Journey to the Interface by DEMOS

Engagement and

The Journey to the Interface
The Journey to the Interface
How public service design can connect users to reform
co-production will grow
From cleaning the streets to checkouts, from
looking after our elderly parents to selling
public, private and voluntary sectors, Journey to
the Interface makes the case for a fresh approach
only out of a deeper,
richer understanding of
us holidays, more than 20 million people in the to public service reform – an approach that is less
UK work in service. The ‘service economy’ now about competition and contestability and more
accounts for 72 per cent of our gross domestic about closing the gap between what people want

how services relate in
product. Most of us work in service; all of and need, and what service organisations do.
us depend on it. But expansion of the service This pamphlet argues that service design can
sector has not heralded a service revolution. oﬀer policy-makers and practitioners a vision
Too often people’s experiences of service for the transformation of public services, as well
practice to people’s

Sophia Parker and Joe Heapy
are alienating and frustrating. as a route to get there. It outlines an agenda
Drawing on the principles and practices for action that spells out how service design
of the emerging discipline of ‘service design’,
this pamphlet argues that the common challenge
that all service organisations face is how to create
approaches can be applied systemically.
Sophia Parker is deputy director of Demos.
everyday lives
Joe Heapy is a director of Engine.
more intimate and responsive relationships with
their users and customers. Drawing on over
50 interviews with service innovators from the

The Journey
to the Interface
How public service design
can connect users to reform

Sophia Parker
Joe Heapy

Acknowledgements Sophia Parker, deputy director of Demos

We are very grateful to PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP for supporting Sophia is deputy director at Demos. She works on organisational
this project. Thanks in particular go to Nick Jones, Andrew Knott, strategy and business development, which involves developing new
Duncan Lampard, Ed Straw and Seema Malhotra for making it such a partnerships and research priorities. She has a specific interest
fruitful collaboration, and for offering invaluable advice, constructive in service design – looking at ways in which public services such
criticism and research leads throughout the project. as education and health can be designed from the user outwards,
There are countless individuals in the many organisations we visited and Demos’s families and parenting work, which she leads on.
who gave generously of their time and thoughts. Our conversations Before joining Demos, Sophia was development manager with
with them have provided the backbone to this piece of work. A full list the Design Council’s learning programme, which used design-based
of contributors can be found on pages 109–111, and we are indebted participatory methodologies to engage with practitioners and
to them for the time they spent talking to us and participating in policy-makers. She has also worked as a civil servant at the Cabinet
our workshops. For now, thanks to Joel Levy, Jim Maxmin and Deborah Office, where her projects included the consultation ‘Equality
Szebeko for their support in framing the project. Their insights, ideas and diversity: making it happen’ and the development and bringing
and inspiration made all the difference in the early stages of the to fruition of the Sex Discrimination (Election Candidates) Act.
research. Also to Lynne Maher, John Proctor and Isobel Rickard for Sophia is co-author of Disablism: How to tackle the last prejudice
providing us with the rich material for our extended case studies. (Demos, 2004), Strong Foundations: Why schools must be built
They helped us to see how powerful service design principles can be on learning (DfES, 2006) and The Other Glass Ceiling:
when put into practice. Alison Miller and Paul Rigg made it possible The domestic politics of parenting (Demos, 2006).
to bring together the fantastic group of local authorities that we
worked with.
At Engine, huge thanks to Oliver King for his advice and Joe Heapy, director of Engine Service Design
reassurance, and to Kate Dowling for her ongoing support and good Joe is a co-director of the service design consultancy, Engine, and
humour. Elena Oliva deserves a very special mention for her patience. is an advocate of the social value of design in improving people’s lives.
At Demos, we would have been lost without the research and As a strategist, he looks at how best to marry business objectives with
coordination effort of Sophie Middlemiss. Her cool and calm approach evolving consumer expectations and needs. Joe has worked with many
kept us going throughout an intensive phase of research. As ever, of Engine’s clients including Orange, MSN, BUPA, Visa, BT and
Tom Bentley, John Craig, Catherine Fieschi and Simon Parker made the Guardian newspaper. Founded in 2000, Engine has approached
incredibly valuable contributions to the writing of the report and the design of services by using design-led methodologies that put users
we feel very lucky to have such a stellar cast of colleagues. at the centre of the process. Engine recently helped Orange to develop
Lastly, thanks to Claudia Boldt, Julie Pickard and Martin Vowles a European customer experience strategy for its retail operations
for working with us to turn a lot of words into the good-looking and has been working with Virgin Atlantic on its development
pamphlet you are now holding in your hands. As ever, all errors and at Heathrow’s Terminal 3. Engine has worked with Demos and DfES
omissions remain our own. – and 30 headteachers – to develop Picture This!, a workshop toolkit
for use by schools in planning for a future of more personalised
Sophia Parker learning. Joe has also worked with six schools in the UK to instigate
Joe Heapy design projects involving staff and students in improving their
experiences of being at school.
July 2006

About Demos

Who we are
Demos is the think tank for everyday democracy. We believe everyone should
be able to make personal choices in their daily lives that contribute to the
common good. Our aim is to put this democratic idea into practice by working
with organisations in ways that make them more eﬀective and legitimate.

What we work on
We focus on six areas: public services; science and technology; cities and public
space; people and communities; arts and culture; and global security.

Who we work with
Our partners include policy-makers, companies, public service providers and social
entrepreneurs. Demos is not linked to any party but we work with politicians
across political divides. Our international network – which extends across Eastern
Europe, Scandinavia, Australia, Brazil, India and China – provides a global
perspective and enables us to work across borders.

How we work
Demos knows the importance of learning from experience. We test and improve
our ideas in practice by working with people who can make change happen.
Our collaborative approach means that our partners share in the creation and
ownership of new ideas.

What we offer
We analyse social and political change, which we connect to innovation and
learning in organisations. We help our partners show thought leadership
and respond to emerging policy challenges.

How we communicate
As an independent voice, we can create debates that lead to real change.
We use the media, public events, workshops and publications to communicate
our ideas. All our books can be downloaded free from the Demos website.
www.demos.co.uk

First published in 2006 About this pamphlet
© Demos
This pamphlet grew out of a series of conversations about projects in our
Some rights reserved – see copyright licence for details respective organisations. We realised that many of the organisations we were
working with – Demos in the public sector and Engine in the private sector
ISBN 1-84180-164-X
– faced a similar set of challenges around the provision of great service. This
Copy edited by Julie Pickard led us to explore whether or not there are some common principles of service
Design by Ispeaktoyou innovation.
www.ispeaktoyou.co.uk The Journey to the Interface brings together what Demos and Engine have
Illustrations by Claudia Boldt learnt from working with service organisations, along with the contributions
www.claudiaboldt.com of over 50 professionals from private, public and voluntary organisations and
Printed by Upstream, London a number of independent experts in service design. The purpose of the
pamphlet is to bring together and organise some of the language and concepts
of user-centred service. We have couched this work in the context of the
For further information and priorities for public service reform in coming years.
subscription details please contact: We hope that the pamphlet provides a useful resource for service
organisations, as well as a conceptual framework for approaches to reform.
Demos In that spirit, each of the core chapters (1, 2 and 3) concludes with a set
Magdalen House of challenges – questions people can ask to test the extent to which their
136 Tooley Street organisation is focused on creating deep relationships with their users – and
London SE1 2TU some shared language for service innovation. After each of these chapters
you will find case studies of public service organisations that are putting some
telephone: 0845 458 5949 of the principles described here into practice. And at the end of the pamphlet
email: hello@demos.co.uk there is a glossary – a ‘shared language of service’ – that summarises
the new concepts we introduce here.
web: www.demos.co.uk
Although many of the tools and concepts described here can be applied
to existing organisations, the transformative potential of service design
as an approach really comes to life only if it is applied at a systemic level.
After the concluding chapter, which explores this in more depth, you will
also find an agenda for action that describes what service design principles
and practice might might mean for people operating at different levels
of the system.
We welcome your contributions to this work as it develops. Do get in touch.

Sophia Parker
sophia.parker@demos.co.uk

Joe Heapy
joe@enginegroup.co.uk

Contents

Introduction Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4 An agenda
The common Seeing services Professionals Measuring success The politics of for action
challenge of as people do and practitioners service design
service

The shift to a service Services need to be Find ways of enabling Find ways of measuring If applied systemically, Just as outcomes need to
economy has not understood as a journey professionals and people experiences as well as service design can be co-produced, so does
necessarily heralded or a cycle – a series of to work together: create systems: life is more offer a vision for the transformation: how
a service revolution. critical encounters that spaces for simultaneous complicated than a key transformation of service design principles
Often as recipients take place over time empowerment. performance indicator. public services, as well can be applied at every
of services we feel and across channels. as a route to get there. level of the system,
that someone else from local authorities
is benefiting. and policy-makers
to politicians.

Pages 6–17 Pages 18–43 Pages 44–63 Pages 64–79 Pages 80–96 Pages 97–103

Learning to have more See services from the Treat professionals and Measure success Don’t let existing A shared
intimate relationships vantage point of the practitioners as explorers’ obsessively, but not organisational language of
with people and seeing interface, and constantly working things out with through operational boundaries limit
service
service as support rather seek to understand more users and customers efficiency alone. Two demand. Find new
than as a commodity may about how services relate – but rather than doing other crucial dimensions ways of supporting
There is a small but
not only generate the to people’s everyday lives this in isolation, they include success in terms of and investing in the
growing discipline
outcomes we are looking – how we use them and should do it on behalf reducing ‘failure demand’ ‘in-between spaces’
of service design.
for, but also offer the route how we relate to them of the system. Put the (the cost of not getting through the formation
This glossary brings
to securing the legitimacy – rather than simply frontline centre stage things right the first time), of partnerships and
together key tools
that public services in the focusing on the internal through designing and success in harnessing social enterprises where
and concepts of this
twenty-first century so workings of service recruitment, appraisal, the underused resource new models of service
discipline to create a
desperately need. organisations. professional development of people’s energy and have a chance to develop.
shared language of
and feedback channels commitment. Make the systemic
service that cuts across
that empower staff. challenge one of scaling
all sectors.
up these approaches.
Pages 104–108

