Society and Purpose – Service Design and Saving the World

Lecture Material

Service design terminology was introduced by Lynn Shostack in 1982. Shostack was a marketing professional in the bank industry. Following this, it was introduced at the Köln International School of Design in 1991 by Prof. Dr. Michael Erlhoff and became recognised as a design discipline specifically. 2001, the first consultancy Liveworks opened its London office and is still active today. 2004 the KISD created the international service design network (SDN). Again, this is still active today with more than 100 members. Finally, 2016 introduced a specific date to celebrate service design which is 1st of June. Source

In the book This is Service Design Thinking, there are five key principles of service design which
are:
• User-Centred: People are at the centre of the service design. User friendly.
• Co-Creative: Service design should involve other people, especially those who are
part of a system or a service.
• Sequencing: Services should be visualised by sequences, or key moments in a
customer’s journey.
• Evidencing: Customers need to be aware of elements of a service. Evidencing creates
loyalty and helps customers understand the entire service experience.
• Holistic: A holistic design takes into account the entire experience of a service.

Or you can summarise this as according to NNGroup:

• Employees
• Customers
• Fellow customers encountered throughout the service
• Partners 

It’s important to consider the following too (same source):

Frontstage components include: (this is what customers see and experience)

• Channels
• Products 
• Touchpoints 
• Interfaces

Backstage components include: (this is behind the scenes that makes the service run smoothly)

• Policies 
• Technology 
• Infrastructures 
• Systems

Customer Journey Map: A customer journey map is a tool that shows the best and worst
parts of a customer’s experience. The journey starts long before a customer starts to take an
action, and shows the entire experience of the service through the customer’s perspective.

Service Blueprinting: A service blueprint goes beyond a customer journey map and allows
you to understand a customer from a more holistic viewpoint, including the work and
processes that go into creating and delivering an experience.

To further look into this as per the below diagram, this article explains the blueprint behind a shoe shining service and anticipates/plans for any human errors such as applying the wrong product (in this instance wrong colour shoe wax):

The earliest known example of protest ‘graffiti’ dates back to the Roman era, with examples
of protest and political slogans being found carved into the walls of Pompeii, the ancient
Roman city which was destroyed during the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79AD.

These early examples are significant in demonstrating the long history of agitation and self expression. However, it wasn’t until advancements in technology brought about by the Industrial Revolution and in particular, the invention of the printing press that enabled people to reach a significant audience. The printing press and especially Guttenberg’s movable type, enabled activists to cheaply mass produce information that rebelled against subjects such as the ruling classes, war and the church, to reach a wide audience.

By the 1700s, political satire had become a powerful tool for ridiculing the ruling classes and agitating for social reform, through the production of cheaply produced newspapers and publications. It was a successful method because it combined humour and illustration to communicate to the working class, who were often illiterate.
Satire was used to great effect by the British engraver, William Hogarth, who was famous for creating a series of paintings of ‘modern moral subjects’, of which he sold engravings on subscription. Hogarth campaigned against the uncontrolled production and sale of cheap gin, through a painting called Gin Lane, which illustrated the evils of gin-drinking. The print was published as a pair with Beer Street, which culminated in the Gin Act of 1751, through which the number of gin shops was greatly reduced.

By the 1800s, satire had become a global movement, aided by the cost effectiveness of print, which spawned many satirical magazines, such as Puck in America, Punch, which was founded in the UK and Le Sourire from France. France, in particular, has a long history of satire, which was bought into the global consciousness by the gun attacks on the offices of Charlie Hebdo, a long standing satirical magazine based in Paris, which killed 12 people in 2015.

By the turn of the 20th century, society, politics and technology were changing irrevocably and art became a catalyst for rejecting the traditional social order. ‘Not the old, not the new, but the necessary’, was the mantra for the era surrounding the first world war, which spawned Marinetti’s Futurist manifesto on Vorticism and Dadaism, which reacted to advancements in society, politics and technology by developing new ways of seeing and
expressing the world around them. The Futurists, in particular, revolted against the traditional art and wanted to bring a new world order based on machine technology and war. They used multiple tools to project their provocation, which included painting, performance art and music.

