This week opened with a distinction that sounds simple but actually reframes how you think about what you are designing. A service is not a product. Products are tangible, you can own them, hold them, and they are the same every time you encounter them. Services are intangible, they are experiences and interactions, and crucially they are heterogeneous, meaning the experience depends on who delivers it and the context in which it is delivered. No two haircuts are identical even in the same salon.
Another important distinction is that products are produced first and then consumed, whereas services are inseparable from their production. You cannot package a haircut and sell it on a shelf. The making and the experiencing happen at the same time. Products also tend to exist within services rather than independently of them. A bus ticketing app is a product but it sits inside the wider experience of using a bus service. Understanding that relationship is important when you are designing in this space.
We were asked to think of a service experience that had stuck with us as an example of good design in practice. The one that came to mind for me was a recent visit to the Apple store to get my laptop repaired.
From the moment I walked in a team member approached me immediately, which already set it apart from most retail environments where getting someone's attention can feel like an effort in itself. I was guided to book in with the Genius Bar for later that day and within the hour I received a call letting me know an earlier slot had become available. The whole experience felt considered and proactive at every stage. Nobody waited for me to ask for something. The service anticipated what I needed and moved ahead of it.
That experience is a good illustration of something that came up in the lecture. How people feel when using a service is a direct reflection of how it was designed. Good feelings do not happen by accident. They are the result of deliberate decisions made at every touchpoint.
At its most straightforward, a service is something that helps people do something. Service design is the practice of intentionally shaping how that help is delivered, across every touchpoint, for every person involved.
A book recommendation that came up this week was Good Services by Lou Downe, which frames service design around the idea that a good service is one that is easy to find, clearly explains its purpose, and delivers what it promises without requiring the user to understand how it works behind the scenes. It is on my reading list.
The lecture also introduced the four orders of design as a way of understanding where service design sits within the broader discipline.
The first order is graphic design, covering print, signs and symbols. The second is industrial design, covering products and textiles. The third is interaction design, covering services and experiences. The fourth is systems design, covering businesses, organisations and governments. A fifth order was also mentioned, the planet, which frames design responsibility at an ecological and civilisational scale.
Service design sits at the third and fourth orders, which is part of what makes it feel so different from the visual and product focused work I had done before this module.