Peter Horvath(This series of posts is based on my literature review – ask me for sources in the comments.)
Tools ensure that customers can express their ideas towards the organizations, and organizations can interpret these systematically. They range from personas to service blueprints, from participant observation to prototypes, etc. Almost all tools in service design aim co-creation in some shape or form. But some publications highlight co-creation as a category, and some as a tool in and of itself. This create ambiguity.
Still, service-design-specific publications really shine at listing and detailing these specific customer-facing tools of co-creation in a hands-on matter. Earlier publications fall short of structuring and categorizing these, but later ones provide guidance on when to use which tool, and even bundle them into frontstage processes, like the hip Design Sprint.
When it comes to structuring the tools, most publications follow a “research-ideate-prototype-implement” type of structure. One reviewed paper acknowledges service design is continuous, and needs to scale, and thus adds a new phase, ‘manage’. One reviewed book acknowledges that service design must fit into a goal-oriented organization, and adds a “measurement” phase (see in a later post).
Yet another book takes tool-structuring even further, creating a triad it calls the “space between model” (see below). This more holistic view combines tools with the valuable dimensions of participant people (see also earlier post), co-creation environment and processes (again, only frontstage combination of tools, and not end-to-end processes). These three elements set the right conditions for the co-creative “space between”, which is a “source of creative potential”.
However, I find a gap in what high-level, more theoretical publications expect from tools, and what practical publications provide with tools. Theoretical publications expect opportunities that shift the one-sided power balance favoring companies today, to allow consumers to continuously engage with each other and businesses in a way that is meaningful to them, and reach the heart of the organization. But practical publications only describe inquisitive one-time engagements, where consumers are sometimes passive but at best reactive, and from the side of the organization only facilitators and front-office staff are directly engaged.
In my opinion, the promise of co-creative companies cannot be achieved by tools alone. Tools need to fit into a robust end-to-end process to deliver on co-creation’s grand vision.
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