6/7
Introduction

Introduction
The common challenge of service

From cleaning the streets to checkouts, from looking after our
elderly parents to selling us holidays, more than 20 million people
in the UK work in service. The so-called ‘service economy’ now
makes up 72 per cent of our GDP.1 Most of us work in service;
all of us depend on it for many aspects of our existence. The
giving of service and the receiving of it is an unmistakable part
of everyday life.
Yet the shift to a service economy has not necessarily heralded
a service revolution. Many of our interactions with service
organisations are characterised by profound frustration, hanging
on the end of a phone, arguing over our consumer rights, feeling
ignored and misunderstood, worrying about the working
conditions of those who serve us. Too often as recipients of services
we feel that someone other than us is beneﬁting. Too often it
feels like ‘producer interests’ or proﬁt incentives matter more than
how we feel.
Public services are not exempt from this sense of frustration.
Since 1997, the public sector has expanded. Public service jobs
have grown, as have the levels of investment being poured into our
schools, hospitals, cultural institutions and security infrastructure.
NHS spending will be 90 per cent higher in 2007/08 when
compared with 1996/97. Schools spending will be 65 per cent
higher and transport will be 60 per cent higher.2 Yet these

investments are doing little to shift the stubborn figures which another. Progressive politicians urgently need to create a vision 8/9
indicate that we still have low levels of satisfaction and trust for public services that puts people and places, not targets and key Introduction
in public services overall. performance indicators (KPIs), at its heart. But if people are
Two problems lie at the heart of this disconnect between people going to believe this vision, equally urgent is the need to refresh
and services. First, people are changing faster than organisations and renew the approaches that are taken to public service
are. Decades of expanding choice and growing wealth have left transformation.
people looking for more than simply quality products and services. In this pamphlet we argue that this common challenge, facing
The search for meaning and recognition, autonomy and control is all service organisations, leads to two major consequences. First,
a defining part of our collective psyche in the twenty-first century. learning how to create deeper forms of satisfaction and wellbeing
The second problem is that ‘service’ is still seen as a commodity through service is the long-term priority for public service reform.
rather than as something deeper, a form of human interaction. Second, a distinctive approach to ‘service design’, which seeks
Many large organisations still seek to provide service for the to shape service organisations around the experiences and
lowest cost and maximum profit. This, we argue, eats away at the interactions of their users, presents a major opportunity for
fundamental purpose of service: to provide support and to help the next stages of public service reform: a route to get there.
people live their lives to their full potential.
This pamphlet makes the case for acknowledging the common The search for real meaning
challenge of service in thinking about how to transform public For many people, relative material comfort is no longer enough.
services. Starting here leads to a different diagnosis of the problem. Twenty years ago, when asked what people looked for when
It is not that public services need to be more like commercial making purchases, the most common response was ‘quality of
service providers. It is that all service organisations need to find product’. In 2004 the most common answer was ‘honesty’. 3
new ways of connecting intimately with their users and customers, The result of the massive expansion in material wealth is that,
of listening and responding in ways that reassure us all that we in Ulrich Beck’s words, ‘people demand the right to develop their
are being understood. In order to develop our thinking we spent own perspective on life and to be able to act upon it’. 4 The search
time with a wide range of organisations – from all sectors: public, for meaning, for authenticity, amid a world of brands, competing
private and voluntary – that appear to be making inroads in messages and demands, now characterises the lives of many people
building strong relationships with customers and users. in affluent western economies.
Drawing on the interviews, workshops and case studies we As one of the interviewees for this project put it, ‘we are tired
conducted, we have generated a set of service design principles of being treated as nobodies with no personality by monolithic
– practical tools and concepts – that offer fresh approaches to institutions, we want to be recognised and understood.’
organisations seeking to close the gap between what they do and And as Michael Willmott and William Nelson argued in their
what people want and need. book Complicated Lives, ‘the self is now something we seek
The current managerialist narrative about public service reform to understand and express, not something we simply accept.
is out of sync with what people want and need from services at This raises difficult issues for individuals as well as our companies
precisely the time that a febrile political environment is awakening and public services who are still struggling to escape the
a fresh debate about how people and services should relate to one historical legacy of mass provision.’5

As employees and citizens, we’re tired of working and want our his particular model of mass production – the greatest number 10/11
work–life balance; as consumers we’re impatient of being nameless of goods for the lowest cost and the largest number of people Introduction
and faceless, fighting for our needs; we want relationships not – has become a defining feature of how we see service.
transactions; we want real voice not meaningless choice. Shoshana Ford’s model had three characteristics that are particularly
Zuboff and Jim Maxmin have argued that the sheer scale of the significant for modern public services. First, costs were lowered
social and economic shifts of the last century, combined with the through standardising the customer or their needs. Second,
new possibilities offered by technology, add up to a wholly new it drew a firm line between production and consumption. Goods
enterprise model.6 In this model, it is not products or services that were created out of the right combination of raw materials,
we value most: it is support. Support that helps people to lead their machines and people; these goods were then marketed and sold
own lives as they wish, and support that helps us to navigate an to the consumers – whose interests and needs had little impact
increasingly complex and information-laden world where it is hard on any activity within the firm. In other words, the value chain
to know who to trust. was linear, and the recipients of the products were placed firmly
at one end of the chain. Third, this separation of production and
The commodification of service consumption created demand for managers – professionals whose
Imagine signing up to a luxury sports and leisure club. In exchange primary role was to match supply and demand in the most efficient
for a significant monthly fee, you are able to attend unlimited way, and whose positions were defined through access to expert
sessions, use as many large soft towels as you wish, pick and choose knowledge and insight not otherwise available to the customers.
from a range of treatments and relax in the social area. Imagine if, For a long time, businesses sought to import this manufacturing
one day, you visit to find a large notice limiting each customer model of mass production into service provision. More recently,
to just one towel each. When you go to the reception desk to as these organisations discerned a shift in consumer expectations,
enquire about something, you notice a printout charting profits there has been a greater emphasis on personalised services and
per month over the last quarter. The prices of refreshments have products. But when personalisation and manufacturing models
suddenly gone up and you notice that a treatment that had once collide, a very particular form of personalisation is created. This
lasted a luxurious hour now takes only 40 minutes. differentiation is based at best on ‘mass customisation’ – the
Good service cannot be reduced to nothing more than an breaking down of a particular service or product into modules
efficient operation: its value lies in the less tangible sense that the which customers can then pick and choose from, or add and
service is supporting you, meeting your needs, working for and on subtract elements of.
behalf of you. The real problem with service is that it is still treated Despite the best efforts of public service innovators up and down
as a commodity – as Will Hutton has argued, a commodity ‘to be the country, our public services continue to be defined by a mass
produced at the lowest cost by the most sweated workers’. 7 This production model. This has created a system that works against
mental model of service has a long and deep legacy that colours professional desires to provide service in the form of support
attitudes in both the commercial and the public sectors. and dialogue to people. Although there are pockets of success
This legacy began when the first cars rolled off Henry Ford’s
production line. Although his business was focused on products,

around the country in genuinely providing service to people, these the desired outcomes, public services need people to get involved. 12/13
successes are more often thanks to professionals circumnavigating The notion of co-production, initially dismissed as jargon that Introduction
the formal system, rather than working with it. featured only in the lexicon of aspiring ministers and seasoned
This government has not been blind to the limitations of mass thinktankers, has become part of the new consensus about future
production in creating public services fit for the twenty-first approaches to public service reform. Contrary to Ford’s model,
century. Since 1997 their approach to breaking out of this co-production demands that production and consumption are
particular model has been guided by an emphasis on the brought together, so that both can take place simultaneously.
diversification of providers, finding ways of increasing competition As Sue Goss has argued:
and contestability and combining them with central targets and
pressure to perform. The almost continuous re-engineering of Many of the new priorities – ‘respect’, an end to ‘binge drinking’,
services that has taken place has been driven in part by a belief ‘recycling’, ‘improved public health’ – cannot be achieved by
that creating a market will bring the consumer values of customer a smart government delivery machine; they require changes in
focus, responsiveness and efficiency into a public sector drowning behaviour from the public. This means not simply reconsidering
in bureaucracy and paternalism. how to deliver using public or even private resources, but how to
But all the evidence suggests that our commercial service access the ‘ free’ resources of public energy, engagement and action.9
experiences are, in general, not much better (and arguably far So a child learning is both consuming an education and producing
worse) than our public service experiences. According to research a cohort of lifelong learners. Someone attending a smoking
by the National Consumer Council, 81 per cent of people had cessation course is both consuming a health service and producing
a bad experience purchasing services last year. Words that came a healthy population. The idea of co-production demands that
up frequently in relation to commercial service transactions public servants and politicians focus not only on the internal
included ‘distant’, ‘clinical’ and ‘uncaring’.8 There is no guarantee workings and efficiencies of existing services, but also on how
whatsoever that introducing private providers and market people engage with those services, and how they can be mobilised,
disciplines into the public sector will close the gap between what coached and encouraged to participate in the ‘common enterprise’
service organisations do and what it is that people are looking of generating positive outcomes.
for. There remains a common challenge of service: that large In many ways the concept of co-production is not new: our
organisations struggle on a daily basis to build genuine and children are not the first generation of students who need to be
meaningful interactions with their customers and users, and engaged in order to learn. More, what has shifted is our
frequently fail to build any kind of responsiveness, flexibility understanding of the role of the state. The ‘five giants’ of the
or ability to adapt into their organisational forms. postwar welfare state saw the role of the state as being limited
to developing systems that would help to avoid crises such as
Why this agenda matters for public service
destitution, and provide cures and treatments for problems such
organisations as illness and unemployment. There was a powerful sense that
Commercial service organisations that are unable to connect with benefits came duties, built into a stable institutional and
with their customers risk losing business and profits. However, social framework that has now unravelled. In many ways, debates
the risks for public service organisations are far higher. To achieve over the balance between individual responsibilities and state

intervention was the leitmotif of twentieth-century politics, in a state of perpetual change. As Peter Taylor-Gooby has 14/15
generating huge debates within political parties as well as cutting argued, ‘the rational incentive-based system that has driven Introduction
across party divides. New Labour’s approach [to public service reform] risks neglecting
The current emphasis on influencing the behaviour of the relationships that are so very important in forging trust’.11
individuals and engaging them in the co-production of outcomes This pamphlet offers some practical tools and insights from the
could be seen simply as the latest chapter in a very long book. small but growing discipline of service design as a first step towards
However, it also reflects an unsung triumph of New Labour. re-balancing the emphasis that has been placed on managerialism.
Even if they have not succeeded in transforming public services, Service designers do not see service as something that can
they have succeeded in turning the tide of public opinion away be reduced to a commodity. They focus on how people actually
from low taxation. A significant majority of the population now experience services, in order to understand how large service
positively expects investment in public services. Politicians owe organisations can create better relationships with their users
it to all of us to respond to these expectations, and frame a new and customers.
story about what public services are for, and why they matter. Experiences and relationships are the recurring themes
of this pamphlet. In chapter 1 we argue that engaging people
The search for a narrative: people, places
in co-production does not happen through consultations, on
and service
citizens’ juries or at council meetings: it needs to happen at the
Despite the government’s attempts to engage people in
point of delivery and through conversation and dialogue rather than
conversations about why public services matter – for example,
choice alone. Therefore, learning to understand and map
through 2003’s ‘Big Conversation’ or this year’s ‘Let’s Talk’
how people experience the point of delivery, the interface between
campaign – it has in practice put managerialism over vision when
a service and their lives, is essential for creating the conditions
considering how to improve and transform public service
for co-production. As we discuss, although smart use of data
provision. Performance management, targets and public service
is important, spreadsheets are no substitute for people.
agreements became the ‘levers’ – in the rather mechanistic world
Chapter 2 explores the pivotal position played by professionals
view of new public management – for improvements. Alongside
in building relationships between people and services, and
the regular spending reviews, commissions such as Gershon and
understanding how people experience services. We argue that
Lyons have been set up to consider how to improve operational
two shifts – one in professional identity and one in the shape
efficiencies and service processes.10 ‘Driving out bureaucracy’,
of the organisational hierarchy – need to take place if service
inspections, regulation and audits simultaneously indicated that
organisations are to take a relational approach to service design.
this government meant business, and that it believed efficiency
Chapter 3 looks at how service innovators are learning to
could be wrought from a combination of digitisation, process
understand these experiences through the eyes of many different
re-engineering, back-office rationalisation and restructuring.
and equally complex people, and how they can connect such
But in all the flurry of activity that has characterised the last
a diversity of need to the design and evaluation of services without
ten years, we appear to have forgotten that a reform programme
resorting to the mass production model of standardisation.
designed to improve the existing safety net was never likely
It describes how the most successful service organisations are
to connect to the challenge of meeting the needs of a society

complementing the ways they measure overall service performance 16/17
with ‘experience metrics’ to build up a much richer picture of Introduction
what really matters to people, and therefore where there is room
for improvement.
The fiction writer William Gibson once said, ‘the future’s
already here, it’s just unevenly spread’.12 Throughout this pamphlet
you will find a handful of ‘near future case studies’ of the public
service innovators up and down the country who are demonstrating
the impact of relational approaches to service reform. By starting
with experiences at the interface, these case studies demonstrate
that relational approaches combine personalisation and efficiency,
at the same time as challenging our current understanding of what
these terms mean.
Finally, in chapter 4, we set out the main elements of a different
approach to reform – led by the service design principles of this
pamphlet – as it applies to the whole system of public services,
with different changes occurring simultaneously at different levels.
In doing this we pose some questions and challenges for politicians
and policy-makers working on public service reform in coming
years, and make some suggestions about where they might look
to learn more about relational approaches to service.
None of these arguments are about throwing away the positive
aspects of current approaches to public service management and
reform. But engagement and co-production will grow only out
of a deeper, richer understanding of how services relate in practice
to people’s everyday lives. And in learning more about these
‘interface spaces’, it is possible that we could also uncover the seeds
of a renewed sense of legitimacy for public services. People’s level
of trust in services is far higher when they are asked about their
local secondary school rather than the education system as a whole:
we trust that which we know. Learning to have more intimate
relationships with people and seeing service as support rather than
Photo by Frank Baron

as a commodity may not only generate the outcomes we are looking
for, but also offer the route to securing the legitimacy that public
services in the twenty-first century so desperately need.

