VISUAL at ServDes 2014

The ServDes conference brings together top researchers and practitioners working in the area of service design and service innovation. ServDes 2014 was held in Lancaster from 9-11 April, and focused on how Service Design is contributing to ‘Service Futures’ and how it is developing as a field of research and practice.

ServDes provided an excellent opportunity to exchange information and knowledge on new research and best practices with a diverse group of colleagues. VISUAL contributed with two papers at the ServDes conference.

“Components of a Visual Language for Service Design”. This paper introduces the VISUAL language and how it was applied in two industrial case studies.

Abstract: The increasing interest in service design implies the need for more formal approaches to the analysis, conceptualization, and implementation of services. In particular, this is critical when multiple actors, such as designers, developers, and managers are to apply a service design approach for a customer centric transformation of the organization and its service offerings. In this paper, we present key components of a formal language for the modelling of customer journeys. The language is developed, in particular, to support customer journey analysis and design; its formal character is meant to facilitate an unambiguous communication of a customer journey throughout a service organization, and to bridge the current gap between fuzzy front-end service design and service implementation. Application of the language is illustrated through case studies from a large web-based service provider and a power company.

To download the full paper click here -> http://www.ep.liu.se/ecp_article/index.en.aspx?issue=099;article=028

“Service Archetypes – a Methodological Consideration”. This paper discusses how service archetypes can be used to overcome challenges of sharing experiences in practice based research.

Abstract: In practice based research, especially when working with non-research organisations, sometimes researchers face challenges related to the willingness of participants to openly share experiences outside the realms of the project. As a consequence there are methodological challenges with showing results, and working with knowledge verification. In this paper we suggest that some of these obstacles might be dealt with by using service archetypes. These form a neutral basis on which the developed design knowledge may be applied.

To download the full paper click here -> http://www.ep.liu.se/ecp_article/index.en.aspx?issue=099;article=043