Lauren Currie is the Director of Snook and Mypolice. In the past she has worked for DesignThinkers, Deutsche Telekom and Future Gov but is now focused on changing the lives of the people of Scotland through service design and practical action. And apparently she often wears tartan tights which is understandable. Lauren is so passionate and excited about Service Design. I really enjoyed our chat.

How did you first learn about Service Design?

I studied Product Design at Dundee University. One of my lecturers left the University and started with live|work. He came back and gave us a talk about his new job and my jaw hit the ground. From that moment on I knew that’s what I wanted to do. And from then on I’ve been on a crazy mission. I tried to absorb everything and anything I could. But I was in Product Design environment and my tutors wanted me to do that. It caused some conflict and they found it hard to support me. I found that teachers from other courses supported me better.

When I graduated I got a freelance job with Design Thinkers in Amsterdam. Arne is one of a kind. He taught me so much and made me believe I could do it. He really embraced how much I really wanted to learn.

When I came back, my University asked me to come do my Masters. They gave me the opportunity to define myself as a Service Design practitioner in Scotland in 2009 and to really see if there is a space for this. It turned out really well. They let me go. I did placements, I got good tutors, I presented at various events. As part of my Masters, I developed “Making Service Sense” which deals with the relationship between Service Design and education. It’s a service to help graduates and educators. It contains a book, a pack of case study cards and a website. This month Snook (Lauren’s company with Sarah Drummond) has started a revisit of Making Service Sense.

What have been some of your favourite Service Design projects so far?

In the middle of my Masters I met Sarah Drummond. At the time we were “rivals”. We were both female voices getting a lot of attention in Scotland. Sarah entered Social Innovation Camp with Mypolice and she won. She emailed me and asked to set up a Skype chat. She asked me if I wanted to be Director of Mypolice.

My Police is online feedback tool for the public and the police to have a conversation. It’s a completely neutral platform which provides a space for these convesations to happen. From the police perspective, it’s an advice tool. From all the data we gather on Mypolice we give them advice on where they can improve and target their resources. At the moment many of the communications is very one-way, broadcasting is used much more than listening. In November 2009 we had our funding secured. Now we have a great web developer who works full time. She’s so clever, really entrepreneurial. She’s building it at the moment. I’m going to go up and down to all the police forces in the country and show it to them, show them how it’s going to make their lives easier. We’re also looking at a Mypolice Lite version so we can put it out there and get people’s feedback.

What’s your current focus?

My current work is really socially focused. I’ve been working on ALISS (Access to Local Information Support Services) with the Long-term Conditions Alliance. We’re designing a new service for people with long term health conditions to help them find information and support services in their local area. We’ve spent time with people who have conditions, their carers

and we’ve run three co-design events. We asked people “If you had a cheque for 100 pounds and you could change what happens after you get diagnosed, what would you do?”.

What are you planning for the future?

We’re looking to change the way services are designed and delivered in Scotland. We want to turn the pyramid upside down and change the way people feel about being a citizen. We want to prove that this way of doing things actually works. Mypolice is the way we’re going to prove it. We’re Scotland focused at the moment. When I was a student, I was told if you want to do this type of work you have to move to London. But I didn’t want to move to London. We want to put our city on the map.

What are the biggest challenges in Service Design projects?

In some projects you need to be sensitive to the ethical and moral responsibilities around your work. Sometimes we go into disadvantaged communities and get everyone really excited about things that might happen. How do we deal with the ethical and moral responsibilities of that? How can we make sure our solutions are sustainable? Sometimes it’s like designing yourself out of a job. You need to make sure the process can be sustained once you are gone. Another challenge can be convincing people of the value of what of what we do. Also, trying to make the intangible, tangible. For the ALISS project, to make a big information engine tangible for people, we pulled together four big desks and got someone to dress up as a train driver. We got people to tie wool from their table to the train and asked them to imagine the train was the ALISS engine and then to tell me what the inputs and outputs would be. It can be really tricky to visual and conceptualise things for participants. Once, we were going to dress up as social media tools. I was going to dress up as Twitter.

