Talent & Culture Strategy at IKEA: Where Values Are the Hiring Criteria

This article is part of MokaHR's Talent & Culture Strategy series, which profiles how leading companies build their people strategies.

Introduction

Every IKEA recruiter who joins the talent acquisition team receives an unusual assignment. Before they screen their first candidate, many are flown to Älmhult — a small town in Sweden's Småland region with a population of around 9,000, where Ingvar Kamprad founded IKEA in 1943.

There, they participate in hands-on activities designed to make IKEA's founding values tangible: togetherness, simplicity, cost-consciousness, and a relentless focus on the many, not the few. They visit the first IKEA store. They experience the flat hierarchy firsthand. They return to their home markets not just as recruiters, but as what IKEA calls "gatekeepers and safeguarders of culture."

This is not typical corporate onboarding. It's the clearest expression of a talent philosophy that has kept IKEA culturally coherent across 574 locations in 31 countries, with over 170,000 employees (whom IKEA calls "co-workers") — a term deliberately chosen to signal that hierarchy matters less than shared purpose.

The results speak to the approach's effectiveness. IKEA's voluntary co-worker turnover was 21.0% in FY2023, according to its Chief People & Culture Officer, Ulrika Biesèrt. In retail, where the British Retail Consortium estimates average turnover at approximately 50%, this figure is remarkable. As Biesèrt has put it: "IKEA's absolute superpower is that people love to work for us and they stay."

Ingka Group — the largest IKEA retailer, operating the vast majority of IKEA stores globally — generated €41.8 billion in revenue in FY2024, welcomed 680 million store visitors and 3.8 billion online visitors, and invested €2.1 billion in lowering product prices for customers. The company paid a €311 million performance-based bonus to co-workers based on FY2023 results and allocated an additional €103 million to a co-worker loyalty pension fund. These aren't just employer branding gestures — they're structural commitments that tie financial performance to workforce investment.

IKEA has been recognised consistently as an employer of choice across multiple dimensions: sustainability leadership, disability inclusion (with dedicated programmes supporting over 2,500 refugees and asylum seekers across 21 countries), and gender equality (annual pay-gap reviews, inclusive succession planning, and the removal of salary history from recruitment to reduce bias). The company has also committed to reflecting the multicultural diversity of its communities at all leadership levels across 30 countries.

How does IKEA attract and hire talent?

The Testament: a 1943 document that still drives every hiring decision

Most companies have a values statement. IKEA has The Testament of a Furniture Dealer — a document written by founder Ingvar Kamprad that functions less as corporate philosophy and more as an operational compass. Tugba Åkesson, Vice President and Global Head of Talent Acquisition at Ingka Group, describes it plainly: "If I'm in a dilemma in my daily work, I can always go back to that Testament. It helps me see how we solve things and think as a company."

The Testament emphasises principles that permeate IKEA's talent strategy: simplicity over complexity, togetherness over hierarchy, cost-consciousness as a form of respect for the many, and the belief that making mistakes is acceptable as long as you learn from them. These are not abstract ideals posted on a wall — they are the criteria against which every hiring decision is made.

IKEA's talent philosophy can be summarised in a single sentence from Åkesson: "Recruitment is not only about filling positions quickly or making it transactional." At a company that hires approximately 51,000 people per year, this is a difficult promise to keep. But IKEA has operationalised it through a systematic values-first hiring approach where cultural alignment is assessed before skills or experience.

Values-first hiring at scale: 51,000 hires per year without diluting culture

IKEA's hiring process is built on the conviction that skills can be taught but values are intrinsic. Recruiters and hiring managers are trained specifically to interview for values alignment, assessing whether candidates embody togetherness, simplicity, caring for people, and the entrepreneurial spirit that Kamprad embedded in the company's DNA.

The cultural immersion at Älmhult is a key element of this system. By sending hiring teams to IKEA's birthplace, the company ensures that recruiters across 31 markets share a common, experiential understanding of what the values mean in practice — not just as words, but as behaviours. As Åkesson describes it: "It's something you can feel, experience, and live. It's not abstract, it's real."

To scale this approach across tens of thousands of hires annually, IKEA now uses technology to pre-screen for values fit. Automated assessments identify candidates with strong cultural alignment early in the process, freeing recruiters to invest more time in meaningful, human conversations rather than administrative screening. Åkesson shared a telling anecdote: during a pilot programme, a candidate with little retail experience who had been rejected multiple times was identified by the new values assessment as a strong cultural fit. A recruiter interviewed them, the hiring manager agreed, and the hire was made — someone who might have been permanently overlooked under a skills-first model.

This "culture addition" philosophy — hiring people who bring something new to IKEA while sharing its foundational values — echoes approaches at companies like Shopify, which also hires for "culture addition" rather than "culture fit". The difference is one of emphasis: Shopify selects for individual builder instinct; IKEA selects for collective belonging.