Service stories 18/19
People
In order to improve their UK business, BUPA relies heavily
on the concept of the ‘end-to-end patient journey’. Every
quarter, senior staff at BUPA Hospitals work with a
handful of their customers to trace what happens from the
moment someone begins to feel unwell – often some time
before that person gets in touch with BUPA. As Alison
Platt, head of BUPA Hospitals, says:
1
Doing this exercise immediately colours how you think
you’ll treat that person – the language, the anxiety, the Seeing services as people do
bureaucracy.
Having traced this, BUPA then maps its own processes,
Services need to be understood as a journey or
technology and interventions to the end-to-end journey. a cycle – a series of critical encounters that take
Senior staff ask themselves what each interaction looks place over time and across channels.
like, what transactions are possible, what information any
patient really needs. Finally, they add a third line – one
that looks at behaviours. As Alison says: The biggest mistake that large organisations can make is to assume
that they know what their service users and customers want. The
A call isn’t just a transaction, we need to ask: ‘How do I common challenge of service – the emotional distance between the
want to make you feel?’ board and its customers, between local authorities and their citizens
– is reflected in low levels of trust and satisfaction. People in
A tangible change that has emerged from doing this
general do not often believe that their needs are met by large service
exercise regularly is that customers calling to discuss their organisations in either the commercial or the public sector.
hospital visit are now offered a checklist of things that If the primary cause of dissatisfaction people have with service
other people in similar situations have asked. This was organisations is that they feel misunderstood, ignored, and treated
introduced after BUPA realised that people often didn’t as faceless and nameless, then service organisations need to find new
know what to ask when the call finished with the question ways of getting to know their users, in all their messy complexity.
‘is there anything else I can help you with?’ Alison, again:
The attitude here at BUPA about customer research used to be like
You have to do as much as possible to manage getting that of the interested spectator – now we use it to drive decisions.
into people’s shoes – psychologically, emotionally, In recent years, public sector organisations have demonstrated
physically. a growing interest in the tools of the marketing and advertising
industries in a quest to learn more about how insights about people

can be used to improve what public services offer and how they and engaged with rather than driven out. Responsive, relational 20/21
offer it. The service innovators we met dedicate people and teams models of service must find ways of visualising users and People
to worrying about the question of what it is that people need understanding their needs, fears, aspirations and preferences.
and want. They constantly search for ways of gaining more – and Between them, all the local authorities across the country
deeper – insights about their customers. They are alive to the fact probably hold more data than the commercial study noted here.
that these needs, expectations and desires are subject to change The question is how these data are being used. There has been
over time and across circumstances. And – most importantly a growing interest in segmentation, and in understanding how
– they constantly strive to connect the insights they gather to to turn raw data into useful insight that improves and targets
organisational strategy, product development, communications particular forms of service. For example, the London Borough
and priority-setting. of Hammersmith & Fulham recently cross-referenced detailed
Alongside the focus on contestability and competition, measures census data with information about the use of services in
of customer satisfaction and the increasing use of segmentation the borough to target services and communications in each
techniques are seen as the routes by which public services can neighbourhood. Their Customer First programme has identified
close the gap between what they do and what people want. In seven customer types including ‘childfree prosperous young
this chapter, we begin by exploring the most innovative practice adults renting from private landlords’, and ‘older people in
around the use of customer insight. However, the service innovators poorer health with moderate prosperity’.
we spoke to as part of this project recognised that, while vital, Some remain cautious about the value of demographic or
customer insight alone will not generate solutions to the common social class segmentation. Any approach to dividing down large
challenge all large-scale service organisations face. People, in all numbers of people into subgroups is limited by the assumption of
their complexity and unpredictability, can never be reduced to data. homogeneity within each segment. Certainly social class is a likely
In the latter part of this chapter we look at how successful service indicator of the types of services someone may or may not use but
organisations keep a steady focus on experiences – as a means of used alone it provides little information about how to design the
guarding against the temptation to put people into boxes or reduce experience of that service for that group. The real richness comes
them to a spreadsheet. from cross-referencing multiple sources of data.
Knowing your users, part one Beyond the basics
Humans are complex beings. Our organisations are constantly The immutable complexity of people needs to be seen as a source
trying to catch up. An ongoing commercial research study13 now of insight for innovation rather than a productivity headache.
segments all 24 million UK households into 11 groups, 61 types New approaches to the design of services use segmentations to
and 243 segments. The study describes each household type break down the more complex dimensions of need, belief and
in terms of its values, patterns of consumption, likely financial behaviour that shape peoples’ responses to service. Such models
situation and where in the country they are likely to live. This are developed more rapidly through smaller-scale qualitative studies
level of complexity can easily feel daunting, but if public service that are designed to inform service re-design and innovation – and
organisations are going to close the gap successfully between what indirectly to derive customer-value metrics from which performance
they do and who people are, this complexity needs to be explored can be measured.

Attitudinal segmentation seeks to understand the meaningful 22/23
distinctions between the values and beliefs of users with respect People
to a particular service. This type of segmentation might identify
subgroups by statements such as, ‘I’m fiercely independent and want
to be treated so’, or ‘I’ve paid for this service – I’m entitled’, or ‘I don’t
want to be a bother’.
Behavioural segmentation groups the practical reasons why people
are using a service or channel as the basis for understanding what
is required. A behavioural segmentation model might group users
by statements such as, ‘I need help’, ‘I need some support’, ‘I need
to complain’.
Journey segmentation recognises that there may be many routes
to a single destination such as achieving a healthy body weight.
As a nation we need to eat less and do more exercise but simply
reminding people of the consequences of not doing this is not
going to have a huge impact. Services need to be accessible, but
the designers of services also need to have understood the breadth
of starting points and the complex emotional journeys that people
will need to be motivated to embark on.
These responses to the challenge of complexity reveal new
insights that go beyond ‘what to provide?’ and begin to answer
‘how to provide?’
Increasingly service providers are using what they know about
their users to create segmented service propositions based loosely
around customer types but inviting customers to self-segment – to
choose from a small number of similar offers and channels based
on what they think best matches their own needs. The same
offer may be packaged in a number of different ways so that
it is not about the choice of which service but the choice
of which experience. The customer takes control of the choice.
Photo by Graham Turner

Self-segmentation is one response to the realisation that people
increasingly defy segmentation and do not like to be told who they
are by big organisations. People exhibit what marketers call multiple
personas. We can be professionals, parents, pleasure-seekers and

NIMBYs all in the same afternoon. Elderly people are no longer As systems get larger, management levels increase . . . but the 24/25
just elderly. Teenagers are no longer a homogenous group all visibility of the consumer or user is critical. This isn’t to do with People
buying the same music and clothes at the same time. focus groups, but real involvement and development. The consumers
People are constantly shifting – or are shifted – between need to stay as real individuals, not just statistics.15
the segmentation models of different service providers. A bank Knowing your users, part two
identifies someone as one type of person and a phone company Using customer insight to tailor services – both in terms of what
identifies them as another. Generally this is not a problem: as is offered and how it is offered – does not necessarily shift the
consumers, people are in control of these relationships and they stubborn legacy of mass production services. Using data to tailor
are not looking for their bank to sell them phones or their phone products and services is similar to drawing information out of
company to look after their money. It suits people to be seen and users, re-calibrating and responding. The people represented by this
treated differently by different providers when each is offering goldmine of data are still kept at arm’s length from the operations
different things. and decision-making processes of the organisation. Similarly,
The frustration begins when an individual wants to be seen as a for people working in those organisations, insights turn people
whole person and the system can view them only as a collection of into numbers, making them two-dimensional.
isolated segmented subgroups across multiple segmentation models.
Speaking at Demos, Jim Murphy MP highlighted the difficulty In the end, your success will depend less on customer segmentation
government has in seeing citizens as individuals.14 As he pointed and more on your ability to describe the needs of your customer with
out, a single mother is viewed as being at least seven different people great vividness.16
across government agencies, including a parent, an employee, a road Many of the service innovators we spoke to have recognised
user, a taxpayer and so on. the limitations of customer insight models, even at their most
The limits of the model sophisticated. As a result, they have begun to make the long, slow
In other words, models of segmentation in the private sector and difficult journey to the interface themselves. Rather than
do not necessarily translate wholesale to the more complex service sucking data in, they are experimenting with tools and techniques
systems in the public sector. In fact the focus on customer segments that take them to the points at which people actually experience
disguises the system of relationships that impact on people’s services. Making this journey enables organisations to understand
experiences and outcomes. Used in isolation, customer in much greater richness how people and services relate in practice.
segmentation carries the risk of reducing service interactions For public services, we believe these tools and techniques are of
to a series of one-to-one transactions and reinforcing the ‘provider particular interest. The desire to empower users and involve them
knows best’ paradigm. Such use of data and insight works best in co-producing outcomes is now so common it is almost a truism.
when used alongside some of the techniques and methodologies Yet, even with the most determined staff and leaders, the legacy
outlined in the next section – techniques designed to prevent service of mass production makes it almost impossible for such service
designers from reducing real and complex people to statistics or organisations to escape their own vantage point on services – as
segments, and to keep a constant focus on the lived experience of functional institutions and ‘episodes’ that interrupt people’s lives
the user journey. Data and insight will never replace people. – to look afresh at what they are doing from the eyes of users.

And it is hard to escape these prisms. The mobile phone the level of dissonance between what an organisation says it cares 26/27
company, Orange, knows from experience that ‘making the journey about (for example, personalisation or user empowerment) and People
[to see services from a customer’s eyes] is very hard, as people how people experience that organisation lies at the heart of whether
have a job within an organisation. Their concern is usually with or not people trust such services. People become suspicious if
delivering their part of the service, not putting themselves in experiences do not match the expectations created by rhetoric,
the position of the user. Experiencing services from a person’s customer charters and organisational commitments.
viewpoint is very difficult.’ The need to map public service touchpoints and explore the
Seeing your services as your users do is not, unfortunately, a extent to which they support the commitment to personalisation
route to simplifying the picture, but it enables organisations to see and co-design is illustrated by the comment of one of our
a different kind of complexity, a complexity that sheds new light on interviewees about a recent hospital experience he had:
how best to prioritise operational, organisational and policy change.
You get the feeling they don’t want you there, that they think you’re
For service designers, the building blocks of service are not episodes
the problem . . . they seem to be saying ‘my life running this hospital
and institutions. They are the touchpoints, channels, architectures
would be so much easier if you weren’t here’. . . . My experience
and journeys that describe services from the starting point of the
is that hospitals perpetuate my anxiety; when I find myself in
interface. It is those concepts that the following sections explore.
this system I feel helpless. There is nothing you can do to ease
The tangible elements of service: touchpoints your anxiety. Information provision is appalling – there’s no
Touchpoints are the people and tangible things that shape the hand-holding. You find yourself asking several dumb-sounding
experience of services (see pages 28–29). The interest in touchpoints questions to various people behind desks – it seems as though
originally grew out of organisations seeking to reinforce their brand the system somehow requires you to do so.
in ways that went well beyond marketing and mass advertising In this comment, it is possible to identify a whole range of
campaigns. In practice, this recognises that as customers of an touchpoints – people, desks, information provision, the hospital
airline, we are more likely to remember something about the brand building itself – that together combine to disempower the person
from our interactions with cabin staff, for example, than we are from needing the service.
looking at the design work on the tailfin.
The forgotten touchpoint: service environments
Everything we do should be characterised by obsessive and
Almost all public services have an implicit association with
uncompromising attention to detail. We know that any journey is
a designed and built environment. Some of the most profound and
made up of many little experiences and that it doesn’t take much to
emotionally charged interactions with public services happen
turn a happy customer into an unhappy one. We cannot afford this
between four walls where furniture, fixtures, fittings and the design
and we must not let this happen.17
of information play a significant role in shaping people’s experiences.
Although branding may not be the top priority for many public Yet so often, they are treated as neutral spaces where ‘stuff happens’.
service organisations, there is a crucial principle here. Touchpoints In fact, our behaviour is shaped by the environment. Chris Gerry,
are the places and spaces where people experience services. The head of New Line Learning Federation in Kent, told us that
extent to which their ‘brand’ invites people in or frustrates them ‘the kids behave differently in here [the school] to out there and
determines the extent to which those people are engaged. And yet the rules aren’t written up, they’re embedded’.