What would be your ideal Service Design project?

We’ve got a new coalition government in Scotland now. They are a hot topic at the moment. There is the “Big Society” concept which is all about changing the mindset of what it means to be a citizen. It’s exciting and I’d love to do a project around the Big Society in Scotland and try and help citizens understand what the government means by it, maybe test different ways we could implement it, or explain the value of it to people so they aren’t so cynical. It’s just a concept at the moment. We really need to look at the implications. Would it mean some public sector workers would become redundant? For example, if some locals get together to clean the community centre on a Saturday morning, does that mean the janitor is out of a job?

How do you explain your job?

I give examples to help explain it. I might ask them “Did you get a coffee on your way to work this morning?” and when they say “yes, from Starbucks”, I tell them a Service Designer looks at the whole journey – every single tiny detail of getting a coffee from Starbucks. When I tell people I’m a designer they might ask “clothes? websites?” and I tell them it’s more socially focused design and give them an example about turning all the chairs around in a medical waiting room because the layout was making patients anxious.

What advice do you have for people interested in working as a Service Designer?

Be a sponge, soak it all up, speak to as many people as you can. You’ll never get a toolkit or a how-to guide because there will never be one. That can be uncomfortable but I think that’s the beauty of it. Get out there and speak to people, learn by doing. Go and sit in McDonald’s and draw a journey map. Then, that’s it, you’ve done it, that’s a tool that Service Designers use. Live, eat and breath it. It’s a really great space to be in and an amazing field to work in.

Food Up Front is an organisation which supports people to put their balconies, gardens and windowsills to good use by growing their own food. Seb Mayfield from Food Up said he intially didn’t understand what designers could do for Food Up Front but was open to new ways of looking at his service offering.

Project background

The brief given to the students was to create something that would motivate young people to change their behaviour and attitude towards growing their own food.

Jonas Piet from Engine Service Design supervised the project. The group began by interviewing a range of young people who represented the target audience. Two personas were created which covered the broad range of customers from 16 year old school students living at home with their parents to 24 year old young professionals living alone.

The group then broke into 3 teams to develop their ideas. The result is three brilliant ideas that have filled Seb Mayfield with so much confidence that he’s keen to carry forward all three!

The Food Front

By Nikki Scott, Joel Longbone, Tom Maxwell

The Food Front is an entrepreneurial scheme for young people. The scheme supports young people of grow and sell their own fruit and vegetables, become an active part of their local community and gain real business experience. Alongside the scheme, a local representative will work alongside schools to introduce the scheme into the curriculum or into after school programs. The rep provides guidance and support and encourages The Food Front members to take the campaign to their local community.

Delayed Satisfaction

By Francisca Veloso, Jesus Selma and Argir Ziovsky

Delayed Satisfaction is a product which encourages customers to delight in the delayed satisfaction of growing their own food then invite their friends over share the fruits of their labour. Each pack contains two types of seeds which cleverly relates to a social occassion (the “Tea at 5” pack contains camomile and blueberry seeds). The pack also contains two pots, soil and recipes (blueberry muffins…mmmmm). The brief is to capture a younger audience so this product offers invovlement, interaction and education about growing food at home.

Know What You Grow

By Dmitry Uljanovs, Jelena Vorosilova, Karen Fok, Simone Marrett, Bex Hoy-Priest an Ritchie Hassan.

A fun and innovative idea, Know What You Grow is centred on a game concept to help motivate and excite young people. Starter Packs are sold at retail stores popular with young people. The packs contain everything the customer needs including three types of unnamed seeds and three serial numbers. Customers take the pack home then plant and care for the seeds. Once the plants are mature, customers log on to a website and try to identify their plants. If their serial numbers match their plants, the customer “wins” and receives gift vouchers for their favourite retail stores.

Great work, guys

I’m really impressed by the ideas generated by the students. It’s great to see students learning how design thinking can be used to analyse existing situations and result in new and innovative solutions. Great work, guys. Congratulations to everyone involved. More information about the project is available here.

