the same way as its functionality. It is, however, directly linked to other aspects of the product and will therefore impact its profitability. All activities in product development being linked with each other means there are always trade-offs to be made. For example using light weight material can affect the transportation costs of the product in a positive way, but can increase the risk for damage during use due to less robustness. To create an environmentally successful product, such trade-offs have to be addressed throughout the development process in order to find a good balance for each individual product [31]. Giving the environment its proper attention in the development process is an important step towards producing eco-friendly products.

Figure 3.7: All aspects in the product development are interlinked. No aspect should be neglected [31].

1.11.2.1 Levels of eco-design in the product

In the article Proposal of an eco-design framework the authors suggest four different approaches to improve sustainable design thinking [37], [38]. The first step towards sustainable product development is to improve and optimize current products so that environmental standards and legislation are fulfilled.

The next step would be redesigning products, enhancing eco-performance. This could for example mean modification of features and components, or choosing better materials.

Innovation plays a big role in successful eco-design. Searching for new ways to fulfill the same function, functional innovation, leading to explicit changes in technology or use is the most demanding, but also the most rewarding measure for improving environmental performance. Another more visionary way of working with eco-design is to create new product and service portfolios with the aim to be more sustainable. Both of these innovation steps require activities like scenario analysis, backcasting and strategy workshops [28].

It is important to consider the fact that sustainable thinking can lead to new innovations and new products that can be both good for the environment and the economic growth [14].

1.11.2.2 Product considerations

When assessing how a product can be more sustainable there are a different aspects that have to be considered when discussing different parts of the products life-cycle. Designers play a big role in how we relate to, and use a products.

Value

A product must fulfill its functional purpose and provide immaterial value to be sustainable. The main function of a coffee maker is to make coffee. Failing to do so will render it obsolete, and the coffee maker will most likely be disposed of. If the primary function is not fulfilled, the product can never be sustainable. Other properties such as size, colour, noise and weight are important for giving a product immaterial value to the consumer. Whereas technology defines the function of a product, its aesthetic presentation may affect its functionality greatly. The perceived immaterial value will often shorten the longevity of a product below its functional life-length. Products with a longer life saves recycling resources and it is therefore important to promote immaterial value, an aspect which designers are great at communicating. The optimal product life length is individual depending on the product [31].

A change in macro or micro trends may also shorten the life of a product, even if the functional life has not come to an end. For designers it therefore becomes apparent that longevity is closely linked to the consumers perception of a product.

Materials and components

Using material resources in an efficient way is naturally important both in terms of environmental and economical aspects. A passive product , for example a chair, should have good materials to last long. But in short-lived products there is no need to waste valuable material or long lasting materials [31]. Using less material or reducing the size of a product will indirectly reduce environmental impacts during transportation, manufacturing and end-of-life. Giving thought to how different materials are assembled into the finished product is also an important aspect to consider as a designer. Clever solutions in this area can for instance increase the amount of recyclable materials in a product. This way of thinking can be referred to as material hygiene [31]. Typical ways of achieving material hygiene is to avoid mixing materials, simplifying separation, and using few and uncomplicated attachment joints. For hazardous or valuable materials, material hygiene is crucial to most companies. Especially hazardous materials are a primary concern. Companies have to ensure the minimization and safe separation of these. Using a closed loop for such hazardous materials as proposed in Cradle to Cradle is essential to material hygiene.

Consumer behavior

Active products, unlike passive products, often have their main environmental impact during the use phase. For active products the user is the one with greatest influence on the energy consumption. To minimize environmental impacts the consumer must have the right information to handle the product in a correct way. This information should be available in the product, on the product, with the product or posted elsewhere ex: the internet.

Recent research suggest that companies can influence pro-environmental behavior with consumers during the use-phase of products. By incorporating a set of cognitive principles into product design purchase and use of eco-products can be stimulated through three types of pro-environmental behavior: curtailing, efficiency and political behavior [39]. Curtailing means changing ones own behavior, for example taking shorter showers. Efficiency behavior means using less by modifying a product, for instance switching to low-energy light bulbs. Using democratic means, such as voting for clean energy, is political behavior. Encouraging the consumer to use a product in the most environmentally friendly way possible is a great opportunity for designers to improve sustainability.

