Designing Services as a Knowledge Creation Process.

Designing Services as a Knowledge Creation Process Integrating the double diamond process and the SECI spiral To be published in Touchpoint – The Journal of Service Design (v.2 / n.2) Maurício Manhães, MSE Gregório Varvakis, PhD Tarcísio Vanzin, Dr In the Touchpoint Volume 1 No. 3, Tether and Stigliani raised fundamental questions about the future of service design: how to build legitimacy, how to control – or lose control of – a profession, how to coordinate efforts between its entrepreneurs, practitioners and academics. They focused on knowledge. We tend to agree that “successful professions are associated with strong bodies of knowledge” (p. 37).

Perhaps, we are sympathetic to that argument because we are from a Knowledge Engineering and Management Post-Graduate Program at the Brazilian Federal University of Santa Catarina, UFSC. The foundation Knowledge management and service design have a lot to offer to the processes of service innovation. The academic literature contains countless citations connecting innovation and knowledge creation and innovation and design.

Some researchers affirm that design is of decisive importance for innovation: “Behind every innovation lies a new design”, says Baldwin and Clark (2005, p. 3).

Moreover, in the economy of knowledge, where the continuous iterations between innovation and competition require an unstoppable flow of new designs, knowledge management has the theoretical resources needed to clarify and assist in understanding innovation as a knowledge creating process in organizations.

Service Design can play a central role in the processes of service innovation and, thus, generate value for organisations. It is clear that Service Design has to present itself through a narrative that makes sense to the world of management and organisations.

Likewise, presenting a method that can be understood and absorbed by managers will facilitate adoption of Service Design practices by its own practitioners and by organizations in general. This effort is in line with what Tether and Stigliani write about the need to “substantiate the industry as a whole” (p. 37).

Service Design can also be understood as a knowledge-creation process. Design and innovation are both knowledge-creation processes. The similarities can be clearly seen. Then, why not create an “interdisciplinary bridge” between the two fields and exchange concepts and theories to the benefit of both?

The method 1

The bridge is based mainly on two constructs: (a) the "double diamond" design process of discover, define, develop and deliver proposed by the Design Council (UK) and (b) the “spiral of knowledge” – as one of the elements of the knowledge creating process (NONAKA ET AL., 2000). Also known as the SECI Model, the spiral of knowledge is a widely accepted knowledge management model. Basiclly, it states that “an organization creates knowledge through the interactions between explicit knowledge and tacit knowledge” (NONAKA ET AL., 2000). These interactions occur into four modes of knowledge conversion: socialization (tacit to tacit), externalization (tacit to explicit), combination (explicit to explicit), and internalization (explicit to tacit). As can be seen in Figure 1, this sequence of knowledge conversion forms a spiral.

Figure 1 The method proposed in this article is not "new". In fact it results from minor adjustments of practices used by many service design agencies. In a sense, much of the "novelty" of this method lies beneath its surface—in establishing an academic rationale for each step.

In brief, the proposed method consists of a series of divergent idea generation steps followed by convergent idea selection steps (RIETZSCHEL ET AL., 2006). The method also establishes a conceptual link between the design process and the 2

Darwinian “blind variation and selective retention” process, as suggested by Simonton (1997). That is, an alternating series of divergent steps (blind variation), followed by convergent steps (selective retention). As Simonton (1997, p. 67) explained, in “the long run, creators must lack foresight regarding the sociocultural merits of their ideas. If it were otherwise, we would have to consider creators a special class of prophets”.

Dorst and Cross (2001) note that the design process involves “co-evolution of problem/solution spaces”. In that process, combinations of problem/solution are selected and tested. This usually requires a heavy cognitive effort from the participants. That effort can be eased through the use of multimodal imagery (as the use of role-playing, pictures, drawings and all kinds of maps) and the understanding of the knowledge creation process (knowing that the creation of knowledge, i.e. innovation, may be facilitated by a dynamic process starting with socialization and continuing through, externalization, combination and internalization).

As illustrated in Figure 2, the proposed method is divided into three stages: Prefield, Field and Post-field work.

In the first stage, mapping and research of a particular value network occurs and a focal point is determined. That network, related to the service under investigation, defines which participants are going to join the process of socialisation at the beginning of the second stage. This definition is made through the mapping of the customer/provider relationships. During fieldwork, multiple multimodal records are produced about the experiences and expectations of participants with regard to the service at hand. These records support the externalization and the combination of knowledge.

In the end of the second stage, each participant prepares a reflection or selfquestioning text. This step facilitates internalization (which is the last step before the spiral goes to the next ontological level). This last record, like all the others, is collected by the organizers of the process. A few days later, the self-questioning message is sent to each. That ends the Field work stage and the internalization mode of knowledge conversion.

The fieldwork provides service designers with sufficient information and knowledge to start a process of designing a new value proposition for the service being studied—the third and final stage of the method.

This article focus mainly on the Field work stage of the proposed method. Future research aiming at the Post-Field stage is necessary and will probably reap greater benefits for the practices of service design. Even so, one of the most important contributions of this work was bringing together an interdisciplinary theoretical foundation for this emerging field, answering the call from Tether and Stigliani. We believe that only through a strong body of knowledge will service design be able to stand the challenges of time.

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Further details about the “diamonds” and “spirals” method can be obtained contacting the authors.

Figure 2

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References: BALDWIN, C. Y.; CLARK, K. B. Between “ Knowledge ” and “ the Economy ”: Notes on the Scientific Study of Designs, SCIENTIFIC STUDIES OF DESIGNS AUGUST. p.1-41, 2005.

DORST, K.; CROSS, N. Creativity in the design process: co-evolution of problem– solution. Design Studies, v. 22, n. 5, p. 425-437. doi: 10.1016/S0142-694X(01)00009-6, 2001.

NONAKA, I.; TOYAMA, R.; KONNO, N. SECI, Ba and leadership: a unified model of dynamic knowledge creation. Long range planning, v. 33, n. 1, p. 5–34. Elsevier, 2000.

RIETZSCHEL, E.; NIJSTAD, B.; STROEBE, W. Productivity is not enough: A comparison of interactive and nominal brainstorming groups on idea generation and selection. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, v. 42, n. 2, p. 244-251. doi: 10.1016/j.jesp.2005.04.005, 2006.

SIMONTON, D. K. Creative Productivity: a Predictive and Explanatory Model of Career Trajectories and Landmarks. Psychological Review, vol. 104, no. 1, pp. 66-89. doi: 10.1037/0033- 295X.104.1.66, 1997.

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