Ezio Manzini is a leading expert on sustainable design. He “sits at the interface between design, community and social innovation with a focus on scenario building toward solutions encompassing both environmental and social quality.” He is Full professor in Industrial Design, at the Politecnico di Milano and Honorary Doctor at The New School of New York  (2006) and at the Goldsmiths College, University of London (2008). At the Politecnico di Milano he is Director of the Unit of Research Design and Innovation for Sustainability and coordinator of the Doctorate in Design.

Ezio will be running Masterclasses and (free) public forums in each city:

Masterclass: Next economy – enabling sustainable ways of living ($300)

Adelaide Monday, 12 July 2010 from 1:00 – 4:00 pm
Melbourne Wednesday, 14 July 2010 from 9:00 am – 12:00 pm
Sydney Friday, 16 July 2010 from 1:00 – 4:00 pm

This masterclass will explore how the interplay between social and technical innovation is opening up brand new opportunities.  How can we conceive and deliver “enabling solutions”?  How can individuals, businesses, institutions, associations and communities collaborate in the framework of viable business models to support sustainable ways of living?

Public forum: Small, local, open, connected (free)

Adelaide Monday, 12 July 2010 from 6:00 – 7:30 pm
Melbourne Wednesday, 14 July 2010 from 6:00 – 7:30 pm
Sydney Thursday, 15 July 2010 from 6:00 – 7:30 pm

The only sustainable way to get out of the current global financial and ecological crisis is to promote new economic models, new production systems and new ideas of wellbeing. To define and implement these new models is, of course, very difficult. But it is not impossible. And we do not have to start from zero.

More from Ezio Manzini

Here’s a few interesting pieces by Ezio Manzini:

Collaborative Services and Enabling Solutions

Ezio’s presentation at Service Design Symposium 2008.

An interview with Ezio Manzini from Service Design Research

“service design is, or could be, a powerful tool to promote sustainable changes.”

Design for Social Innovation and Sustainability

Ezio describes social innovation as a shift towards a new paradigm of business and lifestyle underpinned by sustainable values.

Low Carb Lane

When the team from Live|Work in the UK were asked to develop a bunch of new services to help residents to reduce their energy use they took a service design approach. The key design problem for Low Carb Lane was “how might energy efficiency be accessible, desirable and affordable for all – rich or poor, home owners and renters alike?” The key outcomes from their research was a home energy dashboard to provide real-time energy consumption information via a ‘energy dashboard’ on the resident’s televisions, computers and mobile phones. SaverBox scheme which allows households to install energy-saving products (such as insultation) then pay it off using the savings they make in their energy bill. For example if they saved £40, they pay off £30 and keep the £10 left over. It’s a win:win situation. (image by Gunna)

Green Homes Concierge

When a team from Participle was asked to design services which would help homeowners reduce their enery use they decided to move into a terrace in South London to explore energy saving from a homeowner’s point of view. The team also conducted research with 12 householders across London to gain insight and generate ideas about how to reduce energy use. From their research and insights, they developed Green Home Concierge – a service which offers expert, practical support for homeowners who want to make their homes more energy efficient and cheaper to run – while also reducing their C02 emissions and their impact on the environment.

Streetcar

In 2004 Live|Work helped Streetcar improve their service by taking a service design approach. They started by going through all the service touchpoints. They found 3 key barriers within the exisiting service:

• A small PIN code device that customers had to use to start the car was a huge problem. It was so difficult to use that everytime Streetcar got a new customer they had to go out and meet the customer and show them how to use the PIN code device.
• They also found that the £100 joining fee was a really big barrier for people – customers wanted to try the service before committing.
• And understanding was a big issue. Because Streetcar was such a new service in the UK, customers didn’t have any previous experience with similar services – so they had a lot of really detailed questions about how the service worked.