3 Literature Survey

3 Literature Survey

Findings

This chapter describes and discusses the findings gathered from the survey, the interviews and from research out carried at Electrolux.

Electrolux

Electrolux is a Swedish incorporate company founded 1901 by the visionary Axel Wenner-Gren. The main focus: passion for innovation, consumer obsession and drive for results resulted in Electrolux first vacuum cleaner and these areas are still core values in Electrolux operations.

Today Electrolux is one of the global leaders in the incorporate branch selling 50 million products in more than 150 countries. The home appliance market can be divided into two different parts. The market including Western Europe, America, Japan and Australia/New Zealand is saturated. This implies that its growth had declined and products sold are mostly replacement products. The other part discussed in this matter is the countries with a growing middle class striving for higher life standard. These countries are situated in Africa, the Middle East, Eastern Europe, south Asia, China and Latin America. The purchase of new products to new consumers are big in these parts of the world [40].

Electrolux's brand range includes 8 different brands: AEG, Electrolux, Eureka, Frigidaire, Electrolux grand Cuisine, Molteni, Westinghouse and Zanuzzi. These brands are divided in 3 categories: ultra luxury, premium and mass market. Each brand is directed to different main markets for ex: Electrolux is strategically placed as premium in Europe.

Electrolux has four major segments of products: kitchen, laundry, small appliances and adjacent products. The main segment is kitchen.

Figure 4.1: Product segments and relative revenues [41]

The kitchen segment includes cookers, hobs, ovens, hoods, microwave ovens, refrigerators, freezers and dishwashers. New functions are constantly being developed for keep the leading role in this segment.

The laundry segment focus on washing machines, tumble dryers and drying cabinets. Capacity, user-friendliness and resource efficiency are key competitive areas.

Small appliances main focus is vacuum cleaners. Other products like irons, mixers and coffee machines belong here as well.

Adjacent products include air-conditioning, water heaters and heat pumps. The category is rapidly growing, especially in China.

1.11.3 Global Sustainability strategy

Electrolux vision to be the best appliance company in the world includes being the sustainability leader of the industry [41]. The importance of sustainability was for example highlighted in a market survey made in Australia, Brazil, France, China, Germany and the US. Two thirds of participants ranked the product's environmental impact as one of the three most important factors when deciding what electronics to purchase [42].

Sustainable Affairs (SA) is the department responsible for Electroluxs sustainability initiatives. The department focuses on the different sustainability aspects of the entire Electrolux organization. The different areas, for ex products or labour conditions, are covered by one manager each. SA is also responsible for setting up the overall sustainability strategy for Electrolux. Environmental impacts of Electrolux products are measured with LCA analysis. These studies are carried out ad hoc. The Latest LCA was conducted in 2005.

To achieve the sustainability vision stated by Keith McLoughlin three areas of priority were identified during 2014 [43]. The prioritized areas were

Products, services and markets,

People and operations,

Stakeholders and society.

1.11.3.1 Products, services and markets

Under Products, services and markets four sustainability themes were gathered. "Product efficiency", "Material efficiency", "Eliminating hazardous substances" and "Middle of the pyramid".

"Product efficiency" is one of the top concerns since Electrolux's products have their greatest environmental impact during their use phase from energy and water consumption. The success of Electrolux green range product line, which are the most efficient line of products, suggests that this product efficiency is something consumers also find important.

"Material efficiency" means that Electrolux is recognising how overuse of the earth's resources will become a business concern. Reparability, modularization, use of recycled materials and take-back of discarded products are therefore embraced as addressing measures.

"Eliminating hazardous substances" is a high priority and means that Electrolux actively phases out dangerous chemicals and high impact green-house gases. With the help of a restricted material list, this is enforced throughout the organization.

"Middle of the pyramid" represents Electrolux's ambition to provide water- and energy-efficient appliances to the growing middle class.

Looking at all the appliances provided by Electrolux the most CO2 consuming phase of their lifecycles is usage followed by raw material extraction. The rest of the phases can almost be regarded as negligible. The goal is to cut the CO2 impact by 50% by 2020 relative to 2005.

