By Jamin Hegeman and Alex Nisbett
These are: • Design and business collaborating: what working, learning and building together looks like, what works, what doesn’t? • Measuring success: What? Where? When? How? • Service Design and how it works at different levels within organisations • Not everyone who creates a service calls themselves a service designer • Service designers designing business, businesses designing services • How does the business community view service design? • How organisations access service design • What makes a successful (service) design business? • Marketing service design • What might designers learn from business and vice versa • What will service design look like 5, 10 or 15 years from now?
“We’re particularly interested in understanding the impact that service design is now making on organisations’ bottom lines and in hearing just where the compelling stories of designing business strategies, monetising service propositions and cultural change are coming from.” We will also be maintaining our focus on the practice and business of service design itself: examples and case studies, yes, but
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also on how to buy and sell service design and what the design community can learn from business and vice-versa. We are really excited about the conference, especially as we’ve had over 4 times the number of submissions in our call for contributions that we can accommodate. The response to the theme has been very positive from all quarters, and there are some big names vying for a spot on the conference stage. We’ll be announcing speakers as they are confirmed, so look out for them on the conference website. As this edition of Touchpoint goes to press, there are still two months before the conference itself and much is still to be finalised, so make sure you check the website for details on the following activities and sessions: The development of students and recent graduates is close to all out hearts and an explicit remit of the SDN, and we are currently planning a Student Workshop activity on Wednesday 19th. We have many ideas for a theme and an approach, and we have been especially careful to listen to feedback from previous participants and their tutors. Aside from content relating to the conference theme, there will also be a strand supporting those needing to build their initial understanding of the basics, so the Service Design 101 sessions will be designed to prepare participants for the rigours of the rest of the conference.