In the end the service was simpliefied into 4 steps: book, unlock, enter pin, then drive. This helped give the customer a concept of the service before they committed anything. They also removed £100 joining fee and the number of people who registered skyrocketed. (image by Gavin Luhrs)

Haringey Housing Services
Live|Work partnered with Haringey Council to develop new ideas for housing services and mentor council staff so they could then adopt a service design approach to their own work. The team included a wide range of people and specialists including housing staff, managers and policy officers. Workshops were facilitated with the team to give them a solid method and process for engaging residents and applying the insights they gained to create, test and define solutions to housing issues.
Twelve months on Haringey are on schedule in their task of reducing the number of people in temporary accommodation saving them significant costs. They also found the project brought about a cultural change within housing teams who are now much more prepared to listen to, consider and act on the issues faced by their residents.

Southwark Circle
In the UK service design has been used to create a new social enterprise called Southwark Circle which is delivering vastly improved aged care services for less money designed by elderly people for elderly people using local social networks to bring real improvements to people’s lives. Participle developed this service by using a service design methodology. They started off with two months of user research with older people and their families. They found that older people value a life based on participation and relationships that sustain their sense of dignity and control. Without this they are more likely to become depressed and unwell and ultimately in need of more care, perpetuating a vicious cycle of dependence.
Enter Southwark Circle, a membership organisation that helps people take care of household tasks, forge social connections and find new directions in life. It’s open to all, regardless of levels of need or income. Southwark Circle is made up of members (people over 50) and helpers. Members can get help from other members or helpers on things like DIY projects, gardening, cleaning jobs, and even things like getting a DVD to work or social activities like dinners together. Helpers have the opportunity to give something back to the community like teaching an older person how to use a computer, cleaning windows or picking up the shopping.
Southwark Circle was launched as a social enterprise earlier this year and it’s getting a lot of positive coverage. There are already plans with other local councils to develop a national model.
A promotional video for members and one for neighbourhood helpers is available on You Tube. (image by K’s GLIMPSES).

You Can Kingston
UK service design consultancy Thinkpublic worked with NHS Kingston on You Can Kingston, an initiative exploring future healthy living and wellbeing initiatives for the Cambridge Road estates.
Thinkpublic started by setting up a text message feedback line to gather ideas and input from residents. They then asked more than 60 residents on the Estate what makes them feel happy and healthy. These conversations were a way of starting a dialogue with residents and clearly understanding the challenges they face, in their own words. Three of these interviews are available on Vimeo (here, here and here).
These insights were then used as the starting point for a co-design to further develop ideas.
Local residents responded positively to the consultation process and this was the first time residents were engaged in this kind of collaborative and creative way. (image by thinkpublic)

Alzheimer 100
Still with Thinkpublic, they were asked to investigate ways to improve the everyday lives of people with dementia, their carers and service providers.
Thinkpublic started by conducting interviews with people affected by dementia. They then trained people with dementia in film-making and interviewing skills and asked them to interview those around them (which sounds like a very interesting contextual enquiry/cultural probe hybrid technique). The resulting insights and ideas fed into a full-day co-design workshop where participants voted on the ideas they felt would be most beneficial.
The whole process resulted in a number of recommendations for improvement, including a Dementia Signposting Service, a Mentoring Programme for Carers and the design of a safe “Wandering Garden”. The Dementia Signposting Service is now aiming for national implementation in the UK.

Migrant Workers Health
Mid Essex in the UK had high levels of migrant workers who were not accessing or using local health services. This was impacting on the health of individuals from these communities and adding strain on local health resources. But there was limited information on the health and lifestyle behaviours of this group due to cultural and language barriers and difficulties in locating and accessing communities.
NHS Mid Essex asked Uscreates to help. They took a collaborative approach conducting focus groups, in-depth interviews, co-design workshops and a Touring Café. Over the course of a week the Touring Cafe visited 12 workplaces (ranging from factories to care homes) and involved over 100 migrant workers. The Touring Café, I think, is a great idea. Many of the people who talked to Uscreates in the Touring Cafe said they would not have attended a formal style of consultation.
A co-design event was then conducted with migrant workers, NHS Mid Essex and Council employees, community development leaders and designers. Together they explored four of the key findings from the research:

• Lack of trust and belief in GPs and Dentists
• Language barrier to accessing and using GPs/Dentists/Hospitals
• Lack on knowledge about the NHS system and entitlements
• Health apathy/de-prioritisation of health

All up over 150 migrant workers were involved in the project and already changes in the language translation procedure have been introduced as a result of the research. Findings and recommendations were presented a couple of weeks ago and you can follow further progress at their blog.