Figure 4.2: The environmental impact of life-cycle phases for an average Electrolux products [41]. Impact measured in CO2 emission.

1.11.3.2 People and operations

People and operations consists of the areas "Operational efficiency", "Health and safety", "Human and labor rights" and "Ethical business".

By improving its "operational efficiency" Electrolux reduces energy and water consumption as well as waste and emissions of its factories and other facilities. Apart from sparing the environment from unnecessary harm, excelling in operational efficiency saves much resources. "Health and safety" concerns within manufacturing is an important theme, as is "Human and labour rights". Both areas focuses on the social side of sustainability primarily with human resources in mind across Electrolux's operations. "Ethical business" represents Electrolux's resolve to counter-act bribery and corruption.

1.11.3.3 Stakeholders and society

"Stakeholders and society" holds the themes "Social investment", which means improving social and economic conditions in Electrolux's areas of operations, and "Responsible sourcing", a priority set out to intimately communicate with and monitor suppliers activities.

To help realise its strategies Electrolux has developed a code of conduct. This document holds rules and guidelines for Electrolux employees and suppliers regarding labor-rights, ethics and environmental management.

1.12 Electrolux Group Design

Electrolux Group Design (EGD) is the department responsible for designing the physical shape and user interfaces of all products. The department consists of 9 offices around the world. In total there are close to 200 employees at EGD. About 90 of these are situated in the main studio located in Stockholm, Sweden. Among EGDs employees there are quite a few consultants. EGD has a large mix of newly hired employees and people who has been at the department for many years.

1.12.1 Product categories

Different products are the responsibility of different groups within EGD. These are divided and work separately with their own product categories.

1.12.1.1 Major Appliances

The largest group at EGD is Major Appliances. It is responsible for designing the large appliances of the kitchen and laundry product categories which are Electroluxs main source of business. Major appliances consists of around 125 employees situated around the world.

1.12.1.2 Small Appliances

Small Appliances designs small domestic appliances of Electrolux portfolio. It is a much smaller group than Major Appliances making it a bit more flexible and adaptable. Small Appliances consists of 25 employees in Sweden, the USA, Brazil and China.

1.12.1.3 Home Comfort

The smallest group in EGD is home comfort which designs air conditioners and water heaters. It consist of 8 employees all located at the design studio in Stockholm, Sweden.

1.12.2 Competences

The largest group at EGD is the industrial designers(ID). Other than these there are graphical designers, colour/material/finish(CMF) specialists, user interaction(UI) experts, design managers, packaging designers and studio engineers to bring up the most frequent roles.

To create the best possible user experience all of these competences come together in the EGD competence wheel. This illustrates how insights from consumers, trends and technology is filtered through EGDs different functions, via EGDs usability lab and model builders.

Figure 4.3: The EGD competence wheel. It illustrates the responsibilities of different functions and how they interact. PD in this case stands for Product Design and respresents the tasks of industrial designers. The image was adapted from EGD introduction material.

1.12.3 Strategy at EGD

Group Designs philosophy is to design appealing, innovative and intuitive products that consumers love to use every day. The mission of Group Design is to deliver best-in-class PACS (products, accessories, consumables, services), which build strong brands and drive profitable growth and ,thus, support the Electrolux Group strategy. Four key areas are focused on to achieve Group Designs goal to deliver design excellence, which is one part of the EGD framework;

Innovation - Making sure the design innovation meets the consumer's needs, desires and aspirations

User Experience - Provide the consumer with a pleasurable experience beyond expectations

Design Quality - Ensure a high level of usability and that concept is thought through in terms of industrial design.

Visual Language - Ensure that design creates a differentiated and unique offer, which conveys the brand and its values.

The three other parts of the framework are

Simplify and Focus - maintain simple structures and processes within EGD, and focus on product centric activities

Flat and Engaging Organization - Keep EGD transparent and engaging at all levels

Product passion - Nurture a passion for products through real life experience and understanding of the retail environment.