Video 2: F.T.Marinetti was a founder of the Futurist movement. Theatre that didn’t involve actors. Sets and lights, no dance etc. Disruptive evenings called Serata’s – concerts of noice. The audience were invited to participate in these performances – the divide of the performer and the audience. Performances would end in fights/riots and police would arrive. It was publicity. This concept was recreated in Guggenheim Museum; with LED lighting to change with mood and atmosphere. Stravinsky’s music is used to set the mood, along with around 35 sketches of the set design back then to set a sense of process.

One of the manifesto points that I feel is a good summary of what Futurism consisted of is number 10:

10. We want to demolish museums and libraries, fight morality, feminism and all opportunist and utilitarian cowardice.

On further investigation of the Futurist movement, they believed that not eating with utensils ruined the dining experience. Additionally, wanted to ban pasta as it was not actually native to Italy and imported. In fear of a sudden war – pasta would not be locally available and therefore they wanted to abolish it. Instead, they pledged rice would be far more suitable for Italy’s dishes; along with encouraging a unique ‘experience’ of dining by playing music and spraying perfumes. (Image also from linked source below)

Constructivism was a movement created by the Russian avant-garde by Vladimir Tatlin and Alexander Rodchenko. Objects were to be created not in order to express beauty, or the artist’s outlook, or to represent the world, but to carry out a fundamental analysis of the materials and forms of art, one which might lead to the design of functional objects.

“During the years following the October Revolution of 1917, posters were a vital way for the
communists to get their beliefs across to a wider audience. ROSTA window posters were a
series of cartoon-like posters distributed by the Russian Telegraph Agency, or Rosta, which
served as the country’s national news agency.”

Example of some of revolution posters from this era depicting the armies and head (Trotsky) in charge presented as a monster:

• 

• 

“El Lissitzky, a Constructivist artist who created one of the most famous politically motivated artworks of the period called Beat the Whites with the Red Wedge, which was created in 1919. He produced this politically charged work in support of the Red Army, shortly after the Bolsheviks had waged their revolution in 1917. The red wedge symbolised the revolutionaries, who were penetrating the anti-communist White Army.”

• 

The Second World War introduced the rise of Hitler and the Nazi party which had a devastating effect on humanity, society, politics and the termination of Avant-garde art movements, such as the Bauhaus. This was an era of widespread propaganda, often created by political parties, however some artists still managed to produce work that criticised fascism, despite great personal danger.

“One such political artist was John Heartfield, a German artist who received formative training in advertising with the Berlin Dada movement, and was one of the key components in the development of photo-montage.”

• 

• 

Another exponent of the photo-montage style is the British political artist Peter Kennard, who has created iconic work about capitalism and war since the mid 1960s.

Video 3: Peter Kennard describes in the video that he makes work that essentially points the finger at people responsible for all things bad happening in the world. Photographs of the nuclear mushroom cloud for example are normalised, and have no real context i.e. who, wha, where, why and how? A lot of the work he has made is anti-nuclear, anti-war, and anti-militarism.

Peter Kennard example below. Welcome to Britain (rough) cleverly depicts the tourist industry in London and how money is not being spent on the population’s needs (such as helping NHS and poverty):

• 

The suffragettes were a global movement who agitated for women’s suffrage until 1918, when women won the right to vote in the UK. The majority of the suffragette posters were privately commissioned, often in the stylised realism and decoration of art nouveau, the most popular art movement of the period. However, hand rendered banners and slogans were also used effectively during rallies and protests, as a tool of persuasion.

Video 4: Protests are historical events and evidence of people fighting to make the world a better place. CSPG dates back to the late 19th century. Posters are being preserved as documents that may not be recorded anywhere else. This database is accessible and will be available for generations. Resource to educate and raise awareness.

“The start of the 20th century has seen an exponential rise in demonstration and activism, however, do mass protests work anymore?”

Recent protests from 2020-2021 include black rights matter and women’s rights.