Marc Fonteijn is a co-founder of 31Volts in Utrecht, The Netherlands. 31Volts is a service design agency specialising in design-driven innovation. Marc has a background in software engineering and found his way into service design 5 years ago. Apparently he has a fondness for donuts and wireless digital rabbits (well, that’s what Google Translate says). Marc’s a great guy and I really enjoyed our chat.

How did you start in service design?

It was serendipitous. About 5 years ago I met 31Volts co-found Marcel (a product designer) in the office building where we both worked. We collaborated on a concept project together and we really enjoyed it. We then stumbled on service design and noticed that the process was similar to what we were both used to. We loved the idea that design could be applied to intangible things. This lead to 31Volts (”31″ is the international calling code for the Netherlands).

What was your first service design project?

We responded to a request for quote from the Chamber of Commerce. Five big consultancies pitched for the project – and we won the pitch! 31volts was only 3 months old so it was a great boost to us.

The project focused on finding out what new entrepreneurs needed as they started their business. The Chamber realised they were facing a lot of competition (from other organisations and the internet) to provide assistance and information to entrepreneurs. They started to wonder “do we really know what entrepreneurs need?” So we used cultural probes to help get insight into what entrepreneurs really needed. We gave diaries to 20 – 30 people for a month. We designed  the themes and questions and and tried to encourage people to reflect on their needs and behaviours. We also ran co-design sessions with entrepreneurs and The Chamber of Commerce stakeholders in early 2007.

What have been some of your favourite SD projects so far

In the last 3 years we’ve done a lot of projects. We recently finished a project for the Minsitry for Infrastructure that we are really proud of. The Ministry is realising that people need more than just roads. They wanted to know what future services could the Ministry project to people that travel instead of just making new roads. We ended up developing 18 concepts. For example one of the concepts was around helping people to find a meeting spot so they don’t have to travel all across the country to meet. This means less travel time and less people on the roads. The concepts were clustered and analysed into 5 service scenarios. 1 or 2 of these will be converted into pilots in early 2010.  Our client was really pleased with the outcomes of the project and actually presented with us at Dutch Design Week 2 weeks ago.

Another one of my favourite projects was the Pleasant Platforms project for ProRail (a Dutch Railway organisation). The organisation wanted to know “how can we create a pleasant platform?” Normally they would just hire an architect to design the platform so it looks nice. But we helped them to get an insight into what a pleasant platform could be. We used a range of tools such as customer service journey maps, video interviews, observation and prototypes. While it was no surprise that waiting on a platform was a big issue for travelers, one of the most interesting insights was that as long as travelers were not standing still they didn’t consider themselves to be waiting. This led us to consider ways for people to not be passive on the platform so they don’t consider it waiting.

Our work with GG & GD Utrecht (difficult to translate, but a type of Dutch Utrect Health Association) was also really fun. The project aimed to find ways of promoting a healthy lifestyle for young people. Usually this kind of problem was “solved” around a boardroom table with a handful of business stakeholders. But when 31Volts joined the project we said “let’s ask the kids!” So we went to 4 public schools and talked to 16 years old. We video interviewed them and held a big codesign workshop with the kids and stakeholders from the organisation. During the workshop the stakeholders realised they had relied on a lot of assumptions and they could now see the reality!

What are the biggest challenges in SD projects?