1.13 The product innovation process

Electrolux has stated three goals related to product innovation in the 2014 annual report. The first aim is to minimize the number of product variants with 20 percent through modularization. Second is to increase innovation investments with 50 percent, one third of which intended for environmentally focused research. The third aim is to reduce the time from innovation to launch by 30 percent. Over the last years reducing lead time has been a reappearing objective. This has lead to a formalization and structuralization of the product innovation process clearly describing deliverables, tasks and involvements. It circles around the co-operation of four departments in what is called the innovation triangle. In the corners of the triangle are R&D, marketing and design. In the middle of the triangle are Product Line (PL), the product owners.

Figure 4.4: The innovation triangle symbolizing collaboration in the product innovation process.

The three corner functions of the triangle help realise the objective of PL, to develop and sell new products. Strategically planning for new products is one of their tasks and makes them the primary driver of product innovation. Marketing support new projects with insights from consumers and local markets, design with their expertise in aesthetics and design trends and R&D with technical input regarding function and manufacturing.

The innovation process usually starts with an opportunity assessment (OA). This means that all members of the innovation triangle come together to discuss a possible business opportunity that may have arisen. These can come from any of the members, and be any product, accessory, consumable or service associated with Electrolux business. If PL agrees that the opportunity should be pursued the first step is to create a marketing business brief (MBB). It is a document which describes all relevant information related to the project including expected revenue, key markets and risks. The MBB also contains a product attribute profile (PAP) which defines the areas of focus for said opportunity, meaning where to spend the designated resources for the project.

If there is uncertainty in the MBB regarding how an opportunity can or should be realised two supporting activities can be initiated after the opportunity assessment. Insights to innovation (i2i) is an exercise intended to thoroughly investigate an opportunity's potential business solutions. The activity is of a creative nature focusing on exploring all possibilities related to the opportunity. Advanced development (AD) is of a more technical character. If an AD project is launched it means that an opportunity is in need of a new or radical technical solution.

When the project gets a green light the MBB is completed it and passed on to the involved functions, marking the start of product development (PD). Marketing, design and R&D hereafter work with their separate tasks according to the MBB, which for EGD is interpreted into a design brief (DB). Along the way all included parties meet at checkpoints where clear deliverables have to be presented. Each function has its own specific deliverables which must be approved and ticked off a checklist. All functions of the triangle have their say about what they want for the project and opinions about other functions efforts, but PL makes the final decision whether or not the project can continue into a new phase.

Figure 4.5: A simplified illustration of the product innovation process

1.14 The Design process

Within the product innovation process EGD have their own activities spanning from early research up until finalization of a product design. Traditionally Electrolux has worked with a 1-3 year timeframe when planning for new products. As of late more initiative is taken to look further into the future, more specifically 3 to 5 years ahead. EGD therefore recently implemented an initiative called Pre Development with the intention to research future business opportunities.

1.14.1 Pre Development

Practically there are three strategic domains where the 3-5 year timeframe is considered: kitchen, laundry and healthy homes (healthy homes is an umbrella for product categories related to home comfort and small appliances). Designers from each domain research trends in pursuit of inspiration for future products that may align with Electrolux global business strategy. When an interesting idea for a business opportunity is discovered the design department can suggest its further development to PL. This provides possibilities for EGD to increase their influence over product planning and improve cross-functional cooperation. Pre Development projects are completely independent of other departments and free of constraints. For a Pre Dev project to be picked up into development, however, clear demonstrators has to be provided supporting the business case.

1.14.2 Design in the different product categories

The design process slightly differs between the product categories. Commonly stated by the interviewed employees is that a majority of projects are routine. Such projects usually circle around incremental design changes and does not profoundly explore innovative design solutions. Further concerns among the employees when discussing the design process is time and cost.

1.14.2.1 Major appliances (MA)

Major appliances is the biggest product category and has its own manufacturing sites. High investments in manufacturing equipment and facilities makes MA slow moving when it comes to changes. The products are based on modular platforms which are used over the course of several product generations. A design teams main focus is to create the visible part of the product and the user interaction interface, together with innovative solutions on how to stack things inside. Apart from incremental changes in appearance the technology of the machines may be the exactly the same. Water and energy consumption are important topics for this product category. Energy labeling and standards provided by policy makers are well developed for these products. UI therefore has the important task of getting the consumer to interact with the product making its use as sustainable as possible.

