Marc Fonteijn of 31Volts is running an experiment and collecting quotes on service design from various bloggers on this topic. As a follow-up to the definition of service design by the Copenhagen Institute of Interaction Design, Marcel of 31Volts invited me to participate, and here we go:

Service Design is the design of value creating offerings by aligning intangible processes and incorporating tangible products to create remarkable customer experiences.

Some other interesting definitions are:

Good service design is the process of deliberately crafting our experience and delivery of services, to make them more valuable for the people that use and provide them. - Nick Marsh

Service designers work with companies and governments to orchestrate their encounters with people. - Jeff Howard

Read these and other "one liners of service design" at the 31Volts blog.

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Many “experts” talk about user experience without knowing the fundamentals. The doctoral thesis “Interactive user experience design : creating an effective online experience” authored by Park Ji-Yong is a must-read for everyone who wants to know more about this topic. The fundamental concepts to understand user experience design are explained and a framework to develop and implement them is described. It’s academic but definitely readable for non-academics.

Designing for user experience is central to good web design, particularly in e-commerce settings. However, the relevant dimensions and processes of designing for user experience have been variously defined. This project develops an approach to web design that defines the key dimensions of user experience, including interactivity, participation, and flow, and web site design of the user experience. The idea of Interactive User Experience Design is advanced as a model for designing from the perspective of user experience. The project reviews relevant dimensions of user experience, proposes a model integrating key design dimensions of this experience, surveys design literate university students on effective online experiences, and develops a prototype for a hypothetical commercial web site that incorporates elements of co-creation and identity play. This practice-based project contributes a new proposal for web-based design and new knowledge in the form of an approach to user experience design.

Download the full thesis from the Australian Digital Thesis Program.

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AIGA, the American Institute of Graphic Art, in collaboration with Cheskin, published a primer on ethnography and its role in design.

Great design always connects with people. Designers inspire, provoke, validate, entertain and provide utility for people. To truly connect, designers need to have compassion and empathy for their audiences. Designers need to understand the relationship between what they produce and the meaning their product has for others. And they need to observe the people they are designing for in their own environments.

Ethnography informs design by revealing a deep understanding of people and how they make sense of their world. Ethnography is a research method based on observing people in their natural environment rather than in a formal research setting. When ethnography is applied to design, it helps designers create more compelling solutions.

The guide also introduces guidelines how ethnographers and designers can work together to incorporate ethnography into the design process.

Read more or download the primer directly [pdf].

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A lot is written about innovative companies and their visionary leaders yet most of these stories focus on the usual group of companies: Apple, Starbucks or Google. Telling stories of this small group of “elite innovators” is easy but to gain new insights one has to go beyond this group of companies to discover something new.

FastCompany recently published their 2008 ranking of the world’s most innovative companies and the list provides fresh insights into innovation beyond the “usual suspects”. They are of course included but most interesting are the stories about the less known innovators.

Here is a selection of a few of these companies, the full list can be found online at Fast Company “Presenting the 2008 Fast 50“:

#13 AFFYMETRIX

Imagine going for a half-hour doctor’s visit and coming out with a treatment plan tailored to your unique genetic blueprint. That’s the vision at Santa Clara, California-based Affymetrix, which makes lab tests that scan tissue samples for variations in thousands of genes. The company banked an estimated $405 million in revenue last year, a payday spurred by the Amplichip test — developed in partnership with Roche Diagnostics — which identifies people who metabolize drugs slowly and therefore are especially vulnerable to side effects. Now the race is on to develop advanced tests for genetic predisposition to heart disease and the most common types of cancer.

#30 OMNITURE (See Full Profile)

Omniture is like an intelligence upgrade for the Web. It provides thousands of clients, from Bank of America to JetBlue, with real-time information about how visitors use their Web sites; those visitors, meanwhile, find an increasingly personal experience rooted in previous behavior and interests. And the data derived from this sort of high-IQ interaction have made Omniture an essential tool for improving its return on online ad spending.Last year, it managed $500 million in keyword spending that led to $10 billion in actual commerce. “We want to change the online experience,” CEO Josh James says. “If consumers are happy, everyone is happy.” James certainly is: Omniture grew about 80% in 2007, with sales topping $140 million.

#43 AIRASIA (See Full Profile)

Seven years ago, former music exec Tony Fernandes paid 25 cents for an ailing carrier with two creaky planes and $12 million in debt. Today, AirAsia’s bottom-of-the-pyramid strategy has created one of the world’s fastest-growing, most-profitable carriers, with the lowest operating costs in the industry and fares as cheap as $3. “It’s like our bus,” says Yap Choo Ying, who runs a market stall in eastern Malaysia and now regularly jets to Kuala Lumpur to see her grandkids. In November, the Malaysian company made a risky bet by going long-haul, adding flights to Australia; this year, it will add flights to China and India, where billions of people have yet to take to the skies.

#48 AKQA (See Full Profile)

Most interactive-ad shops master either the creative or the technical; AKQA is expert at both. Whether building a Pixar-quality interactive online universe for Coke’s breathtaking “Happiness Factory” campaign (below), or masterminding a multimedia “alternate reality game” for Microsoft’s Halo 3, the digital powerhouse doesn’t just dream up mind-bending ideas, it actually writes the code that brings them to life. Which is why, after five consecutive years of profitability, AKQA is one of the most dangerous global forces in the ad industry. While ad holding companies and tech firms spent billions in 2007 to snap up digital shops, AKQA fended them off, opting instead for a $250 million investment from private-equity firm General Atlantic. In the meantime, the 700-person agency boosted revenues 39% to $100 million and added new clients such as Unilever, DoubleClick, and Cadbury Schweppes — on top of existing accounts with Nike and McDonald’s.

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IDEO, the world’s most famous design and innovation consultancy, has recently launched a new website for their latest project “EyesOpen”. IDEO’s “method” for designing innovative products and services is built on gaining insight and inspiration rather than improving brainstorming capabilities (see a speech by Tim Brown, CEO of IDEO, on this topic). EyesOpen is the virtual platform to share these inspirations moderated by IDEO but welcoming submissions from everyone.

IDEO believes that forward-thinking design and innovation comes from a combination of insight and inspiration, and that the greatest ideas mean very little if you can’t experience them firsthand. EyesOpen guides and tours are ongoing projects that aim to draw inspiration from culture and communities and the experiences they create, while the EyesOpen website seeks to explore emergent ideas by tying them to concrete experience.

IDEO is on the “crowdsourcing” bandwagon by inviting everyone to submit their stories and observations on certain topics.

This site is a forum for doing just that—sharing fresh experiences that are happening now, in the moment—as well as an opportunity to learn from others. It is a cross between cool hunting and cool thinking. And you are invited to join in on the fun. An eclectic combination of IDEO hosts, guest hosts, and creative and curious folks like yourselves provide the content.

The topic of next month is about aging and everyone is invited to participate:

What will happen to urban spaces, services, healthcare, exercising, nursing homes—and to society in general when 20% of the population is over 65? Will society be transformed for the better or will intergenerational conflicts mushroom? Will boomers move back to cities or stay in the suburbs? Will they retire like their parents or reinvent the notion itself?

Visit IDEO EyesOpen.

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