www.ijdesign.org

International Journal of Design Vol.5 No.2 2011

Service Innovation Through Touch-points

important to emphasize that the design, processes and insights it

offers are very early and are offered as part of the emerging inquiry

into methods and their uptake in service design. The sections that

follow therefore need to be read as an exploratory, case related

inquiry that seeks less to be declarative and solution-centred but,

in keeping with the tenor of design itself, aims to also ﬁnd issues,

better identify them and communicate them.

The AT-ONE Project

This work is part of the AT-ONE research project. AT-ONE is

developing process support, and tools, for cross functional teams

during the ﬁrst stages of the NSD process. The AT-ONE method

helps teams map, ideate and conceptualise potential new services

through a structured series of workshops (Clatworthy, 2008).

Each of the letters of AT-ONE relates to a potential source

of innovation in services, and the letters can be seen as a set

of lenses through which a service can be viewed. The method

therefore runs workshops with focus on each of the following

lenses:

A– New combinations of ACTORS who together can provide

improved services

T– Orchestration and development of TOUCH-POINTS to

provide innovative services

O– Developing new OFFERINGS that are aligned to brand

strategy

N– Understanding customer NEEDS and how new services can

satisfy them

E– Designing customer EXPERIENCES that impress the

customer

The work described here relates to the development of the

method for innovation in touch-points, the letter T in AT-ONE.

This work can be utilized for innovations based exclusively upon

focused workshops on touch-points in which cross-functional

teams work together.

Design and Implementation

The research approach taken was one of participatory action

research (O’Brien, 2001) in which the author was involved in

planning, developing and evaluating the support tool through

several iterations together with commercial service providers

using innovation briefs of commercial relevance.

The Choice of Cards as an Innovation Tool

The idea for developing a tangible tool emerged when we started

running workshops in the AT-ONE project three years ago. As

part of the Touch-Point workshops, we found ourselves using

touch-point examples to help with both mapping and analysis

(before a workshop) and for idea generation during the workshops

themselves. In addition, we identiﬁed a need for activities that

help build project team cohesiveness, common understanding and

common goals.

Within service design, one of the early successful large-

scale initiatives was the RED programme, coordinated by the

Design Council in the UK. One of the projects within RED was the

Diabetes Agenda (RED, n.d.) in which patients were given agenda

cards as a preparation for a health consultation. The cards were

considered a great success by the stakeholders, and this, together

with the need for examples in workshops, inspired us to look into

cards for the AT-ONE project. When we looked more deeply into

research on design for collaborative teams (Molin-Juustila, 2006),

and cards or games as an innovation support tool (Brandt, 2006;

Brandt & Messeter, 2004; Halskov & Dalsgård, 2006) we found

considerable support for the development of a tangible tool. One

of the motivations for using cards was the important role that they

can play for forging team collaboration towards a common goal.

Brandt (2004) describes this as follows:

... movements within a community of practice has both open

periods in which creativity and discussions have room to unfold

and more narrow periods characterised by consensus and/or

decision-making, including the location of these in physical

artefacts. (p. 128)

Brandt refers to the participatory design tradition in design,

in which physical manifestations are a central part of the process,

something she describes as reiﬁcation, which is “the process

whereby people within a community of practice create physical

artefacts on the basis of a common understanding of the practice”

(Brandt, 2004, p. 128). We were interested in developing a tool

that could support group processes through reiﬁcation for a

service. We saw this as both a challenge and opportunity, since

services are often described as immaterial and experiential rather

than tangible. The idea of developing a tangible tool to assist

with the development of an intangible service was particularly

appealing.

Use Context/Requirements Speciﬁcation

Based upon existing research into touch-points, the needs of

cross-functional teams and card-based tools, the project therefore

developed a card-based tool to assist with the following seven

goals:

Team building for cross functional teams:

1. To build a common understanding of touch-points and their

role as part of a holistic service design.

2. To assist with team cohesiveness, team culture and mutual

respect within the team for different disciplines and views.

Analysis and mapping:

3. To gain an overview of the multiple touch-points used during

the customer journey.

4. To identify critical touch-points during the customer journey.

5. To understand the limitations and possibilities of each touch-

point that the company utilised.

6. To identify who is responsible for design, development and

maintenance of each touch-point.

Idea generation:

7. To generate ideas regarding how to innovate through changes

in touch-point usage, design or implementation.