Connecting talent from across the globe, strengthening the exchange of knowledge and experiences, and supporting intercultural dialogue are part of BSH’s talent program TALENTIFY. At last year’s virtual TALENTIFY Campus, the initiative “Inspire Others” was started: Program members formed teams and developed new ideas to foster sustainability at BSH. Today, we want to introduce you to the second team and their project called “Future Concept”, dedicated to inspiring new product ideas and raising awareness on the topic of sustainability.

Inspiration to the fullest – the idea behind the “Future Concept” project

If you want to make products more sustainable, you sometimes have to think outside the box, find new ways, exchange ideas, and make them come to life, so people can really experience them. The idea behind “Future Concept” is inspired by the automotive industry and the concept cars you see at automobile shows. These concept cars are radically different from what people are driving today and they also do not aim at showing the consumers which kind of car they may be able to buy next year: These cars are there to inspire people, to test concepts with the public, to try new ideas both for feasibility and desirability, and to hint at where the industry may want to go.

The TALENTIFY team members were imagining how demonstrating new concepts for more sustainable innovative home appliances could be used to inspire and teach people inside and outside of BSH about sustainability, and so, the idea for “Future Concept” was born: Building concept home appliances with a focus on sustainability. By setting up a process that helps BSH to create new ideas and bring them into realization, the project team aims to gather a larger group of advocates for sustainability within BSH and drive innovation. Additionally, the team wants to bring the concept home appliances to life to inspire the public. This will not only help to find out more about the consumers’ preferences, but also raise awareness for the topic and encourage consumers to pay more attention to sustainable aspects when making a purchase decision.

Garrett Bentley, Digital Program Owner and Innovation Engineer, who came up with the idea of “Future Concept”, further adds: “I have worked on various innovation topics over the past 6 years, and one of my passions is to use innovation to not just come up with a new product, but use the new ideas to inspire, to learn new things, and to test out what may or may not be a good path to go down. While many of the trade shows are demonstrating products that will be out in the next year, I have found myself to be uninspired regarding the future of appliances. In many people’s minds, innovation and sustainability are both subjects that can be tricky to justify investing in. To me, it seemed natural to combine the efforts of inspiring through innovation and inspiring through sustainability with one concept.”

Debuting a pilot project through teamwork and dedication

Most projects come with their own hurdles and challenges. For the “Future Concept” team members it was finding resources outside of their daily jobs at BSH. With time and resources limited, it was of special importance for the team members to prove the value of their idea to move forward. With this as one of their goals, they managed to already gather great takeaways. Having people exchange their ideas and inspirations greatly helped to weed out areas of less value and made the concept more achievable. Working as a tight-knit team keeps the motivation up and helps to think outside the box. Therefore, the team also valued the opportunities to really engage with co-workers on sustainability topics rather than just presenting their final concept at the end of the program. 

Overcoming their boundaries and dedicating themselves to their cause paid off in the end. Right now, the TALENTIFY team members are working on building a pilot of the process, where they will collect the ideas from a smaller group, build a first concept and present the idea internally. The pilot concept aims to demonstrate the value of their idea and serves as a concrete example to learn where the team needs to adapt certain things and what resources will be required.

The six team members also learned that providing information and raising awareness are key when striving for more sustainability. One of their biggest learnings was that sustainability is a complex topic. Often it is only thought about in an environmental way, particularly regarding costs and saving resources. But the TALENTIFY members realized there are so many more aspects to the topic. Their goal is to find a way how they can make BSH more sustainable as a company by making sustainability a priority in their everyday work.