1.14.2.2 Small appliances (SmA)

Small Appliances is aiming to design products with a strong decorative focus. Representatives from SmA explain that these types of products are becoming more of an accessory in modern homes, placing more importance on their appearance. To tackle this SmA dedicates much work to the research phase of a project. Straying away from the common process, SmA are in the process of setting up their own specific process guidelines to ensure that the somewhat specific needs of small appliance products are met in time.

Contrary to MA, SmA does not have their own manufacturing sites. This puts SmA in an entrepreneurial position towards their suppliers. This can be both positive and negative. Positive in the sense that they can choose the factory best suited for the occasion and negative in the sense that it can be hard to develop good relations with suppliers.

1.14.2.3 Home comfort (HC)

Home comfort products are highly seasonal. They are mostly sold during the warm months of the year. This puts a lot of pressure on the relatively small design group responsible for these products. Projects are often reduced to mere weeks. Time pressure leaves less room for questioning or analysing. Therefore the design work done is mostly logotypes and small design changes of for example the panels. HC products are manufactured by certain suppliers who also manufactures products of competitors. Having the same supplier as the competition leaves HC limited options to improve the products. If a new and innovative idea is presented the supplier can easily apply this to all HC products manufactured, destroying a possible business advantage for Electrolux.

1.14.3 Design work in the different functions

The different product categories, teams and functions within EGD have different ways of working and different steering documents. Usually a design group consists of one manager, two industrial designers and a studio engineer with support of other cross-functional specialists providing support in UI and CMF. These specialists work with different design groups but are for the most part tied to a certain product category.

1.14.3.1 Industrial Designers (ID)

The main task of industrial designers is to design the physical shape of Electroluxs products. Their working methods include sketching, 3D modeling and prototype making. In projects industrial designers own the product concept, meaning that they are responsible for a products complete appearance up until the product design has been decided upon by PL. Industrial designers use artistic expression within the limited environment of their specific industry.

1.14.3.2 User Interaction (UI)

Interaction designers create the interface which controls a products function. Their work is of a systematic character since constructing a user interface is both a technical and aesthetic challenge. Programming, animation and electronics are areas of focus for UI designers.

1.14.3.3 Color/Material/finish (CMF)

CMF designers have special knowledge in materials, colours and finishes, and their respective manufacturing processes. Recently they are getting involved in projects at an earlier stage, working closer with ID. Also working close with the purchasing department they influence decisions related to their areas of expertise. Within projects they provide purchasing with a wish list containing the materials and colors wished to work with. CMF designers are involved in projects longer than both UI and ID. They are consulted all the way up to specifying manufacturing methods.

Being a small group of specialists spread over the world, they have started to document their work on a common server. The reason for this is to improve communication within CMF, communicate important findings to other functions and to avoid overlapping work. As of today this documentation does not include environmental aspects.

Current state of sustainability on EGD today

Both employees and internal documents state that there is no spoken or unspoken sustainability strategy or goal at EGD today. However some aspects considered in the process can be linked to sustainability, but they are often carried out due to cost. Special sustainability projects have been done at EGD, especially in SmA were a sustainability specialist, Cecilia Nord, worked earlier. During her time at SmA the Green Range project and the Vacuum of the sea project were carried out.

Figure 4.6: Resulting products of environmentally focused projects at Electrolux. To the left; a Vacuum of the Sea. To the right; a Green Range vacuum cleaner.

The Green-range portfolio consists of products manufactured in recycled material, non hazardous colors and more efficient engines. Stated by the annual report the green-range represents 13% of products sold and 25% of the gross profit [44].This project enabled extensive research in the area of materials allowing the employees involved to deepen their knowledge.

Vacuum of the sea was a PR initiative. Plastic was collected from the seas all around the world and attached to vacuum cleaners in an artistic way. The exhibition of these vacuum cleaners traveled around the world.