Intuitively it’s impossible to ignore the impact the built
environment has on people’s sense of self and agency. For example, 30/31
one student participating in a Guardian book about experiences People

of school18 commented that ‘the basic aspects of the buildings
we are taught in do not promote learning, but instead, enhance
feelings of negativity’. Spaces are not empty vessels; they are socially
constructed and as such can communicate powerful messages
about value, the importance of users and the extent to which
they can play an active role in service. One of our commercial
interviewees commented:
People get psychologically managed by rooms and corridors to adopt
behaviours that suit the organisations and support its systems – the
spaces are not conﬁgured to the needs of those people.
There is unprecedented capital investment going into the
re-design of public service environments at the moment, across
schools, hospitals and other public buildings. While such high
levels of investment are welcome, there will be a return only if the
construction of new buildings grows out of a focus on how spaces
can be designed to empower users. This is not about re-creating
modernised versions of old buildings. We need to turn the focus
to how these buildings relate to the services enacted within them,
and communicate to people that they are in control.
In turn, this requires that public services considering new
builds start with architectures, rather than architecture. This is
a term borrowed from the world of web development. It means
the complex and dynamic arrangements of objects, dialogues,
information, content, processes and navigation that they work
with online. By focusing on architectures, service providers start by
considering customer behaviour ﬁrst, and built architecture second.
For example, many shops and leisure venues create a range of
personas to imagine the needs and preferences of people using a
space. From this they are able to explore how to respond – through
the design of the environment – to the various motivations of their

customers. ‘Service blueprints’ are developed alongside building strategy’ (as set out in the Budget earlier this year) needs to start 32/33
blueprints. In this way organisations can design environments that with people’s experiences and preferences for different channels, People
are both instructional and inspirational to a diverse group of users. rather than efficiencies alone.
Today, it is no longer possible to assume how a user will access
Greater access through the proliferation of service channels
and use a service once many channels are available for them to do
In the past, the customers of services tended to stick to a single so. Therefore every channel needs to some degree to accommodate
channel. People booked holidays by sitting in front of a desk in every kind of user and must be joined-up so that users can move
a travel agents, they bought bread from a baker and got their milk easily between them. Orange, for example, uses a single customer
from the doorstep. Public services have in recent years begun to account, which enables them to provide a consistent experience
expand the number of ‘ways in’. Andy Carroll, a strategy manager regardless of whether customers decide to call up, go online
at the Pensions Service, told us that ‘we’ve made a huge investment or visit a store on the high street.
in moving from a local paper-based organisation to a national This is important because channels are not simply new routes
contact organisation’. The goal for the Pensions Service is to move for delivering services. They remain ways of engaging users, of
away from office-based services, instead supporting people over drawing them in, of helping people to look after themselves.
the phone, or via one of the 2500 outreach workers who are Therefore individual channels and the relationships between
now working to support such a major ‘channel migration’. them need to be mapped onto people’s lives. As a member of the
The story of the Pensions Service is mirrored all over the public Transformational Government team told us, ‘solutions need to be
sector. To access health support people can attend a medical drop-in about services, not IT’.
centre, go online or call NHS Direct – which now receives 600,000 To make this real, the government is going to need to do more
calls per month – in addition to making an appointment with their than ‘promote responsible channel choice by telling people how
general practitioner (GP). This trend is likely to grow: last year, much the use of more efficient channels saves, and what that saving
the Cabinet Office published Transformational Government where could achieve in terms of reinvestment elsewhere in the public
they argued: services’.20 Building the functionality of e-government must not
Over the next decade, the principal preferred channels for the distract government or users from the more difficult challenges
delivery of information and transactional services will be the of improving services. Technology is of course part of this, but it
telephone, internet and mobile channels – as well as increasingly is by no means the only part.
important channels within the digital home . . . government will
The interaction of different touchpoints: journeys
innovate its services to take swift advantage of new technologies
Greg Nugent from Eurostar told us:
as they emerge.19
Mapping the customer journey brings together services, products
In this proliferation of channels, of ‘ways-in’ to services, there
and experiences . . . it’s the only way you can see how they interact
are two key questions all service organisations need to address.
and how the brand adds up to more than the sum of its parts.
First, how can they understand the different channel needs and
Doing the journey made people admit where it was going wrong,
preferences of a diverse set of users; and second, how can they
because they could see it all in front of them.
understand the different interactions and relationships between
different channels. Any attempt to create an ‘integrated channel

Earlier in this chapter we noted that often service experiences �� 34/35
are treated as ‘episodes’ – interruptions to people’s everyday lives. People
By starting with people and asking them to describe their experiences ��

– as BUPA does, in the example that began this chapter – the focus ��
shifts from looking at episodes, to thinking about journeys: how all
the touchpoints and channels come together over a period of time ��
and interact with people’s lives, needs, interests and attitudes.
When someone enters prison, they are assessed seven times ��
in the first three days – for level of risk, for health, for learning and
��
development and so on. Each of these assessment touchpoints could
be perfectly designed; however, for many prisoners it is frustrating
��
to provide the same information time and time again. It serves to
disempower them, to leave them as little more than a figure on an ��
��
assessment sheet. Focusing on individual touchpoints and exploring
the extent to which they ‘live the brand’ of user empowerment is a
vital part of a relational approach to public service transformation.
However, equally important is the need to understand the As the example of BUPA demonstrates, mapping a user journey
interactions between different touchpoints and channels. Equally, is a far more powerful way of understanding where services could
if the information taken about these different needs is not pulled be improved and how engagement could be better encouraged than
together by the organisation, how can it ever provide an integrated any kind of large-scale customer satisfaction survey.
service to the prisoner? But journeys can be used for more than simply identifying
Services need to be understood as a journey or a cycle – a series problems or points in the service where there is room for
of critical encounters that take place over time and across channels. improvement. As the users of services are given more choice, and
This is key to integrating the organisation of services around their are empowered to make decisions that may previously have been
user, and to combining distributed organisational resources to made by experts, it will become more important to include tools
create experiences and outcomes. to help people manage the uncertainty associated with choice.
The concept of ‘service journeys’ is familiar to designers. As a Talking about ‘equipoised choices’ in healthcare, Bernard Crump,
technique it was pioneered and trialled extensively in Scandinavia; chief executive of the NHS Institute for Innovation and
it has been used to design everything from aeroplane cockpits to Improvement argued:
financial trading systems and is increasingly being applied to services
We need tools to help what need to be sophisticated and paced
in the public and private sectors. As a method, it enables people
conversations about decisions to be made – these decisions don’t
to create a rich picture of how service experiences play out in the
lend themselves well to the seven-minute outpatient model . . . we
context of everyday life. The objective here is not to understand and
need to surround that consultation with tools to help people decide
optimise operational processes but to determine the best experiential
what to do.
journey for the users of a service.

A service journey is often characterised by a series of choices, 36/37
which in some instances may have life-changing consequences. Challenges People
Well-designed service journeys should first anticipate and design- • How are you segmenting your users? What combinations of data
out the likely errors that users could make when using services
do you use to create insights?
– many of which can be put down to poor information design
– and reduce the negative effects of any errors that are made. • Who is responsible for ‘user intelligence’? How are they connected
When possible, service users should be able to undo choices and to the management of your organisation?
re-choose without incurring penalties. Another strategy to reduce
the uncertainty of choosing is to provide the means for users to • Are you genuinely looking at your services from the vantage point
simulate choices – to play out scenarios and to experiment with of the interface?
the options available. Through the simulation of future journeys the
likelihood of making the right choices increases, and the risk and • Can you map all the touchpoints of your service? Do you know
inefficiencies associated with making the wrong choices are reduced. how people feel about these touchpoints?

The new building blocks of service • How do the different channels of online, phone and face to face
Insights, segmentation, touchpoints, channels, environments, interact for different kinds of service users?
journeys. It is these, not data, functional institutions and episodes,
that constitute the building blocks of services from a user’s • How are you ‘designing in’ deliberation, dialogue and
perspective. If the commitment to creating user-centred services opportunities for co-creation to the touchpoints and channels
is going to add up to any more than hollow rhetoric, then service of delivery?
organisations need to become experts in the methods, tools and
ways of seeing service that ensure they can genuinely make the
journey to the interface, and see their services as their users do.
The picture of service is no less complex from the interface as
it is from a systemic perspective. What is different, however, is that A shared language of service
the interface focuses on how people and services relate, not simply
the shape of existing services. In tackling the common challenge Journeys
of service that this pamphlet is focused on, we need to recognise Channels
that generating positive outcomes requires engagement, and real Segmentation
engagement comes through experiences. Therefore, being able Proposition
to map and shape those experiences is the only way that public Touchpoints
service organisations will be able to create strategies for genuine Architectures
improvement and ultimately the transformation of services. Service environments
Personas
Definitions on page 104–106

38/39
Case study

Luton and Dunstable Head and Neck
Cancer Services

The multidisciplinary team meeting at the Head and Neck Cancer
Clinic starts at 8.30am where some patients’ cases are discussed
by the team to make decisions on treatment and care. At the same
time patients start to arrive at the clinic waiting room. This is an
anxious time for patients and sometimes parts of the clinic process
heighten that anxiety rather than reduce it. The way the chairs are
arranged in the waiting room leaves patients facing a wall full of
official notices or looking directly at others; the number of different
professionals that seem to be around can be bewildering as are some
of the processes. This often leads to a feeling of helplessness, and
thinking ‘if only the experience could be different’:
You have to get there early to claim a seat otherwise you’re standing
. . . by the time the consultants arrive at the clinic it is already busy
as the clinic shares its waiting area. There are patients and carers
standing all over the place, waiting quietly to be seen.
The consulting rooms at the clinic are much like a dentist’s; the
patient sits in the chair and stares upwards, surrounded by an
average of seven members of staff, and it is in this situation that
most patients are given their diagnosis.
Across the NHS patients are rarely involved in healthcare
improvement beyond mechanisms such as focus groups and
questionnaires. Luton and Dunstable Hospital Head and Neck
Cancer Services has been taking an innovative approach to the
ongoing re-design of their service, which is putting patients and
staff right at the centre of the process.
Photo by thinkpublic

