Rosenverse

This video is only accessible to Gold members. Log in or register for a free Gold Trial Account to watch.

Log in Register

Most conference talks are accessible to Gold members, while community videos are generally available to all logged-in members.

What is the role of service design in product-led organizations?
Gold
Tuesday, December 3, 2024 • Advancing Service Design 2024
Share the love for this talk
What is the role of service design in product-led organizations?
Speakers: Andy Polaine and Lavrans Løvlie
Link:

Summary

One of service design’s early principles was the move away from the industrial, siloed mindset and to think in terms of connected ecosystems. In the last 10-15 years, the rise of the product-led organization has brought efficiencies but also allowed organizations to slip back into industrial, siloed models. Increasingly, service design is being employed to provide a connected view across product teams, but this raises important questions. Where should service design sit in the org? Who should they report to? How should service design best interact with and enable product teams without clashing with product operations? In this session, Service Design: From Insight to Implementation co-authors Lavrans Lovlie and Andy Polaine invite service design and product practitioners to share their experiences and principles for service design operating in product-led environments.

Key Insights

  • Service design often acts as a horizontal glue connecting siloed product teams in product-led organizations.

  • Despite well-designed individual products, companies struggle to bundle services due to disjointed customer journey designs.

  • Many organizations lack a clear home or reporting line for service design, which reduces its power and influence.

  • Language matters: framing service design in business terms is critical to securing funding and leadership buy-in.

  • Product management has successfully captured business language and resources, sometimes leading to siloed structures.

  • Service design is often practiced under different names and disguises within organizations.

  • Enablers for service design include leadership sponsorship, integrated tooling (like journey management platforms), and cross-team collaboration.

  • The shift from industrial assembly-line organizational thinking to ecosystem thinking remains a challenge.

  • Access to the right conversations, meetings, and communication channels significantly affects service design effectiveness.

  • Service design’s role in product-led organizations requires balancing strategic storytelling with practical integration methods.

Notable Quotes

"Service design is product strategy."

"Lots of service design is happening but it is in disguise."

"If you’re not on the invite list, it’s almost impossible to do the right work."

"Product teams have done excellent work in their own silos but struggle to sell bundled services."

"Organizations have a finite pot of money and many more initiatives than resources."

"The shift from an industrial assembly-line mindset to ecosystem thinking is the core of what service design proposes."

"Language matters, so does money, and how you connect to business determines your funding."

"Service designers are often brought in to fix the cracks that open up when teams work in silos."

"The people work—the conversations and relationships—are a large part of the work, not just obstacles."

"Many places don’t call it service design but are doing service design activities in practice."

Ask the Rosenbot
Margot Bloomstein
Fostering Trust in Your Brand and Beyond (Videoconference)
2020 • Enterprise Community
Daniela Magaña Flores
Ahead of Competition: Learn What UX Benchmarking Can Do for Your Business Today
2022 • Advancing Research 2022
Gold
Bria Alexander
Reflect and Chart Forward
2021 • Civic Design 2021
Gold
Brigette Metzler
Scaling ResearchOps: Helping Researchers do Their Best Work
2020 • Advancing Research 2020
Gold
Louis Rosenfeld
Welcome / Housekeeping
2023 • Enterprise UX 2023
Gold
Steve Baty
Breaking Out of Ruts: Tips for Overcoming the Fear of Change
2016 • Enterprise UX 2016
Gold
Sam Proulx
Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About Screen Readers
2021 • Design at Scale 2021
Gold
Josh Clark
Sentient Design: New Postures for AI-Mediated Experiences (2nd of 3 seminars)
2025 • Rosenfeld Community
Joseph Meersman
Sweating the Pixel: Scaling Quality through Critique
2021 • Design at Scale 2021
Gold
Silke Bochat
5 Antifragile Strategies for a DesignOps 2.0
2024 • DesignOps 2024
Gold
What DesignOps Can Learn From DevOps
2017 • DesignOps Summit 2017
Gold
Smitha Papolu
Theme 3 Discussion
2024 • Enterprise Experience 2020
Gold
Ana Maria Montero Barrantes
The Authentic UX Talent Show
2024 • Enterprise Experience 2020
Gold
Daniel Orbach
Zero to One: Co-Creating Operating Models with your Team
2024 • DesignOps 2024
Gold
Marisa Bernstein
It Takes GRIT: Lessons from the Small, but Mighty World of Civic Usability Testing
2021 • Civic Design 2021
Gold
Tim Parmee
Changing Our Design Pressure Points
2023 • DesignOps Summit 2023
Gold

More Videos

Angelos Arnis

"Collaboration should include stakeholders often not traditionally represented, like marketing, sales, and customer support."

Angelos Arnis

Navigating the Rapid Shifts in Tech's Turbulent Terrain

October 2, 2023

John Calhoun

"Prioritizing design ops work is tough amid competing priorities and limited time and budget."

John Calhoun Rachel Posman

Bring your DesignOps Story to Life! The Definitive DesignOps Book Jam

October 3, 2023

Alfred Kahn

"Look at your partnership with product and engineering as a design task—understand their pressures and needs."

Alfred Kahn

A Seat at the Table: Making Your Team a Strategic Partner

November 29, 2023

Dan Willis

"Apologizing is the most magical healing restorative gesture human beings can make."

Dan Willis

Enterprise Storytelling Sessions

June 3, 2019

John Maeda

"Understanding computation is critical to understanding modern tech, more so than design alone."

John Maeda Alison Rand

About Design Organizations (Videoconference)

May 13, 2019

Anat Fintzi

"I learned I had to stop asking questions and start telling them what I was thinking, then say tell me what you think."

Anat Fintzi Rachel Minnicks

Delivering at Scale: Making Traction with Resistant Partners

June 9, 2022

Uday Gajendar

"Temporary, quick, and sometimes rough artifacts have a lifespan just long enough for the conversation they enable."

Uday Gajendar

The Wicked Craft of Enterprise UX

May 13, 2015

Kristin Skinner

"We’re seeing a shift away from attribution to focus more on impact on the experience itself."

Kristin Skinner

Theme 1 Intro

September 29, 2021

Maish Nichani

"Before stage in customer journey is so important—it sets customers up for success by making pages findable and clear through SEO and self-assessment tools."

Maish Nichani

Sparking a Service Excellence Mindset at a Government Agency

December 9, 2021