Retention: why turnover is half the retail average

IKEA's 21% voluntary turnover rate — in an industry where 50% is the norm — isn't achieved through extraordinary compensation. Retail pay remains competitive but not industry-leading, and IKEA has openly acknowledged challenges attracting specialised tech talent at retail-level salaries. Instead, retention is driven by three interconnected factors.

First, purpose. IKEA's mission — to create a better everyday life for the many people — resonates with co-workers in a way that abstract corporate missions rarely do. The company's sustainability commitments (96.6% renewable electricity, 77.7% operational waste recycled, €2.1 billion invested in price reductions) make the mission tangible. Co-workers can see that the company practices what it preaches.

Second, internal mobility. IKEA pairs new hires with seasoned co-workers, offers cross-functional training, and provides explicit opportunities for employees to "reinvent themselves within IKEA." The company has set targets to increase its internal fill rate from 35% to 50% and is building an AI-powered internal talent marketplace — a direction that Spotify has pioneered with its Echo platform, filling 30% of roles internally in 2024.

Third, financial sharing. The €311 million performance bonus and €103 million pension fund allocation in FY2023 are not executive perks — they're distributed across the co-worker base, reinforcing the "for the many" philosophy with real financial commitment.

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How does IKEA develop and manage employee performance?

From co-worker to leader: the Bloom programme and beyond

IKEA's development philosophy reflects its flat, egalitarian culture: leadership isn't a title — it's a behaviour that should be cultivated at every level. The company operates several programmes designed to develop leadership capacity broadly rather than concentrating it in a management elite.

The Bloom programme encourages co-workers to step into new challenges early in their careers, building confidence through experience rather than through formal promotion processes. This approach embeds leadership development into daily work rather than reserving it for high-potential programmes — a philosophy that aligns with IKEA's principle that "every co-worker is a talent."

For more senior development, IKEA invests in inclusive succession planning designed to strengthen gender balance in leadership pipelines. The company has maintained approximately 50/50 gender diversity across its global workforce and actively works to ensure this balance extends to management and leadership roles.

IKEA's digital transformation has also reshaped employee development. With over 5,000 tech and data professionals in Ingka's Group Digital function, the company is investing heavily in AI literacy — 4,000 co-workers have participated in AI training to date, and AI literacy resources have been viewed 54,000 times. CHRO Biesèrt has described the approach as "human-centred AI" — focusing on upskilling and reskilling rather than replacement.

Inter IKEA (the franchiser that manages the IKEA brand) has also invested in Workday HCM to create a centralised talent platform with machine learning-powered skill matching. The system automatically aligns talent with opportunities, enabling what Inter IKEA calls a "competency-based workforce strategy" that understands both people's ambitions and organisational talent gaps.

Performance culture: managing 170,000 people with four layers of hierarchy

IKEA's organisational structure is famously flat — only four layers separate a store cashier from the CEO. This flatness isn't decorative; it has direct implications for how performance is managed.

The company relies on regular feedback, one-on-one discussions, and co-worker surveys rather than heavily bureaucratic review cycles. Biesèrt personally visits IKEA stores to speak with frontline co-workers in "less formal settings" — a practice that signals to the broader organisation that performance information flows in both directions, not just top-down.

Recognition is embedded in daily operations through programmes like Co-worker of the Month and the emphasis on storytelling — sharing personal stories of how co-workers live the values. As one IKEA leader described it: "Our stories are powerful because they are personal. They reveal why our co-workers feel seen and supported."

This people-centric performance approach shares parallels with Starbucks' servant leadership model, where frontline employee experience is considered inseparable from customer experience. Both companies operate on the premise that in retail, the quality of the employee experience is the quality of the customer experience — there is no gap between the two.

What can HR leaders learn from IKEA's approach?

IKEA's talent strategy is built on a foundation that few companies can replicate overnight — an 80-year-old culture anchored by a founder's document and reinforced through decades of consistent practice. But several principles are immediately applicable.

Hire for values first, train for skills second. IKEA's core insight is that cultural alignment predicts long-term retention and performance more reliably than technical qualifications. This doesn't mean ignoring skills — it means assessing them after values alignment is confirmed. AI-powered screening tools can automate this prioritisation by evaluating behavioural and values-based assessment data alongside technical qualifications, ensuring that cultural fit doesn't get lost in high-volume hiring.

Send your recruiters to the source. The Älmhult immersion is expensive and logistically complex — but it works because it gives recruiters a shared, experiential understanding of the culture they're protecting. Companies without an Älmhult can create their own version: structured cultural immersions where hiring teams spend time with founders, long-tenured employees, or customers to understand the company's DNA from the inside out.