The project has been sponsored and supported by the NHS journeys through the service. These touchpoints then formed 40/41
Institute for Innovation and Improvement and is co-produced the key focus for re-design. Many of the touchpoints that were Case study
with the service design consultancy, thinkpublic, anthropological identified can be re-designed very easily and would make
researchers from University College London and, importantly, a huge difference to the patient experience. For example, staff
patients and staff from the hospital. The objective has been not moved weighing scales out of sight of the waiting room – they
to solve any specific problem of service delivery, but to achieve hadn’t noticed how embarrassing patients found it to be weighed
an improved experience of the service by involving staff and patients in front of everyone.
in the process of re-design. To do this, a range of techniques has Film was also used as a way to encourage involvement – literally
been used to help patients and staff describe their experiences handing over the lens through which the service was viewed
with a specific focus on the touchpoints. to patients and bringing their lived experiences to life for others.
A project team was brought together that comprised patients, Patients found this process to be an incredibly powerful way
carers, healthcare staff, researchers and improvement leaders. The to share their stories and be heard. When patient’s films were
core project team knew that the initial engagement with patient shown during working sessions it immediately created a shared
carers and staff would be critical, so in the build-up to the project understanding and a new empathy for the deeper needs of patients.
they engaged with their audience through a range of communication The effect was to connect and energise the group towards a common
media including posters, leaflets and a low-tech newspaper to create purpose – to improve the patient, carer and staff experience.
interest. Patients and staff were invited to become involved in As Deborah told us:
examining the service in ways that were unfamiliar to most of them.
While we did have some concerns that re-living and sharing these
A participatory design project like the one at Luton and
types of experiences might be difficult for patients, the majority
Dunstable is not something that staff can be coerced or targeted
felt that it was invaluable in helping them to move forward
to get involved in. Vital to its success is that those who take part
and in building relationships with other patients, carers and staff.
are willing and energised participants. As a subtle mechanism of
recruitment onto the project, all staff were invited to keep log books Many patients suggested that the project methodology of
and to note their own thoughts, frustrations and ideas about the filmmaking that they had been invited to work on should become
service they were providing. Deborah Szebeko, a member of the part of the patient journey itself – an example of how handing
service design team, told us: control over to users in the context of a designed methodology
becomes an aspect of service in its own right:
We had a strong sense that patients wanted to get involved because
they felt that they wanted to give something back to the service. Staff We’ve had one patient working closely with us and visiting our
were excited to work with patients in a way that was different from studio to edit his film; he has helped bridge a gap and get staff on
their usual relationship with patients. board with film. He is extremely passionate and just really wanted
to help; he has taken time off work to get involved with
Insight was generated in a number of ways including further work the project. He also feels he is learning new skills.
with the log books and patient interviews. The patients and staff
mapped a set of touchpoints that they felt formed their experience
of Head and Neck Cancer Services and re-played their emotional

In this example, service design, service delivery and insight The project is still work in progress but staff appear to be more 42/43
generation happen simultaneously and collaboratively at the motivated to work with patients. Patients are calling staff to Case study
interface. As one patient of the service said: arrange times to meet; they appear to be mobilised and active in
co-designing and trialling ideas. The perceived risk expressed by
I enjoyed meeting everyone – feeling I was eating properly for the
some staff that involving patients in this way would unfairly raise
first time, possibly because I was in company.
their expectations and lead to disappointment has not transpired.
This type of participatory design intervention led the team As one member of the team pointed out:
to conclude that the principle of building continuous service
improvement mechanisms into the everyday experience for both Patients and staff are not asking for gold taps, in fact most of their
patients and staff – rather than being an independent activity – can suggestions are quite achievable with a little budget. I would say one
add an incredible amount of value to the service. And importantly, of the most important things is providing space for relationships to
it helps to improve communication between patients and those build and supporting that with communication.
staff who are providing care. The experience of connecting patients and staff in this way has
Through mapping user journeys, patients articulated clearly that proved to be extremely valuable in changing beliefs about what they
this clinic represented a ‘pinprick’ in comparison to their whole can achieve. This combination of experience and belief has led to
journey, which involved many other departments and hospitals – as positive action, resulting in change that will actually improve
well as touchpoints outside of the formal system. This demonstrates experiences.
the wider challenge for health services in working together across
the whole patient journey.
The process so far has opened up a new dialogue between staff
and patients. The project – which now has its own active blog
– has connected people with the same interest in improving the
touchpoints of the service and has given ‘permission’ and a structure
to make small but significant changes happen. Lynne Mahar at the
NHS Institute for Innovation and Improvement commented:
‘The process so far has challenged traditional views and experiences
of service improvement, giving patients and staff a new energy
and commitment for change.’ Together they are trialling how the
clinic’s space is used; instead of the consultants having rooms,
which patients move in and out of, patients now have rooms
and staff move to see them. The clinic is now building a closer
relationship with neighbouring Mount Vernon Hospital, which
provides radiotherapy, to build a better understanding of the
wider patient experience.

Service stories 44/45
Professionals
Peter Gilroy, now chief executive of Kent County Council,
told us that ‘the quality of interactions is my obsession . . .
relationships are the glue that hold everything together’.
In his previous job, as strategic director of Kent Social
Services, his first step towards achieving 3-star status was
to work on improving the experiences of his staff working at
the council: ‘If we can’t look after our staff, they are
not going to look after our customers.’ He produced a 2
ten-point plan that focused on two dimensions: people’s Professionals and practitioners
work ‘on the job’ and their quality of life overall.
Training and career progression was a major focus, as was
work–life balance and staff health. But Peter’s approach
Find ways of enabling professionals and people
went beyond simply making life better for his frontline to work together: create spaces for simultaneous
professionals: he took that focus and used it to demand that empowerment.
people re-imagined the shape of the organisation:

I wanted to create a paradigm shift to show that the front
of our business was more important . . . you’ve got to take Richard Elliot, former manager of a drugs action team in Bristol,
very seriously the behavioural and care aspects of the found himself dealing with a tangle of 44 different funding streams,
workforce – and I don’t mean of your senior people, your nine planning grids and 82 different objectives. By his estimation,
priority must be the front of the business . . . transformation
he and his team spent little more than 40 per cent of their time
actually working to tackle drug issues. Unsurprisingly he resigned,
isn’t just about things, it’s about behaviours and mindsets.
writing that ‘monitoring has become almost religious in status,
High expectations are rewarded with recognition and as has centralised control . . . the demand for quick hits and early
validation for good work. Kent has regular ‘Oscar’ wins is driven by a central desire analogous to the instant
ceremonies for frontline staff, and employees from any gratification demands made by drug users themselves’.21
area of the council can qualify for exchange trips around Richard’s story is echoed in a wider complaint about the impact
the world if they have performed excellently. Under Peter’s of targets of professional autonomy and identity. Public service
leadership, Social Services reached 3-star status and Kent professionals and practitioners are growing increasingly vocal
is now one of four 4-star councils – suggesting that his about the unintended consequences of targets, arguing that their
determination to put the frontline centre stage reaps powerful cumulative impact adds up to disengaging, frustrating and
benefits not only for the people working there but also for alienating experiences for service users. Practitioners recognise that
the citizens of Kent. many people approach a service organisation and are made to jump
through a set of complicated hoops in order to meet an apparently

straightforward request. The agents they are interacting with are knowledge to being about building capacity to cope. The second 46/47
not doing what seems obvious to meet the request, because they is to ‘design in’ a focus on the frontline, the interface space between Professionals
are instead driven to focus on doing whatever they need to do in people and services.
order to meet the target. Those who work at the frontline of public
The zero-sum game of professional and
services argue that this runs entirely counter to why they took their
public autonomy
jobs in the first place, and that targets from central government
Ninety-one per cent of people with long-term health conditions
undermine their professional autonomy. Their frustrations stem
report a desire for a greater say in decisions about their treatment.22
in the main from the sense that the system prevents them from
Every week, 52 million Americans go online to find out about
providing the support they want to give as professionals.
health.23 Parents overwhelmingly see other parents, not
But this is not a straightforward story about ‘oppression by target’.
professionals such as health visitors and parent practitioners,
At the start of this pamphlet we described the notion of mass
as the experts.24 In searching for meaning and recognition, people
production services, a model where one of the most distinctive
are looking for greater autonomy and an understanding that they
features is a particular form of professional identity. This identity
want the right to make decisions about their own lives, as the
is characterised by access to expert knowledge and insight not
people who best know the social, cultural and economic context
otherwise available to people and users: the primary job of the
of such decisions.
professional is to match supply and demand in the most efficient
The rhetoric of user-led public services put forward by this
way through acting as gatekeepers to services. The impact of this
government risks polarising professional and user empowerment as
on people’s experiences of services is just as profound as the target
if it were a zero-sum game. For example, in autumn 2005, the Prime
culture about which professionals complain: such models of
Minister made a speech in which he argued that ‘public service
professionalism create an unequal distribution of power. Sitting
reforms [in health and education] must be driven by the wishes of
in the consulting room as a patient is a very different experience
the users not the producers’.25 There is a sense that if users need
from sitting in that same room as the doctor.
to be put at the heart of public services, then providers, producers,
Over the years organisations have tried to improve the quality
departments, agencies and councils must step back, cede power and
of interactions between staff and customers through introducing
stop pursuing their own interests and preferences.
behaviour guides – such as requiring staff to look customers in the
Yet advocating user empowerment in this way will not resolve the
eye, wishing them a good day with a pleasant smile. These are all
tension that characterises debates about the place of people-facing
important, but only if they stem from a deeper, more profound shift
professionals in public services. Relational public services require
in how staff and customers understand their relationship. In this
dialogue, empathy and understanding. Over 30 years ago, Ivan Illich
chapter we explore the place of people-facing professionals in
wrote passionately about the need to go beyond existing models of
organisations that are innovating services. Drawing on our case
professional–user relationships. In Deschooling Society he argued
study organisations we argue that two themes need to be put at
that ‘good institutions encourage self-assembly, re-use and repair.
the heart of approaches to reform. The first is the task of shifting
They do not just serve people but create capabilities in people,
notions of professional identity from being about expertise and
support initiative rather than supplant it.’26 Far from seeking to set

user interests and producer interests at odds, future approaches 48/49
to reform need to focus on how people and service staff can work Professionals
together to create outcomes.
When Richard Duvall founded the online bank Egg, he set out
to create a bank that could ‘dance with its customers’ – a bank that
could respond to changing needs, expectations and preferences.
Similarly, the most successful service organisations are finding ways
of recognising people’s professionalism through being experts
in designing support collaboratively with people. Professional
expertise continues to exist, but it is deployed differently: rather
than solving problems or telling people what to do, this expertise
is used to uncover needs and help people navigate a complex
network of possible support.
The professional as expert but not as we know it

The collective good is made up of millions of different, sometimes
intimate decisions and experiences about the way people lead their
lives. These decisions depend on relationships – more or less equal,
more or less deep, more or less extended, but always a two-way
exchange between public and professional.27
The tension – that on the one hand, professionals feel
disempowered by targets, and on the other, dominant models of
professional identity keep the power on the side of the service
organisations, not the users, will not be resolved through setting
staff and users against one another. The challenge, instead, is to
focus on how professionals and people can work together to create
outcomes. Service innovators have focused on creating spaces where
professional and personal autonomy can grow simultaneously.
They have done this through fostering a form of professional
identity, vested less in expert knowledge and more in capabilities
to provide deep support to individuals, to motivate them to help
Photo by Linda Nylind

themselves. As Charles Leadbeater has argued, ‘professionals
should serve people in a way that builds up distributed capacity
for coping’.28