However these projects bring knowledge and awareness to the EGD department there is no structured way of bringing them up on the agenda. It can also be discussed if these projects are more green design than eco-design due to the main focus on disposal. There are furthermore no sustainability tools available at EGD. Employees states that ever since Cecilia Nord left the department no further structured work has been done and no one is responsible for the sustainability flag in project meetings

1.14.4 SWOT

This swot presents the strengths, weaknesses, threats and opportunities related to the integration of sustainability into the design process of EGD. The strengths and weaknesses are internal, while the opportunities and threats handles the external aspects. These aspects are based on findings from the web-survey and the semi structured interviews. The results of the web survey can be found in appendix D.

Figure 4.7: The SWOT-matrix describing the main areas of strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats.

1.14.4.1 Strengths Positive attitude at EGD

The survey showed that there is a widespread positive attitude towards sustainability. Both personally and professionally employees state that they can and should take more responsibility for the environment.

Figure 4.8: Diagrams from the web-survey. Results show the positive attitude among employees, both personal and professional, towards sustainability.

Furthermore many participants commented that the initiative to investigate sustainability has been long overdue and that the topic is very important.

Im so glad to hear someone is asking these questions. Sustainability is not top of mind with the North American side of the business. It deserves more attention.

Great survey! This really shows how bad we are at including this in our daily work!

Some employees are personally committed and interested in the topic of sustainability. Their knowledge and drive is raising awareness of environmental issues at the department today.

It can be discussed if the observed positive attitude is a result from asking socially conscious questions. The survey was anonymous and generated a large number of comments where employees expressed concern, came with suggestions or gave positive feedback providing context for the conclusion. Furthermore the interviews supported this finding through meaningful suggestions and enthusiasm from the interviewees.

Structured process

As of today EGD is a part of a structured and formalized product innovation process. Steering documents like the MBB, PAP, checklists are used to control the outcome of design work. These documents have great potential to act as forums for sustainability discussion along the projects. Internally at EGD the Pre Development initiative is another potential forum for more creative and innovative sustainability discussions.

Creative and innovative mindset

Designers are people with a creative and innovative outlook. Coming up with new ideas and expressions is a part of their work. At EGD these properties are surely in stock based on innovative suggestions from survey participants and the sheer volume of design awards secured by the department over the last years.

1.14.4.2 Weaknesses Common sustainability goal

As stated earlier there is no goal or strategy for sustainability at EGD presently. There seem to be confusion among the employees regarding which areas EGD should focus on. A common goal is one of the most important factors when pursuing sustainability, and therefore the lack of one is a great weakness. One survey participant crudely points this out .

We need a stake in the ground regarding percentage of renewable raw materials and recycled plastics that we use in our products. Is it 25%, 50% or what!?

Knowledge

The knowledge of sustainability among the EGD employees is inadequate. Participants state that they believe themselves to have enough knowledge to make environmental decisions and that they know how their products impact the environment. Most employees, however, did not know which phase of the products lifecycles is most harmful to the environment. Acccording to Electrolux usage is the phase most impactful phase in terms of CO2 emissions, but only 23 % of the participants were aware of this.

Figure 4.9: Diagrams from the web-survey. Results show the employees believed knowledge in the area of sustainability

Figure 4.10: Right: environmental impacts of Electrolux products throughout their life cycles measured in CO2[41]. Left: chart showing which product life cycle phase EGD employees believe to have most impact.

In addition, many employees state that they have not read the sustainability chapter in the latest annual reports. As a result they do not know what Electrolux is doing in the field of sustainability or how they can partake in or support this work.

Figure 4.11: 14 participants out of 98 had read Electrolux sustainability chapter of the latest Electrolux annual report.

The survey also showed that education in sustainability differs. Some state that they are self taught, some that they have had academic education but the result can be considered unimportant since it does not reveal the actual knowledge of the participants.

What can be said though is that most were not familiar with, or had used, any tools for eco-design. It therefore seems like the knowledge that employees do possess is not applicable to their work as designers.

Documentation

Today the work documented can be found in PowerPoint presentations saved by the designer in charge of the project. However, there is no structured way of sharing and saving project information.

Time limitations

The aim to shorten the development process considerably, added to the fact that some product categories tend to rush through projects, result in less time for reflection. In an already