Do you know (not only) your customers but also your stakeholders?

QUALITY  The measures are more often qualitative than quantitative –  (And includes more than just the smile of the pig serving you)  Look at Servqual

I did some RESEARCH into how managers develop new or improve existing services (in short, how they were designed)  Transport  Charities  Health  Banking & Insurance  Public & Private Services  (Not education)

SERVICE DESIGN MANAGEMENT can be defined as -  THE ORGANISATION OF THE PROCESS FOR DEVELOPING NEW SERVICES  So you need a process  Only 20% had a written design process

Market Research  Almost half do NO research for new services prior to their development. Do You?  Many rely on ‘me too’ development or even on ‘customer complaints’.  ‘Attending cocktail parties’ is not an adequate investigation of the market!

The better you understand your customers the better will be your service.

Written specifications are the key controlling documents  Less than half the respondents had seen a specification in the past seven years  (and most of those who had, described an inadequate document).  What are your specifications like?

So write down all you are going to do before you do it It is the best way to highlight problems, interrelationships and contradictions

The Product Design Specification

A new product strategy document.  Less than one third of respondents had seen a document that outlined a clear strategy within their organisation.  Do you know where your place wants to be?

Designs role How can design inform the strategic plan? Design: exploratory Design: directional Design: integrative Design management can be the key to effectively using design at each level Design can act as the ‘glue’ between the key activities and the informal and formal Can flourish in environments characterised by change Can operate on multiple levels A design need?:

The Conclusions from the Research The Conclusions from the Research  Service design is still not managed in an organised manner.  As such, most service organisations are not in adequate control of their new services  Only 17% had an effective process.  And most of these generated a greater turnover from recently developed services.

All this means is that you don’t have to be very good to be better than the competition!

Technological Challenges and Opportunities  When introducing technology, introduce just one or two aspects at a time and then introduce more technological sophistication when users have become familiar with the first level of technology.

Technological Challenges and Opportunities  The misused application of technology can turn a bad process into a slightly faster bad process which helps the customer little and can increase costs a lot.  We have become wiser and now apply technology to genuinely improve products and services. Technology can improve services and can be used to make people feel special and individual.

Why are so many services difficult to use? Ease of use has been found to be near the top of what customers want from a product. Generally, if products are designed for the elderly and disabled they will be easier for use by everyone. This is known as ‘Inclusive Design’.

Technological Challenges and Opportunities  This means a greater emphasis in design, through the use of ergonomics to make products easy to use so that customers fully benefit from the technology that is on offer.  Don’t expect customers to read user manuals

If your service is difficult to use it is not the fault of the user - IT IS THE FAULT OF THE ORGANISATION PROVIDING THE SERVICE TO BE MORE ACCURATE – IT IS THE FAULT OF THE PERSON WHO DESIGNED THE SERVICE! – IS THAT YOU?

Technological Challenges and Opportunities  Design so that additional features could easily be added. This aspect of design is known as Platform Products (Wheelwright and Clark 1992, Meyer and De Tore 2001) where a basic production platform is developed with the intention of building new features into it at a later date.

THE IMPORTANT ELEMENTS OF DESIGN SPECIFICATION Reliability Maintainability Aesthetics Safety Price Ergonomics

So how do you define success? It brought good publicity to the organisation. The customers liked it. It will bring a smile to the faces of children. We won awards for it. It is a flagship product. We show it on all our publicity. It was a technological breakthrough.

By all means have these - but THE MAIN MEASURE OF SUCCESS HAS TO BE FINANCIAL– even in education!

The performance customers want from each U.S.P. Performance Function X Maximum customer performance required _________ ___ _ _______ XX X Minimum customer performance required _________ ___ _ _______ XX Design > Parameter

HOW DO CUSTOMERS USE YOUR SERVICE?

Jan Carlzon, then President of Scandinavian Airlines, said in 1980  ‘All instances where customers come into contact with our organisation constitute ‘moments of truth’ – unique, never-to-be- repeated opportunities for us to distinguish ourselves memorably from competitors’.

“HELLO – HOW CAN I HELP YOU?” I HELP YOU?” Use mystery shoppers

Plot the route that customers go through when using the service Also plot what is going on in parallel Find the ‘critical path’ and ‘bottlenecks’ Re-evaluate process Redefine and apply design to the process with enhancing ideas EFFECTIVE TOOLS: It is difficult to design a service without Blueprinting

Consider J.I.T. in the service sector – it works better  In manufacturing Work-in-progress ties up space and money  But it doesn’t complain. In a service it is people waiting – usually in comfortable surroundings  In manufacturing the worst type of inventory is finished goods – all the value has been added  In services, people go home

Queuing techniques (but don’t design a better waiting room – design it out of the system!)