If outcomes are more likely to be achieved when reform to public position and the management communicates this effectively to 50/51
services starts with the experiences and interfaces between people staff and customers alike when it goes ahead and deals with those Professionals
and services, it is clear that frontline workers are an essential part ineligible claims.
of the jigsaw puzzle. Despite expanding options for ‘self-service’, The remainder of this chapter outlines how successful service
many of the most complex problems people face go beyond the organisations have taken a simple principle – that professionalism
boundaries of DIY service. However, the insights put forward needs to be rooted in empathy, support and dialogue – and
in this chapter apply just as much to the fleeting interactions threaded it through every layer of their business, from individual
between people and service professionals as they do to longer-term accountability, to shared values, to organisational systems, benefits
relationships. Relational approaches to reform are not all about and processes. It is this ‘Russian doll’ approach that ensures that
forming long-term relationships over time; instead they are about this is about far more than simply overlaying old models of service
a set of qualities – empathy, recognition and understanding with new indicators of customer service. Instead these organisations
– and a consequent focus on dialogue. As one participant from demand a lot from their people-facing professionals; but in return
a local authority said to us: ‘We aspire to create relationships with they put the frontline – the interface – centre stage and shape
our customers but at the moment we barely give them a one night the organisation around the pursuit of high-quality interactions
stand. What’s important isn’t the length of the relationship but the between people and services.
extent to which I feel understood and listened to at that moment.’
Accountability for experiences: defining
Putting the frontline centre stage professionalism for individuals
Chapter 1 has already described how hard it can be for large Recruiting for empathy
organisations to genuinely see their services from their users’ first direct, judged to be the number one bank in terms of customer
perspectives. Equally, making the case for empowering staff to work service, explicitly hires ‘empathetic people’ – and interestingly, many
collaboratively with users is far easier than creating organisations former nurses and teachers can be found on the payroll. John Lewis
where all the surrounding systems and processes align with those Partnership speaks of the importance of recruiting partners who
professional values and expectations. A common theme in all the are experts – but as Patrick Lewis, their supply chain manager
organisations we met is that an unerring focus on creating highly pointed out, ‘we need to be careful that people are experts in
satisfying customer experiences has to be sponsored from the top. customers not products’. They recruit predominantly on attitude
Similarly, such a focus can sometimes lead to short-term losses in rather than experience; this is reflected not only in how they bring
order to make long-term gains. For example, in 2005, BUPA in new recruits, but also by the fact that many of their senior
processed £90 million of ineligible claims. It did so because its positions are filled through internal promotions.
frontline staff had worked with the customers and decided that, Large organisations need to find new ways, not only of
for whatever reason, there was a good case to process the claim. encouraging, but of making inevitable a focus on the extent to which
By doing this, BUPA is effectively communicating to its staff that staff respond to and support people seeking service. The dialogue
listening to the customer is more important than enforcing the rule and conversation that sits at the heart of relational approaches is
book. Customer satisfaction and loyalty, rather than immediate about more than listening. It requires staff to be empathetic, to have
profit, is an important part of BUPA’s long-term commercial an ‘intuitive unity’ with people that is driven by their recognition
of the emotional, social and cultural context of service experiences.

Guardians of the customer experience ‘If you were doing your job brilliantly, what would it look like?’ 52/53
Many of the organisations we met over the course of this research Significant organisational time was put aside to consider the Professionals
had introduced performance frameworks that evaluated every question. The result is not a fixed set of job descriptions, but rather
member of staff on the basis of their contribution to positive a series of excellence profiles for all staff, ranging from catering
customer experiences, in addition to some other more traditional managers to consultants, that represent a shared set of values
measures of job performance. to which people can be held to account. Everyone is able to access
For example, at Virgin Atlantic staff are appraised on the extent any excellence profile they wish through a central system. Rather
to which they perform as guardians of the customer experience. than defining a specific set of activities, the profiles are aspirational
Angus Struthers told us: and are firmly grounded in the organisation’s mission to ‘take care
of the lives in our hands’.
Staff have to remember that they are not just working for Virgin Similarly, about five years ago, Tesco held a series of day-long
Atlantic, but they’re working for the passenger and they have got to seminars for literally thousands of staff. The purpose of these
be able to put themselves in the shoes of the passenger, and ensure sessions was to start a conversation about what Tesco stood for,
that passengers receive the kind of experience they would like to and what it should stand for. The results were boiled down into
receive, as corny as that may sound. two simple, memorable lists: ‘four things we do for customers’ and
And as Alex Popple at MSN UK said: ‘six things we do for each other’. In developing these lists, Tesco
successfully created a shared agenda, used and owned by staff
We’re incentivised around doing things that are ground-breaking up and down the country.
. . . everybody is supposed to have an objective around improving Pret a Manger uses its recruiting process to remind staff of its
the customer experience. values and encourage them to own them. Every applicant who wants
Open and shared professional values to work at Pret is invited to an ‘experience day’ – a day where they
and behaviours go and work in the store to which they have applied. At the end
The most successful service organisations have understood that they of the day, the rest of the staff vote on whether or not the applicant
cannot simply legislate for how staff relate to customers through met the criteria of customer focus that all Pret employees are held
performance frameworks. These organisations have also focused to account on. If fewer than 90 per cent of staff believe that this
on how to keep relational values alive, to stop them from ossifying is the case, then the person does not get offered the job.
in company mission statements or job descriptions that get buried Experiences at the interface drive organisational
in human resources folders. They are experimenting with new ways priorities too
of distributing capacity for holding staff to account on responding The story of Peter Gilroy’s ten-point staff plan outlined at the
to people’s needs. They are permanently looking for new ways start of this chapter illustrates another common theme from the
of fostering a sense of mutual accountability. organisations we spoke to over the course of this research. All had
BUPA and Tesco have invested considerable company time high expectations of staff. But they also tried to provide a lot in
in working with staff to develop the values that guide relationships return, both in terms of recognition and support. As Peter Simpson,
with customers. For example, at BUPA Hospitals, the senior former commercial director at first direct, said, ‘people are people –
management team worked with all staff to answer the question:

the only difference between a person working here and a person not 54/55
working here is that we’re paying one of them’. Professionals
Another important characteristic of these organisations is that
they sought to learn from their staff – about how organisational
systems and processes stood in the way of being able to provide
support, or about which rules worked against positive experiences
between services and people. Good service organisations treat their
staff as the ‘eyes and ears’, able to advocate powerfully for how
things can be improved for users or customers.
Training and celebrating
The organisations we spoke to spent disproportionate amounts
of time and money on supporting staff to achieve more. For
example, Pret spends virtually nothing on advertising. Instead,
they take the 6–7 per cent revenue that would normally be spent
on marketing activities, and reinvest it in training and fun. Pret
staff are offered free English lessons and regular parties. For Pret,
as with many other good service organisations, they do not believe
it is possible to ask staff to focus on empathy and relationships
with customers without building in a people-centric culture to the
organisation itself.
Similarly, Peter Gilroy in Kent fought hard to invest 2 per cent
gross every year on training and research – despite widespread
concerns about deficits. He remained firm, however, arguing that
such investments always bring better returns. He backed up this
investment by insisting on regular celebrations of and rewards
for staff success. The awards celebrations they hold, which senior
staff are expected to attend, celebrate staff who have been judged
excellent by users. High-performing teams and individuals are
rewarded by funding for study trips around the world. As Peter
argued, the total cost of these activities adds up to little more than
a single national advertisement for a new post, and yet they are key
Photo by David Mansell

to empowering, enthusing and ultimately retaining his staff, who
he regards as his most valuable asset. In his words, the training and
mentoring schemes, as well as the parties, became ‘part of the ether,
part of the gold dust’ that have contributed to the organisation
improving its services so successfully in recent years.

Such anecdotal evidence about the impact of training is backing up this message, organisations can demonstrate their 56/57
supported by larger-scale studies. Bassi Investments charted support for staff from whom they are demanding high levels of Professionals
the performance of a share portfolio of companies with high empathy and entrepreneurialism in meeting people’s needs. One
investments in training over five years, against the ‘Standard & respondent said to us: ‘Organisations need to give people mirrors
Poor’s 500’ (a US equivalent of the FTSE 100). The findings were to compare themselves to others. This is the only way you’ll
clear: the US firms that made the largest investments in employee overcome the temptation of command and control.’
skills made the largest returns (16.3 per cent per annum) compared There are two further benefits to fostering peer networks of
with the average return (10.7 per cent) across the index. In other people-facing staff. First, innovation no longer happens in isolation,
words, investors received a 52 per cent higher return over five years but instead through teams. Encouraging people to work together
from shares in companies that make high investments in training.29 and experiment with fresh approaches to meeting people’s needs
can increase staff satisfaction and create more positive service
Quality of work
experiences. Second, finding ways of sharing knowledge can create
Professionals should be paid fairly for their work, but not at the
efficiencies and prevent people from inventing the same wheel
expense of the working conditions themselves. Increasingly, we
many times over.
are recognising that control over working time and conditions,
self-management and forms of democratic control over the Learning from people-facing professionals
workplace are as important as the traditional trade union agenda
of pay and conditions. Research in the UK has found, for example, Our success is built on insights from individuals on the frontline.
that autonomy ranks higher than hours and pay as a factor in Chapter 1 discussed the importance of opening out the channels
determining job satisfaction.30 by which data and insight can be used to drive organisational
Building lateral capacity priorities and development. Alongside gathering insights from
Ask most people-facing staff who they could learn from most and users and customers directly, the service organisations we spoke
the response will usually be other people doing their jobs elsewhere. to created the time, space and expectation that staff insights would
For too long, public service workers have been trapped within their also drive the process of priority-setting and problem-solving for
own zones of practice – whether that’s the classroom, the district or the organisation.
the GP’s surgery. The continuous process of professionals learning For example, John Lewis Partnership holds weekly ‘consultation
how to respond, and taking on a mantle of ‘solutions-assemblers’ half-hours’ where staff are able to share insights about what’s
or ‘advocates’ as part of the shift in professional identity described working well and what is working less well in each of the stores.
above (see page 48), can be sped up and supported by a focus These are discussed at the individual store level as well as at the
on fostering lateral connections through the development of national office. Last month, Peter Gilroy sent out a message via
communities of practice or ‘action learning groups’. payslips to all his employees, asking them each to ‘take five’ – to
Organisations that seek to facilitate and support such lateral think for five minutes about new ways that Kent could generate
networks are effectively communicating to their staff that they income for its work.
recognise that knowledge, ideas and expertise are not located in Insights about service improvements are valuable by-products
the central office, but instead at the frontline. In spelling out and of interactions between professionals and users, and organisations
need to ensure that they develop the mechanisms and channels

that are able to capture and use these insights. Just as setting 58/59
up communities of practice underlines to staff that they are the Challenges Professionals
ones likely to have the best ideas, creating these opportunities for • What are the key aspects of professional identity in your
feedback – and demonstrating that this feedback can have an
organisation?
impact on strategy – is a crucial part of creating a culture that puts
activity at the interface centre stage. • Do your job descriptions, recruitment strategies and performance
Relational approaches to service put frontline professionals frameworks reflect a firm commitment to improving user
at the centre stage, alongside users, as key characters at the interface experiences of service?
between people and services. This has implications both for the
professionals themselves and for the way in which the frontline • How have you invested in training and recognition for your staff?
is connected to the rest of the organisation. For the successful
service organisations that feature in this report, professionals – their • How are you connecting frontline professionals to each other?
roles and identities – play a crucial role in focusing on experiences • What are the natural points of common interest and social
and engaging people. The challenge, in their terms, is to create
contact?
the space and capacity for people and professionals to grow their
autonomy simultaneously – and to shape an organisation that • Which aspects of organisational routine offer opportunities for
actively supports this. garnering staff feedback?

• What connections to organisational structure and strategy
need to be made in order for staff ideas to flow into corporate
priorities?

• Where does your organisation learn its collective lessons?

