Service Design and Process Engineering — the perfect match!
I am a Service Designer who works closely with Process Engineers, tackling problems and creating solutions that put our customers first. I started my journey as a Service Designer making solutions that were very conceptual, and over time I have learnt that I needed to make my designs more tangible so that they could come to life. To make this happen I had to learn to work closely with the Process Engineers in my team who could look at my designs with a different lens.
In this article I’d like to share with you how I’ve become a better Service Designer because of this relationship and how I’ve learnt that by asking different questions these two disciplines can come together to understand the customer experience holistically and ultimately design better solutions together.
Why they are both important disciplines in delivering a service experience
A theatre performance is a nice example of how Service Design and Process Engineering can come together to create a great service experience. In her article “Service Design 101” S. Gibbons describes how Service Design would craft the ‘frontstage’ what the audience would see and interact with, such as the music, stage design and actors. Process Engineering would define the ‘backstage’ — the people managing the set in the background, controlling the lighting and sound etc [1]. The performance would not be successful if both didn’t work together to make it happen.
Collaboration between the two fields is essential. Process Engineering helps you understand how things work, whilst Service Design helps you understand how those processes impact the customer. Both disciplines aim to create a better colleague and customer experience and, when working together, even better outcomes are almost guaranteed.
I experienced the success of this relationship when trying to convince my stakeholders to replace an entire legacy system. These are tricky conversations to have — trying to balance the needs of the business and customers plus having technical constraints being thrown into the mix. Since understanding the value of collaboration between Service Design and Process Engineering, I feel like a much stronger Designer and can talk holistically to the benefits of my designs (the “how” and the “why”). I have also found that this collaboration has led to a greater sense of comfort and trust from my stakeholders.
Two ways in which the two disciplines can collaborate
1. Service Blueprinting
Reaching solutions together and collaborating can happen in many ways but my first experience of bringing these two disciplines together in a very tangible way was co-creating a service blueprint.
According to Gibbons, a service blueprint is a diagram that visualizes a service by showing the relationships between people, technology, processes and touchpoints [2] it is a great tool to identify service gaps and areas for optimization.
It is usually the core responsibility of a Service Designer to create but, it cannot be done alone because it requires mapping multiple layers of a service experience. [JD(1] You will need input from multiple teams, especially Process Engineers, in order to get all the information you need.
Service blueprinting enables you to gain a collective understanding of the problems you are solving across all touchpoints in the customer journey. Whilst Service Designers map the customer journey/steps, Process Engineers map the required processes and system integration points.
Here’s an example by N. Gilson of a simple service blueprint for a restaurant service experience. It clearly shows how the Service Design and Process Engineering lens have been applied [3].[JD(2] You will see that the Service Design lens focuses on the front stage, like making a reservation and being greeted by the restaurant staff, whilst the Process Engineering lens focuses on the backstage actions and supporting processes, like the chef preparing the food.
2. Research & problem solving focused on different aspects
As a Service Designer your focus will be to conduct extensive customer research to understand the customer experience across the different touchpoints. Whist you do this, your Process Engineering team will focus on understanding what systems, teams and processes are in place.
Both teams will ask different questions and relay their answers and new ideas back to each other in order to get a holistic view. After this research you should be able to define a problem statement, and then identify the key pain points in the customer and areas for improvement in the backend together.
An example of this collaboration can be seen by looking at the customer messaging and communication in a service experience: The Process Engineers would map the systems, technology and people responsible for communication delivery. In parallel, the Service Designers would focus on understanding what the customer is feeling and thinking when they receive this messaging, and whether they understand the message.
Designing a better solution together
Two disciplines looking for different things and asking different questions will almost guarantee a successful design. This collaborative approach will not only allow you to understand the situation at a deeper level, but also help get buy-in from your stakeholders.
I have realised in reaching my own solutions that ‘the what’ is only an idea, until you can transform it into something more tangible — understanding ‘the how’. When you see for yourself, the symbiotic partnership between these two complimentary disciplines and the results that can be achieved, you won’t ever want to go back to looking at problems from one perspective!
References
[1] S. Gibbons. 2017. Neilson Norman Group. Service Design 101. [Online] Available: https://www.nngroup.com/articles/service-design-101/
[2] S. Gibbons. 2017. Neilson Norman Group. Service Blueprints Definition. [Online] Available:https://www.nngroup.com/articles/service-blueprints-definition/
[3] N. Gilson. 2020. Miro. How to make effective service blueprints. [Online] Available: https://miro.com/guides/service-blueprints/
