Service Design Show

Isn't it funny... Even though we live in a world which is dominated by services still many organisations have a very strong product mindset. And I get it (sort of). Products are tangible, easy to measure, perfect to manage. Everything a CEO wants right? Well, you as a service design professional know that product centric thinking is harmful. It creates silos, destroys the customer experience and i...

As a service designer you never stop learning. But as you may have noticed already textbooks will only get you so far. Pretty quickly you'll want to discuss details and nuances of our practice that aren't easily captured in traditional literature. So how do you continue developing your skills once you reach that point? In the old days you would join a guild. The bakers, blacksmiths or brewers. Tod...

There is a clash... A clash between existing business logic and service design. For instance the focus on value extraction versus value creation. The difference in an open versus hierarchical workstyle. And the emphasis on statistical versus empirical evidence. If not dealt with in the right way, this clash creates tensions which prevents you from making a positive contribution through your work....

This week's episode of the Show is a pretty remarkable one. You're going to hear the story of how design has not only survived, but is actually thriving within one of the most challenging environments... a bank. Our guest in the episode is Alex Guazzelli. Alex is the head of design at the largest financial institution of Latin America and has been part of this journey from day one. Today he leads...

Imagine that your organisation would fully embrace design? There would be much less friction between how you work and how the organisation operates. When you'd see an opportunity to improve something and make a positive contribution with your skills you could just go for it. Unless you're one of the lucky few, most service designers still need to fight hard to get support for their way of working....

Okay, I know it sounds almost impossible but it really happened… A fellow service designer named Delia told me that she has crafted an elevator pitch for service design that is really effective for her. How effective? Well she used this pitch and it landed her a speaking opportunity on the first encounter with someone at a random networking event. Pretty amazing. ============ Build your own perfec...

If you're asking really good questions, you're going to get better results. This is a quote from the conversation with Warren Berger. Warren is the author of The Book of Beautiful Questions. Definitely one of my favorite books from 2021 that I'm sharing left and right. So I was really excited that Warren agreed to come on the Show and share his thoughts with us. Of course we address a lot of quest...

Did you know that people are looking up to you? *** LEARN MORE ABOUT THE CIRCLE https://servicedesignshow.com/circle/ *** Sure, part of the identity of a service designer is to stay in the background, act as the facilitator and let co-creation guide the way forward. Humbleness could be our middle name. These are great traits that we definitly shouldn't lose but they aren't enough… Because when you...

There is a dangerous trap in the ways you use to capture the needs of the people you're designing for. Of course, you have constraints and need to make design decisions. And the saying is true that if you're designing for everyone you're essentially designing for no-one. So there are a lot of tools and methods to describe who it is that you're designing for. Personas, empathy maps, customer avatar...

Okay, we all know that delivering tangible value in service design can be hard. You often have to deal with a lot of constraints that you have no control over and the distance to the end-users can be immense. So how do you, despite these obstacles, still make progress? And at the end of the day feel that you're actually contributing something valuable. This was exactly the question that was discus...

I'm sure you've experienced it... You put your heart and soul into your work, you try to create value through design, you have an optimistic mindset. But whatever you do, you always feel like there's a mysterious organisational force pushing against you. It's the "organisational dark matter" that makes your life as a service designer so much harder. But there's hope. As the design director at Live...

Are you an in-house service design professional? Have you ever wondered... * How can I show evidence of progress in my work? * How do I set the right expectation about what I do? * Where can I have the most impact? Well, you're definitely not alone. In this video 5 in-house service designer who participated in the Campfire, openly share their thoughts on these questions (and more) with you. Even i...

Polestar is the manufacturer of one of the most iconic electric cars at this moment. So you can imagine that I was really excited when the opportunity came along to have a conversation with Christian Appelt, their head of service design. Making service design work within a company that is organized around a strong product is a challenging task for sure. But when I heard that their ambition is beco...

Everything in service design starts with user research. But as you've probably experienced often it's challenging to get the time and resources to do proper research. And when research is already being done by an organisation it's often not the type of research that we'd like to see. It can be frustrating to see that user research isn't making the difference you know it can. So what does it take t...

Take a guess... How much time do you invest to learn something during your week? It's a lot. We learn all the time in order to grow as a professional, a team and an organisation. Heck by reading this email you're learning something (hopefully). Most learning happens organically and on the fly. Which is totally fine. But when you deliberately want to bridge a gap in knowledge, skill or experience i...

Here's a question that makes every service designer cringe... Can you show (prove) the impact of your work? So what makes this such a tough question? Well the value created through design is emergent and appears in shapes and forms that you didn't expect upfront. It's often hard to capture the benefits and outcomes using traditional ways of measuring successes (excel sheets). Nevertheless it's not...

Design is often described as a problem solving approach. But what if you didn't have to solve problems... What if you could let problems disappear by dissolving them? Let me give you an example. Now that we can't do regular school exams due to the pandemic we look for new ways to still do exams. That's solving problems. Dissolving problems is about figuring out how we can achieve the same goals wi...

What's it like to be an in-house Service Designer the Swedish Tax office or the fashion giant Zalando? In this episode of the Service Design Show you're going to get a sneak peak behind the curtains. You'll hear about the challenges in-house service designers face. And of course get some practical tips on how to navigate around them! Even if you're currently not working in-house I think you'll fin...

How can I as a service designer, be of more value to my organisation? That's the question we're exploring in this weeks episode of the Show. And the answers we find will surprise you! So yeah, of course you want to work on challenges that matter. You want to make a difference. But all too often designers are still not heard within enterprise environments. And you know what that means. When this ke...

Now be honest with me... What is the first thing you think about when you hear game design? Badges, points, rewards? Gamification? Minecraft? Well, in this weeks episode you're going to hear a completely different story. Together with Andy Morales I explore how game dynamics can be used in the word of service design. It's quite amazing that this topic hasn't been covered on the Show before as ther...

"I didn't sign up to be making wallpaper." That's a quote I can strongly relate to from this conversation with Jim Kalbach. As service designers we want to make a tangible impact on the world around us. For that you need to make sure that your work gets "shipped". If you fail to do that you're often just making wallpaper as Jim said. And the stakes are high because if you fail to ship you run the...

Have you heard about Workplace Empathy? It’s a powerful movement championed by dr. Emma Jefferies. The idea is that too often we leave ourselves at the (remote) door when we put our professional hats on. This is a recipe for a lot of nasty things like work related stress and burnouts. The antidote to this might be closer than you think. What would happen when you employ the same levels of empathy...

Does your life get easier when you're embedded within an organisation as a service designer? Or do you run into the same challenges as the rest of us? In this special episode of the Show you'll get a unique "behind the scenes" look from 8 in-house service designers who participated in the recent Campfire. Next to this you'll also get some very practical tips on how you can be more successful when...

Expectations of design. Everyone has them. What it is. How it works. The value it can create. Often these expectations are implicit. This is especially challenging when you’re working with business people who don’t necessarily think like a designer. Of course you believe in the power of design and want to live up it’s promise. So it can get really frustrating when you feel you’re not able to live...

A big part of your job as a service designer is to make services easier. Easier to find. Easier to navigate. Easier to use. Why? Because this not only makes the life of your customer easier but also yours. As you know creating services that offer a coherent experience across the board comes with some implications. In order to accomplish this organisations have to work across silos and have adopt a...