Service Design Show

This can't be true... It was a revelation that left Mauricio Manhaes in disbelief. A disturbing pattern emerged during his research on what it means to cultivate a design-driven culture in everyday work. Doing research is much like connecting dots, where individual stories often lack groundbreaking insights. However, unexpected patterns can suddenly emerge when you look across these stories. A...

It's the magic ingredient (and blind spot)...Trust. It's not a topic that gets much attention in the service design space, but it's the secret sauce you need to get people on board with your ideas. Trust is the linchpin whether it's your colleagues, clients, or CEO. That's why, in this week's episode, we dive into what it truly takes to cultivate a deep sense of trust with...

It's not a walk in the park... In fact, calling it challenging is a major understatement. What we, as service design professionals, often need to tackle some could described as brain surgery. But I bet they didn't teach you that in service design school. They certainly didn't for me. But why the analogy to brain surgery, you ask? According to our guest, Perrin Rowland , who serves as t...

What's the impact? What happens when you can translate the value of service design in a way your business leaders understand? Does your daily work transform? How does it influence your projects? Does it open doors to new challenges? Does it boost your career? Many theories abound, but why not hear it straight from the pros who are bridging this business-design gap? In this episode, six service...

It feels like an absolute no-brainer... Involving our users in the design process. We've all seen the outcomes of services that neglected this step. In the best case, these services that looked great on paper just get no adoption in the market. In the worst case, they cause harm to certain communities. Within service design, we know that co-designing solutions is a way to minimize this risk gr...

In this episode, we dive deep into DesignOps and its rapid adoption by leading companies worldwide. Personally, I'm a strong advocate for DesignOps. I feel it holds the potential to unleash, or at least significantly contribute to, the full power of design within organizations. The fact that you're reading this tells me that you probably also feel design needs to operate at a more strategi...

Imagine not just designing one service... But shaping your entire organization so that it keeps improving the services it offers, continuously. Yes, it's a much bigger challenge, yet the reward of creating a highly service-oriented organization is immeasurable. But let's be real, redesigning an entire organization isn't a task for the faint-hearted. You're tinkering with an establi...

What does the good life mean to you? And can you design for it? I had the pleasure of speaking with Diana Albarran Gonzalez recently, who firmly believes in the power of design to shape a better future for individuals, organizations, and our planet. She challenges the prevailing Western-centric and industrial philosophies that often prioritize extraction and exploitation over our collective well-b...

Okay, this might sound a bit strange... But whether or not you can drive change within your organization has little to do with the quality of your work. Often it's the (lack of) enabling factors around you that determine how impactful you can be. So in this week's episode, we take a step back from our core service design practices and focus on the external conditions that influence our wor...

In this episode, we dive deep into the insights and experiences of Patrick Quattlebaum, co-founder of the renowned service design agency Harmonic Design. With Harmonic's recent 5th anniversary, I seized the opportunity to discuss what Patrick learned along this journey. You'll hear inspiring perspectives on the challenges of running a service design agency, the essence of effective leaders...

This one was a challenge... I'm trying to summarize the episode you'll hear with Adam Lawrence and explain why you would want to tune in. Ironically, of the key takeaways from the conversation is that words can be very limiting, especially when dealing with challenges that involve complex intangible human experiences. This is why you see many other, richer forms of communication being used...

Which do you prefer? A service that simply gets the job done. Or... a service that not only gets the job done but also helps you express your values and identity. If you choose the second option, you're in for a treat. This week's episode is all about decoding the design of meaningful services. But first, let's take a moment to acknowledge that the things we buy often reflect our value...

We must have him on the Show... That's what crossed my mind when I came across Jaryn Miller's recent LinkedIn post. Jaryn is the service design manager at Headspace Health. You might know Headspace from their popular meditation and mindfulness app, but these days they do a lot more. So I reached out to Jaryn with an invitation, and luckily, he said accepted. Our conversation took us on a p...

How can you enhance your collaboration skills? One of the charms of service design is that you always need to involve people from many different disciplines to achieve meaningful outcomes. And as the challenges that you're working on become increasingly complex, effective collaboration becomes more crucial than ever. However, not all forms of collaboration are created equal... Understanding th...

Is design facing a leadership crisis? If you’re nodding in agreement, you’re not alone. As service design professionals, we know the power of our craft to create meaningful change. Yet, we often struggle to find the support necessary that allows us to have a long-lasting impact. And when those around us in leadership roles fail to advocate for the value of design, progress stagnates, and burnout b...

What does it take to unlock the full potential of service design? That was the burning question in my recent conversation with Jung-Joo (JJ) Lee . As you know, service design's true value goes beyond delivering specific artifacts or running workshops. However, the prevalent narrative around service design in recent years suggests that it is a codified process with specific outcomes that can be...

As service designers, we often face the challenge of sustaining momentum for change after the initial excitement of a project. It's easy to get caught up in the research and ideation phase, but true success only comes from making a tangible impact on our customers. If you've ever struggled with getting your insights to stick, you're not alone. Recently, Lisa Salamone hosted a session i...

Have you ever thought about... what a sustainable service looks like? Nowadays, we have a pretty good idea of what sustainability means for products, but I would argue not so much for services. The language around sustainability resides very much in our material world. We talk about carbon emissions, reducing waste, and moving towards circularity. But services aren't made up of atoms. Our desi...

How do you scale service design from 10 to 100 inside an organization? That’s what you’ll hear in this conversation with Doug Powell. But first, let me tell you a personal story. My car was leaking oil. It started with small drips but got worse over time. The idea of having to take the entire engine apart wasn’t something I was looking forward to. So we tried to “solve” the issue by tightening nut...

I almost can't believe it... Colleagues for the entire org are lining up and asking for service design. That's what Niamh Parsley said when I asked her about the biggest change that happened in the last two years.  Niamh is the Senior Design Manager at the world's #1 music streaming service, Spotify. When Niamh joined Spotify, only she and one colleague were waving the service design flag. Bu...

I'm sure you know them. Services that made you smile, made you feel special, made you feel... human. Unlike the bland and ordinary services that quickly fade from our memory, they are the services that we remember and look forward to. The secret behind these exceptional services is the emotional connection they create with their users. But creating this emotional connection isn't easy. Luckily, th...

Okay, take a guess... Which services are probably the most challenging to design? I argue that it's the services that your users don't explicitly ask for. Wait, what?! Who designs services that their users don't ask for? Well, your government does. A lot. Think of public services like collecting taxes, keeping your street clean, and providing quality education, and helping to alleviate poverty. Th...

What is the secret... How do you get non-designers to appreciate the value of service design? It’s also a question that keeps coming back over and over again. And I get it. Clients hold budgets, internal stakeholders have decision-making power, and you need your colleagues to pull projects off. If you don't get these people on board with your work, you risk paying a high price. However, when you k...

Journey Mapping is, without a doubt, one of the most important tools we use. We spend a lot of time and effort to create the most impactful maps we can.  It’s all part of the job: * Dozens of workshops * Hours doing user research * And weeks of sensemaking. The perfect journey map. Success! But what comes after the map?  Unfortunately, in most cases, it’s used... and then stowed away. &n...

Journey mapping is reaching its limits. Sure, journey maps and mapping work fine at a small project or team level.  But it quickly breaks down when you want to organize around the journey, at a bigger company scale. In order to do this, you need something that goes beyond mapping. But before we dig into what that is, let's look at why journey mapping breaks down: Everyone has their way of doi...