Some very exciting changes are taking place at the Service Design Network. Throughout the last 13 years, SDN has evolved from a network of passionate academics and practitioners, which shared thoughts and collaborated on small research projects, to an open community that we facilitate and encourage, creating evidence for service design as a strong and relevant discipline.
Today, SDN has become a strong creator of content, publications, reports and initiatives. We’ve become a really genuine and inspiring network that strengthens the idea of service design as a driver for success in the public and private service sectors.
Throughout recent years we have sharpened our strategy. Our main purpose is to build awareness for service design in the public and private service sectors, and in the world of policy makers. We have grown to become, among other things, a promoter of service design as a discipline.
"I strongly believe that by promoting service design, we will also strengthen the market for our agencies, we will strengthen the opportunities for our academic members, and we will strengthen the relevance of service design industries." – Birgit Mager, President of Service Design Network.
We will continue to facilitate communications. We will continue to curate platforms for exchange, but we will, more than ever before, create content that is relevant for the community and for the growth of service design.
The difference is evident at first glance. We are giving a fresh and modern identity to SDN. Implicitly, this change also symbolises a new level of maturity: we have evolved from a facilitator for the service design community, to a curator and creator of content. This is what the new brand, the logo and the website stand for.
The most evident benefit for our members is that access to our digital platform is a lot easier. The content is organised in a much more inviting way. Members can create and upload their content. The personal member profiles are more fun and attractive – they show more of the creative personality of SDN, and its members.
The Service Design Network has a continuously growing community of associated members – people that follow us, that join in our conversations and that are loosely connected to SDN. With the new era of SDN, we want to embrace them and give them an official space as community members. And there is an abundance of content for these community members associated with SDN.
The impact that we have as a lobbying organisation is strengthening the discipline of service design – this impact will be bigger the more members and community members we have. So we are opening up – we are embracing everyone who is passionate and interested in service design.
Service design as a practice will accelerate its growth. It has been growing continuously over the last 20 years, but now it has reached a point of massive acceleration. It becomes apparent when we see companies hiring more service designers, companies that are building their own service design expertise within the organisation and companies acquiring service design agencies. We see a growing market with many opportunities for service design as a strategic instrument and as a hands-on practice to improve and innovate service experiences for users all over the world.
The Service Design Network will be the driver for this development. We will connect the inspiring people, and we will equip our community with knowledge, methods and the tools they need in order to successfully apply and evolve service design.
This year, the Service Design Network will publish its second Service Design Impact Report – and the health sector is in the spotlight!
Due to high demand the Service Design Award 2017 deadline has been extended to June 27th! It is the premier international award for service design. The Award recognises work of an exceptional standard in the field of service design by both students and professionals.
We loved being a part of the 2nd international Service Design Day! Congratulations to everyone who got involved because you managed to make an even bigger buzz than last year, which means more people than ever now know about the amazing power of service design!
Service designer Mikko Koivisto has won the Ornamo Award of 2017. Koivisto, the Lead Service Designer and Customer Experience Director of the Hellon service design agency, is one of Finland’s first academically trained professionals in service design. He has been involved in developing this field both in Finland and abroad.
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