Make internal mobility visible and measurable. IKEA's goal to increase its internal fill rate from 35% to 50% is ambitious, specific, and measurable — which is why it's likely to succeed. Most companies say they value internal mobility but don't track it as a KPI. Platforms that centralise job postings, skills profiles, and career pathways — whether through an enterprise ATS or a dedicated talent marketplace — make mobility a system rather than an aspiration.

Share financial success with the workforce. IKEA's €311 million bonus distribution and €103 million pension allocation aren't charity — they're retention infrastructure. Employees who share in the company's financial success have a material reason to stay, independent of job satisfaction or cultural affinity. For companies that can't match this scale, even modest profit-sharing or equity participation programmes strengthen the psychological contract between employer and employee.

P&G's "Build from Within" model achieves similar retention through development investment rather than direct financial sharing — demonstrating that there are multiple viable paths to the same outcome. The key is choosing the mechanism that best fits your company's economics and culture.

What is it like to work at IKEA?

Working at IKEA is defined by a paradox: it's a global company of 170,000 people that insists on feeling like a local business where everyone knows each other's names. The language reflects this — "co-workers," not employees; "for the many people," not shareholders; four layers of hierarchy in a company with €41.8 billion in revenue.

The daily experience varies dramatically by role. Frontline co-workers in retail stores navigate customer interactions, restocking, and the physical demands of a large-format retail environment. Digital and tech co-workers — now over 5,000 strong — work on omnichannel transformation, AI integration, and the digital tools that support both customers and fellow co-workers. What unites these experiences is the cultural thread: the expectation that everyone, regardless of role, operates with simplicity, cost-consciousness, and care for both customers and colleagues.

Benefits include the performance-based bonus (distributed company-wide), the co-worker loyalty pension fund, flexible scheduling (piloted in several markets), and hybrid work options for non-frontline roles. IKEA has invested in global menopause guidance, mental health support, and programmes supporting refugees and asylum seekers — commitments that reflect the company's broader social mission.

Sustainability isn't a CSR addendum at IKEA — it shapes the working experience. Co-workers recycle 77.7% of operational waste, source 96.6% of electricity from renewables, and participate in circularity initiatives including As-Is areas that sell pre-owned and refurbished products. For many co-workers, this alignment between personal values and daily work is the strongest retention mechanism IKEA has.

The company isn't without challenges. Frontline co-worker turnover, while half the industry average, remains above IKEA's own targets. Attracting specialised tech talent at retail compensation levels is an ongoing struggle, and the company's consensus-driven culture can slow decision-making in a market that increasingly rewards speed. But IKEA's willingness to acknowledge these challenges publicly — rather than papering over them with employer branding — is itself a cultural strength.

Frequently asked questions

How does IKEA hire employees?

IKEA uses a values-first hiring approach where cultural alignment is assessed before skills or experience. Recruiters are trained to interview for values, and many participate in a cultural immersion at IKEA's birthplace in Älmhult, Sweden. The company hires approximately 51,000 people per year across 31 markets, using automated values assessments to pre-screen candidates while freeing recruiters for in-depth, human conversations.

What is The Testament of a Furniture Dealer?

Written by founder Ingvar Kamprad, The Testament is IKEA's foundational cultural document, emphasising simplicity, togetherness, cost-consciousness, and long-term thinking. Employees describe it as a compass that guides daily decision-making and helps maintain cultural consistency across 574 locations and 31 countries. It continues to shape hiring criteria, management practices, and strategic decisions more than 80 years after IKEA's founding.

What is IKEA's employee turnover rate?

Voluntary co-worker turnover was 21.0% in FY2023, according to IKEA's CHRO — roughly half the retail sector average of approximately 50% (British Retail Consortium). IKEA attributes this to purpose-driven culture, internal mobility opportunities, financial sharing through performance bonuses and pension contributions, and a values-aligned hiring process that selects for long-term cultural fit.

How many people work at IKEA?

Ingka Group, the largest IKEA retailer, employs over 170,000 co-workers across 574 locations in 31 markets. Gender diversity is maintained at approximately 50/50 across all levels, with an Inclusion Index of 79%. The broader IKEA ecosystem — including Inter IKEA and independent franchisees — operates 504 stores in 63 countries with €45.1 billion in total IKEA goods sold in FY2024.

See also

• Talent & Culture Strategy at Starbucks: Servant Leadership and Inclusive Hiring

• Talent & Culture Strategy at P&G: Building from Within

• Talent & Culture Strategy at Spotify: Treating Employees Like Adults

Ready to scale values-first hiring without sacrificing speed? MokaHR's AI-powered ATS automates screening, scheduling, and candidate communication — so your recruiters can focus on the human conversations that protect your culture. Book a personalised demo →