A shared language of service
Guardians of the customer experience
Mutual accountability
Excellence profiles
Communities of practice

Definitions on pages 106–107

60/61
Case study

Birmingham OwnHealth
Pfizer Health Solutions is working with NHS Direct and two
primary care trusts (PCTs) in Birmingham to create an innovative
approach to service. Launched earlier this year, Birmingham
OwnHealth will support up to 2000 people with diabetes, heart
failure and/or cardiovascular disease. It draws on health
prevention models used in the USA where the focus is less on
efficiency of existing services, and more on changing projections
and trends. John Procter, who leads the Pfizer Health Solutions
team working on the scheme, argues that there is a need to invest
in the value of health, and move beyond simply looking at the costs.
He sees the work in Birmingham as an opportunity to demonstrate
what this looks like in practice:
Innovative partnerships such as this one can play a crucial role
in helping the NHS shift from being a ‘sick’ care system towards
being a patient-centred ‘health’ care system. It will deliver benefits
to all – individuals and their families, clinicians and healthcare
professionals, and the wider NHS.
At the heart of Birmingham OwnHealth is the ambition to reduce
the number of ‘non-scheduled’ visits to secondary care – by far the
most expensive element of health services – through enabling
people to better manage their conditions and prevent them from
escalating:
Programmes like this don’t save money immediately – but they
do reduce the growth of trends over time . . . it’s as much about
what you don’t spend as what you do.
Photo by Duncan Phillips

62/63
Birmingham OwnHealth has innovated in terms of the channel from the programme, with the ‘graduation criteria’ being focused Case study
they use: it is a service delivered entirely over the telephone, on the on capacity to self-manage, rather than a pre-defined set of
basis that phones are in people’s homes and part of their everyday outcomes that may mean different things to different individuals.
lives, even if they are not very mobile. To make the service as Birmingham OwnHealth has also begun to knit together the
accessible as possible, it is offered in two languages (English and whole range of local services for their users. They are mapping what
Punjabi) and all supporting patient information has two versions – they call the ‘local service ecology’ – noting the locations for specific
one for high literacy and one for low literacy. services to help guide users towards what they are looking for. In
The scheme’s success also rests on how the frontline time this map will help the PCT in collaboration with GP surgeries
professionals are trained: the focus is on their professional role to ensure that services are evenly distributed. Staff work with people
and interactions with the patient and the need to build relationships from specific GP surgeries to enable them to build up relationships
with the people they are supporting and the surrounding services and provide regular feedback on the patients on the scheme to help
that each patient may wish to access. Rather than using their ensure continuity across different service channels.
clinical expertise to instruct people, the NHS Direct nurses are John talks about how hard it can be to measure the impact
trained to use that expertise to guide people to reach their own of their work, particularly for the handful of patients at risk
conclusions instead: of developing cardiovascular disease who are not yet suffering
but are highly likely to have an ‘incident’ in the next ten years.
It’s totally different to an inbound system that uses algorithms Using Prochaska’s model of behaviour change, 31 he says, ‘moving
. . . it’s about coaching and support and conversation. someone from pre-contemplation to contemplation to action over
This alternative model of professionalism is supported by the course of the year or more may represent real progress towards
the design of the scheme’s knowledge management and needs prevention, but there’s nothing in it that can be reflected on a
assessment system – a digital platform developed by Pfizer Health balance sheet’. Yet, as he rightly points out, the savings generated
Solutions. In the first conversation, the care manager will ask some by reducing the impact from these kinds of diseases, even by
simple questions – for example about diet, exercise and so on – and 1 per cent, are far higher than any figure saved through rationalising
the system will highlight areas where the patient needs to do some existing services.
work. Together, the care manager and the patient will talk in order It’s early days yet for the scheme but John tells us that local staff
to understand which issues are relatively straightforward to tackle, in the PCT are already excited:
and those where the patient feels they need more support to tackle. Birmingham OwnHealth is not about replacing services at a local
They then set some targets – not based on system performance but level, it’s about enhancing and improving what’s already there.
instead on the goals that the patient feels they can achieve through We’ve learnt that you should just start somewhere, anywhere, and
the conversations and coaching offered by the nurses. The ultimate let the rest of it grow and develop over time . . . it’s the hardest thing
goal is for each individual to begin to have a positive impact on their to get started, but once you have it’s possible to see what else could
health and wellbeing through taking action built on the confidence,
grow from it.
knowledge and understanding they have gained through working
with their care manager. In time people will eventually graduate

64/65
Measurement

3
Measuring success
Find ways of measuring experiences as well as
systems: life is more complicated than a key
performance indicator.

Seeing service as a delivery mechanism rather than a transformative
experience has led to a particular form of information gathering and
system measurement. Existing targets have tended to focus energy
on underperformance in operational eﬃciency, at the expense
of underperformance in the transformation of people’s lives.
Being able to assess the quality of the experience is as important
as knowing the eﬃciency of the operations: both are necessary
forms of measurement. As Patrick Lewis from John Lewis
Partnership told us, ‘you’ve got to run the organisation at a more
complex level than that of KPIs’.
Chapter 1 explored the sorts of insights successful organisations
gather from their customers and users. The insights these
organisations seek to collect go beyond demographics and even
attitudes – they are also interested in what people think about
Photo by David Levene

something, how they felt about a particular experience or product.
What this reveals, therefore, is that by gathering information about
customers and what matters to them, service organisations also
begin to gather a form of feedback, which itself provides measures

of success. Rather than this success being measured at a systemic Not only do measures of experience add a richness to existing 66/67
level (such as progress against targets), such insights represent the approaches to system measurement, in some cases they illuminate Measurement
measurement of success from an experiential perspective – from the unintended consequences of targets and efficiency metrics.
the vantage point of the user themselves on the service they are A number of people we interviewed as part of this project spoke
accessing. This matters because, when it works, users themselves of the detrimental impact system measures can have on people’s
experience success directly, with obvious consequences for their experiences of service, and warned against placing too much value
sense of satisfaction and trust. on a ‘single view’ of performance information. For example, one
In other words, successful service organisations have found representative of John Lewis Partnership said to us that he ‘doesn’t
ways of measuring success and improvement at more than the let a KPI stand in the way of doing what’s right’. This was supported
systemic level. The information flow between users and the by the views of many of the local authority representatives we
organisation is far more dynamic, and customer insights are treated spoke to. As one respondent said:
as a form of measurement for assessing performance at the same
time as determining priorities. The service innovators we spoke The problem is the monitoring. Targets are increasingly driving
to understand that unless they can see what is working and what provision. Councils are now learning sophisticated ways of ‘playing
is going wrong from the perspective of the user, they have little hope the game’, pouring resources into those things on the boundaries of
in engaging that person, or (in the case of commercial organisations) target levels. This distorts the relationship with customers.
keeping their custom. The actual experiences of people, rather than the detached
Measuring impact and success by experience metrics can measurements of customer satisfaction and proxy measures of
be revealing. Take, for example, the civil justice system. In recent performance such as waiting times, should be used as drivers for
research for the Department for Constitutional Affairs, as many as service transformation. The trick is to measure performance in
a third of people felt that the experience of sorting out the issue was ways that illuminate the quality of the experience rather than
at least as stressful as the issue itself. A further third felt that both focusing solely on operational performance. Organisations need
were equally stressful. And the knock-on effect of these experiences to measure what users value, as well as what organisations and
on other issues that relate to other public service provision is telling service systems value.
as well: respondents highlighted illness, as well as employment The public sector has already begun to adopt many of the
and relationship issues as side effects of their problems and the customer research techniques that are used in the private sector.
experiences of trying to resolve them.32 Focus groups are used to test ideas and support service planning.
Don’t let a key performance indicator get in the way Some service providers are commissioning mystery shopping
of doing what’s right: measuring experiences research to directly assess the quality of customer service. Pret’s
mystery shoppers assess not only the range of products on offer,
There are tensions between the need to look at a single but also the quality of service. They have turned apparently soft
customer view and the overview. We need to do both. measures of human interaction into harder metrics: did the barista
The two together can be very revealing, and can expose look you in the eye and smile? Did they tell you how much change
deep structural problems. you were receiving?

The government has until recently advocated a unified 68/69
cross-service measure of customer satisfaction as a means of Measurement
adding experiential measures to the system metrics already in
place. However, the problem with satisfaction as a measure is
that it is highly subjective if viewed from the perspective of the
users. People bring different expectations – often shaped by their
own circumstances and backgrounds – to service experiences;
all satisfaction measures is the extent of the gap between those
expectations and perceptions. Expectations and perceptions are
highly individual and changeable.
So, more needs to be done to identify ways of measuring actual
service experiences. The service organisations we spoke to are
pioneering a number of experience metrics, all of which could
be applied to public service organisations as a way of enriching
the means by which system performance is understood.
Tesco has developed a management and measurement tool that
they call the Steering Wheel. The wheel is based on the theory
of the balanced scorecard that prompts businesses to consider not
only the financial performance, but the impact on the bottom line
of the happiness of employees, the efficiency of operations and
the satisfaction of customers. Tesco has five customer-value metrics
derived from customer research – a notably small number – that
they believe are the five aspects of the supermarket experience that
are most important to customers: the aisles are clear, I can get what
I want, the prices are good, I don’t want to queue, the staff are great.
Tesco believes that things need to be simple if they are to be applied
at every level of the organisation, from boardroom to stockroom.
Alex Cheatle from TEN UK, a lifestyle management and
concierge business, explained:
We measure ourselves based on what they [our clients] want.
We ask each member, exactly what/when/how do you want? and
our system then tracks everything we do against that expectation,
using time tracking and feedback loops. We haven’t come across
a single call centre that can deal with this level of complexity.

This form of measurement – in customer terms, not universal associated with measuring success. Feedback is not used to punish 70/71
standards set centrally and sometimes arbitrarily based on what people; it is used to prioritise the activity of Chris and his senior Measurement
users might judge to be good – can be called my-metrics. colleagues. It creates an atmosphere of continuous improvement.
My-metrics are also an important part of Birmingham OwnHealth, Furthermore it makes small-scale experimentation and innovation
the case study described at the end of chapter 2. less risky: teachers at Chris’s school can get almost immediate
Paul Bello from Orange described the current high point of feedback on the impact of any changes they make to their teaching
success measures in the commercial sector as the propensity to practice – all the data is available for everyone to see and use.
recommend. ‘Would you recommend this service to someone else?’
Feedback, measurement and information at
has become the only question worth asking customers for some
the interface
organisations in assessing success. The theory is that most customer Closing the gap between the interface and the boardroom
surveys are inherently inaccurate as questions can be asked in User insights can be challenging, demanding and uncomfortable
ways that lead to positive responses. But ask people if they would for organisations. However, the most innovative service
recommend a plumber, for example, and they are forced to put organisations see beyond this. They view their service users as
their own reputation on the line.33 a resource or specialist network to draw on for development ideas.
The current approach to inspecting schools and hospitals For example, BUPA seeks out the things that are not working
at periodic intervals is one of the most stressful elements of any about its service. As Alison Platt, head of BUPA Hospitals said,
public service manager’s job. Staff sickness increases in schools ‘the challenge is always to get people to believe that the service
around the time of Ofsted inspections as school staff feel under on offer can be improved’. As well as investing significant time and
tremendous pressure to perform against the criteria set by the money in following user journeys and evaluating how touchpoints
system. Chris Gerry, head of New Line Learning Federation in and channels can be improved, BUPA’s customer intelligence team
Kent, might therefore be regarded as a glutton for punishment focuses on the four elements of BUPA’s service that customers like
in deciding to invite Ofsted in on a much more regular basis. least. These are identified through focus groups and customers
He supplements their inspections with his own feedback system. are then invited to work with senior management to make a plan
Every month students are asked to provide feedback on teacher of action to tackle these issues. Progress is assessed and fed back.
performance against a number of metrics that the students What is significant is the dynamic nature of the flow of information
themselves were involved in devising. These metrics are focused on through BUPA. This process is repeated quarterly, so that, like at
things like whether the lessons were boring or engaging, whether Chris’s federation of schools, the feedback loops between action
homework was marked on time, and so on, rather than student and learning are much tighter.
grades. As Chris puts it, ‘we know that the best way of creating It is not only users whose shared wisdom and insight is being
lifelong learners is to engage them’, so measuring the success or used to drive service improvement. John Lewis Partnership,
otherwise of this engagement is crucial. among others, also treat their staff as the ‘eyes and ears’ of their
What Chris is doing is measuring service experiences as they organisation. They are the people closest to customers, and from
unfold. Not only does this provide him with a much more constant their interactions in store they can offer deep insights into how to
flow of information and feedback that enables him to pinpoint in improve performance from the perspective of people’s experiences.
more detail where work is needed, it also reduces the levels of stress Staff are encouraged to share what they learn about customers and