The first steps of a service design project are fun – gathering insights, creating concepts, sharing ideas. Then something has to be done to implement the results of the project. This implementation means change for the organisation and this is often very challenging. Unfortunately this can sometimes be a breaking point for some service design projects.

Also, explaining the value of service design to clients can be challenging. When we are selling service design the outcome is unclear. This is not a challenge unique to serivce design – all design industries have the same challenge. For example, at the beginning of a graphic design project, no one knows what the outcome is going to look like. But this is more accepted in graphic design. It is more of a challenge for service design because of a lack of successful implementation – but this is changing. So at the initiation stage of a service design project all we can say to a client is that “it will be something good!” and the client needs faith in the project and the service designers.

What would be your ideal service design project?

It wouldn’t be just one! I really enjoy helping product-oriented companies to transform into service-oriented companies. I also like projects that focus on enhancing the customer experience, especially for healthcare or hospitals. These kinds of services need to be functional but should also result in happy clients!

How do you explain your job to your friends?

It depends on my mood! I’ll usually say “I design services” and then people look confused. It’s the same as explaining web design in 1995. Eventually service design will become more familiar to people.

What advice would you give anyone interested in working as a service designer?

Don’t quit! Persist. You need to be a marathon runner – not a sprinter. It will take time, so don’t give up. Strive to do something remarkable – do stuff that really matters. Try to make a difference.

Suze’s note: The links in this post point to 31 Volt’s website which is in Dutch. You can translate the pages using Google Translate.

Public Service Design Roundup – 5 Cool Projects

As I have been learning more and more about the user-centred design process, I started asking why government wasn’t using this process more often. To sate my curiosity, I took a little spin around the web to see what interesting public service design initiatives I could find.

A good primer was the 2008 Making the Most of Collaboration report by London-based ‘power and politics think-tank’ Demos. They took the pulse of service design with a survey of nearly 500 service agencies across the world. Over 90% claimed to have involved users in service design or development, to varying degrees, which is a pretty promising figure. They also saw a strong tension between the participative ethos and the top-down, siloed way of working that government agencies love so much.

1. Australian Tax Office Simulation Centre

Surprise for all you Aussies out there – the Australian Tax Office have been running a user experience simulation centre since 2003!

At the centre, they use all the familiar service design tools (participatory design, prototyping and mixed-skill design teams) to refine their services. I’ve enjoyed the fruits of these first hand, having been quite pleased with new features of their online tax submission app eTax, like the ability to suck in the interest figures from your bank accounts and your payments from other government agencies. This is leaps and bounds from the simple form-filler of a few years back.

2. Design for a productive ‘third age’

Southwark Circle is a membership organisation for older people in Southwark Council, London. For a small monthly fee, members are hooked in to a variety of volunteer transport, social support and government services, all with the aim of helping members enjoy a productive ‘third age’. This service was the result of two months of user research and co-design led by Participle in the UK. Their manifesto, Beveridge 4.0 [PDF] , is an interesting read, too.

3. Improving the lives of people with dementia

thinkpublic equipped people with dementia with filmmaking and interviewing skills to get a deep insight into their needs. Emergent service ideas were a “Wandering Garden” and a Dementia Signposting Service which is being prepared for nation-wide rollout.

4. Designing International Strategies

While there’s not a heap of info in English about it on their site, Dutch firm DesignThinkers seem to have their work cut out for them, having signed up for three years with the Ministry of Economic affairs to develop International Strategies and Service Concepts. Would love to see what comes out of this one.

5. Children’s hospital design (Batman, wash my window!)

…and back to the UK just one more time. Evelina Children’s Hospital in London was designed with children and their families through the whole process, right down to the menus. Some cool features came out of the process, like fold-down beds in all wards for parents to stay over and window cleaners dressed as superheroes.

Would be great to hear some tales from those of you that have been involved in selling service design to government agencies.

About Matt Daniel

Matt works on information architecture and web strategy for a Victorian State Government department in Australia. Matt is interested in the use of user-centred design techniques for the developent of public services on the web and beyond.

Would you like service design with that?

