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 greatly and to deliver services that meet the needs of our users. Yet, involving users in a meaningful way...
Aug 31, 2023•56 min•Ep. 183
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 strategic level and not be confined to surface-level challenges. DesignOps plays a crucial role in creating an envir...
Aug 17, 2023•52 min•Ep. 182
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 established system that has steered the company for years, propelling it to where it is today. In my view, we don't have a ...
Aug 03, 2023•57 min•Ep. 181
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-being. To transform our design practice and prioritize the greater good, we must embrace diverse pers...
Jul 20, 2023•55 min•Ep. 180
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 work. During a deep dive session in our Circle community, Ben McCammon shared a valuable health check framework...
Jul 13, 2023•57 min
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 leadership, and the future of our field. We also delve into the highly anticipated sequel to his co-authored book, ...
Jul 06, 2023•1 hr•Ep. 179
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 in service design. We love to visualize, prototype with LEGO and even act things out. And what we find is t...
Jun 22, 2023•1 hr 1 min•Ep. 178
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 values. Some of the most successful products allow us to express our identity through them, like driving a Tesla, wea...
Jun 08, 2023•53 min•Ep. 177
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 profound personal journey. It became clear that Jaryn is on a mission—a mission to foster inclusivity and equ...
May 25, 2023•49 min•Ep. 176
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 the differences between them can make the distinction between a smooth journey with great results and a ro...
May 18, 2023•42 min
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 becomes all too common. But here’s the good news. You can lead the change today, regardless of your j...
May 11, 2023•1 hr•Ep. 175
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 applied to almost any situation. While this storyline might make it easier to initially "sell" service ...
Apr 27, 2023•53 min•Ep. 174
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 in our Circle alliance where members shared their experiences on sustaining momentum. We discussed practical tips...
Apr 20, 2023•43 min
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 design "materials" are things like time, experiences, relationships, processes, etc. So this brings us back ...
Apr 13, 2023•55 min•Ep. 173
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 nuts, double-checking every seal, and adding fresh oil. As you might have guessed, the problem of cours...
Mar 30, 2023•1 hr 3 min•Ep. 172
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. But today, over 50 design professionals across every area of the company are spreading the practice. How did...
Mar 16, 2023•49 min•Ep. 171
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, there's a proven "tool" that can help you do it - rituals. Think for a moment about the rituals in you...
Mar 02, 2023•58 min•Ep. 170
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. These are often the "forgotten" services that are so important in order to maintain the wellbeing of o...
Feb 16, 2023•50 min•Ep. 169
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 know how to play the game well, you increase your chance of doing more meaningful and fulfilling work...
Feb 09, 2023•58 min
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. The map becomes single-use artifacts, forgotten. Used once, then too difficult to keep updated for when a new desi...
Feb 02, 2023•59 min•Ep. 168
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 doing it; there is no standard. It's hard to get an overview across multiple journeys. Identifying and priori...
Jan 26, 2023•50 min•Ep. 167
Imagine that you'd get the opportunity to join an intimate dinner party. A dinner where you're accompanied by some of the brightest people in our field. And where you'd get the chance to explore a thought-provoking topic. Would you enjoy the evening? That question was going through my mind when I was thinking about how the Circle community should feel. Now, almost two years after the first "dinner party" at the Circle, it's time to take score. So I sat down with two members of the Circle for a f...
Jan 19, 2023•44 min
I have a family with two small kids who are quickly growing up. The challenge many parents, including me, encountered was... how do we keep our home somewhat clean and tidy. My initial and naive strategy was to pick up everything left behind. But this strategy breaks down pretty quickly, as you can imagine. So then I tried to distribute the responsibility to everyone in the family. If everyone does their part, it should be a minor task, right? But of course, it didn't take long before I realized...
Jan 12, 2023•57 min•Ep. 166
This can transform your business strategy... That's what I thought during my recent conversation with Indi Young. Indi recently published a book titled Time to Listen. Here's my summary of the book. It teaches you how to design services that are less harmful, more accessible, and in the end, better for business through the "simple" act of listening. Basically, transforming open and honest conversations with your customers into one of your most valuable assets. But if it's that easy, why isn't ev...
Dec 22, 2022•1 hr 6 min•Ep. 165
Let's build a *system* of journey maps! Hold on there... do you know what you're getting yourself into? Journey maps are great. They help you align people, processes, and resources around your customers' needs. This leads to a more efficient organization, happier employees, and less frustrated customers. But as you might have experienced, journey maps also tend to spiral out of control pretty quickly. You start with a simple map that is adequate to get the job done. Then you slowly but surely st...
Dec 16, 2022•57 min
You need to fail... Yes, I said it. Because failure is the fastest way to success when you're innovating. But it's surprisingly hard to fail. And this is a major problem. Why, you ask? Well, in our service design practice, failure is part of prototyping. You have an idea, you create something, you try it in the real world, learn from what happened, and based on that, improve your solution to repeat this process. See what I did there? You try and learn, that's the key. Trying something, you actua...
Dec 08, 2022•1 hr•Ep. 164
When you asked me to play the piano, I can assure you that nothing close to music would come out. Would we, at that point, say that the piano is broken? That would be silly, right? Somehow, this is the typical approach when organizations bring in design. When design doesn't fully deliver on the expected outcomes, it's the process that is declared faulty. Mauro Porcini is the Chief Design Officer at PepsiCo. In his career, he has seen many design-driven initiatives fail, and some succeed. This le...
Nov 24, 2022•50 min•Ep. 163
I'm sure you've heard this before... "You can't design for everyone." That's a fundamental principle in a good design process. In the end, design is all about making choices. And one of these choices is defining who you are designing for. But here's an interesting question: Can you design with a specific user in mind without excluding others? This sounds a lot like a paradox, right? So why bother trying to solve it? Because if we don't, we are creating inequality and harm. This isn't exclusive t...
Nov 10, 2022•53 min•Ep. 162
Think for a moment about a hard conversation you needed to have about a topic that really mattered to you. This could be a conversation at work or just in your private life. Now, what if... that conversation went down in your memory as exciting, productive, and fun? What if it almost felt like a game? Sounds too good to be true, right? Well, according to Fred Dust, that's exactly what's possible and even what's necessary. According to Fred, we have almost entirely lost the ability to have hard c...
Oct 27, 2022•57 min•Ep. 161
Sustainability is the innovation frontier of the 21st century -- and if you don't get on that train, you'll be lost. This quote emerged during the recent conversation with Bhavi Patel and Heydn Ericson on the Show, where we explored the intersection between circular and service design. As it turns out, you, as a service design professional, are in a great position to push a more sustainable approach forward. Yes, even if it's currently not a priority in your organization. In this episode, you'll...
Oct 20, 2022•50 min
