1) Can you explain what service design is? And how your company implements it / uses that field?

A service is when one person or organization acts to create value for another--a customer, client, or citizen. Services increasingly involve multiple interactions in various media over time, such as digital or in-person. 

Service design seeks to understand the holistic service experience through those connected interactions, and to know what is meaningful and valuable to people from the service. Service design teams then improve it by orchestrating the series of interactions to be more valuable-ideally to both the customer and the provider. The best service design practices look at individual services, broad service portfolios, and the entire service ecosystem to provide the needed context to make the best decisions.

With my clients our focus is on value--how do we make something work better for people, and how to make it work better for the organization.

2) What do you believe is the greatest opportunity for your company using service design? 

The greatest opportunity for our clients as they use service design as a trojan horse for the deep organizational transformations required to compete both today and tomorrow. Understanding the desired service experience creates a touchstone and a lens to view different elements of the organization and align around creating a positive experience. 

3) Can you share three tips for implementing service design in their own practice? 

1. Start with lived experience--get out into the field and see how services work today.
2. Codesign solutions with customers and with staff to build buy-in and generate more robust ideas.
3. Think of a given service as a gateway to trigger organizational change and transformation.