Service design is a new discipline which focuses on understanding what customers want, then designing services which meet their needs. Sound familiar? Web designers have focused on user-centred design for years to create websites and applications that are user friendly.

Service design is well established in Europe and North America and there’s already a handful of Australian businesses offering service design. What is it? Does experience in designing for screen interaction translate to designing services too? Will service design be the next big thing?

It was so much fun. People were very kind and generous with their feedback (here, here, here, here, here, and here).

During my presentation, Overlobe did a fantastic sketchnote:

Brian Phipps says brand managers should look to service design as a robust methodology to evolve brands. In the three-phase evolution of brands, service design can move a brand towards being a service and unlock more value than a product alone could provide.

Phipps also argues service design is more strategic than traditional brand myths and symbols: “Because service design is customer-focused and results-oriented, it contains more strategic potential than traditional brand myths and symbols. Brands built on symbols, myths and stories are not strategic. They’re customer dead ends.” I couldn’t agree more.

It’s great to get people’s perspective on service design from other disciplines. I’m looking for more of this type of stuff.

1. Look at your service as a product
Just like products, good services need to be connected to good business strategies.

2. Focus on the customer benefit
Focusing on benefits for customers might involve rethinking the organisation.

3. Dive into the customer’s world
Service design explores the emotions and experiences and helps customers to explain more about their own desires.

4. See the big picture
A customer’s service experience might start long before their first interaction with the provider (such as discussions with friends and family). Services are embedded within largers systems of interactions and relationships.

5. Design an experience
Service design uses techniques that have their roots in interaction design, experience design and performning arts.

6. Create perceivable experience
Service design strives to make the invisible visible and the not yet existing perceivable.

7. Go for a standing ovation
The service performance needs to be supported by a designed setting that meets the needs of the “actors”

8. Define flexible standards
100% standardisation of production sites is not applicable to services.

9. A living product
The service system should invovle an “open membrane” between the customer, employees and environment”

10. Be enthusiastic
The corporate culture has a major impact on the quality of the service.

This list is a summary of Birgit Mager’s 10 Service Design Basic Cards.  Unfortunately, it’s currently out of print.

“Service Design aims to ensure service interfaces are useful, usable and desirable from the client’s point of view and effective, efficient and distinctive from the supplier’s point of view.”

I’ve seen a lot of definitions for service design lately. Here’s a collection of some of them:

The Copenhagen Institute of Design’s definition of Service Design
Service Design is an emerging field focused on the creation of well thought through experiences using a combination of intangible and tangible mediums. It provides numerous benefits to the end user experience when applied to sectors such as retail, banking, transportation, & healthcare. Service design as a practice generally results in the design of systems and processes aimed at providing a holistic service to the user. This cross-disciplinary practice combines numerous skills in design, management and process engineering. Services have existed and have been organised in various forms since time immemorial. However, consciously designed services that incorporate new business models are empathetic to user needs and attempt to create new socio-economic value in society. Service design is essential in an knowledge driven economy.

Wikipedia’s definition of service design
Service Design is the activity of planning and organizing people, infrastructure, communication and material components of a service, in order to improve its quality, the interaction between service provider and customers and the customer’s experience.

Frontier’s definition of service design
service design is a holistic way for business to gain a comprehensive, empathic understanding of customer needs.

UK Design Council’s definition of service design
Service design can be both tangible and intangible. It can involve artefacts and other things including communication, environment and behaviours. Whichever form it takes it must be consistent, easy to use and be strategically applied.

Continuum’s defintion of service design
Developing the environments, tools, and processes that help employees deliver superior service in a way that is proprietary to the brand.

Engine’s definition of service design
Service design is a design specialism that helps develop and deliver great services. Service design projects improve factors like ease of use, satisfaction, loyalty and efficiency right across areas such as environments, communications and products – and not forgetting the people who deliver the service.

live|work’s definition of service design
Service Design is the application of established design process and skills to the development of services. It is a creative and practical way to improve existing services and innovate new ones.