their responses to products with colleagues locally, and their views we detected across other successful service organisations we spoke 72/73
are fed back to product development teams. BUPA also worked to to. Increasingly, feedback, insight and ideas are things that are Measurement
underline the importance of employees providing feedback as they not only gathered, but also offered back to users of services.
developed their excellence profiles. Alison Platt told us: ‘We had to Service innovators are looking for ways to open up and break down
get away from the culture of “I just want to do my job”. Well actually, the barriers between customers and organisations. They see every
feedback is your job.’ interaction between a person and the service as an opportunity to
Service innovators do not ask only people-facing staff to offer learn something new.
insights back to the organisation. They also ensure that managers Requesting and sharing information and insight on a regular
and senior staff have a direct line to the interface. This is not about basis offers an effective new channel of honest dialogue that can
‘visits’ or ‘inspections’; to be effective these organisations have looked benefit service organisations and users in equal measure. Presenting
for ways of putting the customer squarely on the board’s agenda. system information and measurement back to users in accessible
As one respondent told us, ‘they’ve got to feel it’. BUPA involves all and usable ways is an important element of building trust and
senior staff in the work around user journeys. In addition, every putting people in control. For example, if district-level data suggests
week the directors take on ten customer complaints and have that crime is going down, but a person knows that burglaries have
to sort them out. This is about real exposure, not visits. gone up on their street, they are unlikely to believe the figures.
Providing street-level data on crime would help people to close the
Closing the gap between information and users
gap between service experiences and system measures. It would give
Paul Hodgkin is a practising GP who has a sideline in an
people the confidence that their local police force had enough data
exciting new social enterprise. In 2005 he founded the website
and insight to target specific problem areas. Improved technology
www.patientopinion.org.uk. It is a brilliant example of how service
should make this kind of ‘very local’ information and insight
innovators are creating new channels at the interface that bring
gathering possible in a way it would not have been 20 years ago.
together feedback, service measurement and user information
These organisations are pioneering an approach that combines
simultaneously. The website invites people who have recently
service delivery, service design and insight generation at the point
experienced hospital treatment to swap stories. Other people
of the interface, to inform policy and ongoing system re-design.
preparing to go to hospital can use the site to help them make
There is much that can be learnt here for future public services.
decisions about where to go for their treatment; the information
Politicians and policy-makers are searching for a new way of looking
is far more accessible and immediate than any star rating or
at performance that takes in trust and satisfaction. It seems unlikely
performance report. Paul also sells full access to the information
that ever more fine-grained system measurements (eg customer
on the site to primary care trusts, to enable them to get a better
satisfaction, value added) will provide the solution. Instead, we need
feel for system performance from a different perspective. In effect,
to look at how experiences are measured and assessed, and put
looking at the website gives the trusts continuous access to ‘collective
these insights alongside some of the more abstract measures already
wisdom across the system’. Patient Opinion’s strapline is ‘this is our
in existence.
NHS . . . let’s make it better’.
Adding in experience metrics and reducing feedback loops will
Like Chris Gerry’s feedback tools, it is not possible to separate
help to tackle the deep problems of mistrust and dissatisfaction.
out insight, measurement, feedback and information on Paul’s
There is an additional benefit too. As this chapter has outlined,
website. Chris’s and Paul’s work illustrates a wider pattern that

smaller feedback loops are a key element in creating a culture 74/75
of experimentation and innovation. The service innovators we Challenges Measurement
spoke to learnt from getting it wrong, but they learnt quickly • How are you measuring the experience of different kinds
and were able to adapt and improve quickly thanks to their deeper
of users?
understanding of the impact of particular decisions and approaches.
For these organisations, a formalised service design development • How frequently are you assessing performance against
methodology mitigates the risk of failure by managing incremental experience metrics?
levels of service prototyping. Involving users at every stage also
enables service designers to spot flaws not just in terms of • Is your organisation ready to use feedback, even if it is negative?
operational systems, but also in terms of the experience of users.
• What access do your users and staff have to performance
information? Is it presented in an accessible format that
communicates to people at their level of interest?

• Are you benefiting from the collective wisdom of your customers?

A shared language of service
Experience metrics
My-metrics
Collective wisdom
Prototyping
Definitions on pages 107–108

An important turning point was the success of the collaboration 76/77
between the police and the TMO in pinpointing and closing Case study
Young people in Kensington down a number of crack houses in the borough. In one area this
joint working saw the successful removal of five major dealers
and Chelsea and massive reductions in crime – car theft by 50 per cent, street
violence by 60 per cent and burglary by 30 per cent. ‘The police
‘It’s unusual to find good working relationships at this level,’ says found that there was a huge pay-off in working with us, and that’s
Isobel Rickard, who lives in Lincolnshire but spends her working really important. There’s got to be a pay-off; everyone’s got to
week running housing management services for Kensington and get something out of it.’
Chelsea Tenant Management Organisation. She is pioneering
a new approach to tackling anti-social behaviour that stands out
from the rest.
For one thing, her view of ‘rolling out’ is not about determining
how things should be and telling others to deliver services
differently: ‘It’s hard to sit round as managers and say it needs
to happen – it needs to come from the bottom up.’ Instead, Isobel
is working with the council’s Youth and Education Welfare Services,
and the local police, to build the crucial relationships estate by
estate. Together they are creating estate-level partnerships, based
on trust and a shared sense of purpose, which take in voluntary
organisations, registered social landlords and the numerous other
agencies that play some part in tackling anti-social behaviour:
‘you’ve got to look at the whole picture’. However, it is not just partnerships that have made the model
You get the sense that much has been learnt from the so successful. Isobel has also stressed the importance of giving
perspectives of different professions on the same sets of issues. a voice to young people, so often demonised in discussions of

Photos with permission of Kensington and Chelsea TMO
This understanding has been crucial to orchestrating the integrated anti-social behaviour. For example the TMO, youth service and
service that Isobel and her team are working to create. The Tenant police carried out a consultation exercise on one estate to gain
Management Organisation (TMO) got involved in training a better understanding of the perspective of young people. The
the community police support officers, and they have played a huge result was a series of activities delivered by all the different agencies,
part in some of the local successes. The TMO also works very which enabled staff to get to know the kids by name and build
closely with the youth service, which provides outreach work relationships with them. This is about involving young people in
in some of the problem areas. This has created a sense of ‘common designing services. ‘We have to fit around them even if we don’t
endeavour . . . bringing all those people together made it possible always agree,’ says Isobel. ‘They need to know the estates, know
to see how they could all make some changes.’ where the trouble will be.’

Although this approach may sound like common sense, Isobel Isobel, ‘so that nothing’s happening that no one knows about’. The 78/79
has clearly fought hard: ‘Selling the idea of financing bad behaviour meetings offer a way of exchanging information early and making Case study
will always be hard.’ Nevertheless, she has stood firm. She sees connections. They also enable staff to track particular young people,
anti-social behaviour orders (ASBOs) as impossible to enforce wherever they are and whoever is dealing with them. In the past,
– ‘so what’s the point?’ – and as a result there are only three ASBOs says Isobel, the partnership was ‘good at doing things initially, but
in the borough. ‘There’s so much money out there being spent not very good at following through’.
on anti-social behaviour but it’s all going on the punitive stuff.
Why don’t we put some into prevention as well?’ This belief does
not stop intervention, far from it: ‘Of course we intervene as soon
as we identify a problem – but we’re not heavy handed, we let
the voluntary workers do their work first.’
Working at an estate level has enabled the teams to see the
importance of improving relationships on estates, building the
capacity to manage and co-exist peacefully, rather than simply
trying to tackle or contain anti-social behaviour. It is an approach
that has been applied across the TMO’s estates – for example
a recent exercise at World’s End saw older people gathering in
hoods and baseball caps while young people tried getting about
with canes and walking frames.
The professionals involved and the attitudes they bring with
them really matter: ‘The quality of individuals in tackling this Isobel is adamant about the need for this meeting to be kept to staff
stuff is paramount.’ This does not necessarily mean working only at an operational level and has resisted the temptation to use the
with experienced or fully trained staff: the TMO has introduced gathering for training sessions or other activities: ‘As soon as things
a graduate trainee scheme, taking on people with no housing go up into the strategic level then things stop happening – and these
experience and giving them the opportunity to study for an MA meetings have done more for anti-social behaviour than anything
in housing while working. Four young people have been trained else in the last three years.’
through the scheme in the last two years – and one has just It is clear that the TMO’s approach is having a dramatic impact,
become an area manager. not only on the lives of the young people but also on the overall
What’s also striking about Kensington and Chelsea’s approach quality of life on the estates where this approach is being used. For
is the emphasis it places on regular feedback, which is regarded Isobel , this is all that matters: ‘Performance indicators have no
as crucial and is firmly focused on operations. Every week relevance or meaning at all to what’s actually going on here – we’d
the agencies involved – registered social landlords, the police, spend so much time counting that we wouldn’t be able to do
environmental health, the TMO, mediation services, victim support, anything! It’s very hard to measure how many people haven’t gone
the youth offending team and the domestic violence team – meet on to be in gangs.’
for a quick-fire exchange of information. This is vital, according to

80/81
Politics

4
The politics of service design
If applied systemically, service design can
offer a vision for the transformation of public
services, as well as a route to get there.

The principles of the previous chapters could be used to great
eﬀect to improve existing service organisations. But only if they are
applied systemically will service design principles have the potential
to transform public services as we know them. Service design
approaches help to close the gap between what people want and
need, and what organisations do. It helps to generate a shared, single
view of system priorities that connects actual experiences with
the setting of those priorities. Service design focuses minds on the
deeper purpose of service – to generate deep forms of satisfaction
and wellbeing. And it builds the capacity of organisations and
groups of organisations to adapt and morph as people’s needs
change. In these terms, service design can oﬀer a vision for
transformation, as well as a set of tools and a model of change
for bringing it about.
Photo by Don McPhee

Current models of service have created a distinctive set of Service design re-frames the central tenets of any 82/83
building blocks for public services – functional institutions, reform agenda Politics
episodes and abstract system or output measurements. The The language and frameworks that we use determine the parameters
approach taken to reform is itself driven by these building blocks: of the debate, and limit the kinds of organisational and service
they produce an agenda that is focused on very particular models innovations that we can imagine. Service designers do not see
of the core elements that any political party in power would need service as something that can be reduced to a commodity: they
to address in thinking about public services. For example, a view of understand it instead as being a form of support, a kind of
services as commodities encompasses the following assumptions: scaffolding to help people live their lives as they wish. By offering
a fresh set of building blocks – the touchpoints, journeys, channels,
• Efficiency is seen to be primarily about increasing the capacity of service environments and architectures that together form the
the existing system to do more. It is about operations, driving out drivers for change in every service organisation we spoke to – service
bureaucracy and tightening existing processes and supply chains. design re-frames the ways in which the main elements of reform
For example, the Gershon review of 2004 indicates that cuts of can be understood.
£20 billion are going to be achieved through a combination of In focusing on the interaction between people and services,
cutting ‘inputs’ (mainly jobs) and increasing ‘productive time’.34 rather than services alone, service design enables policy-makers
• Personalisation is equated most often with consumer models of and practitioners to see new possibilities. Far from simply offering
mass customisation, where particular services are modularised incremental improvements to existing services, these possibilities
and people are able to choose – but not always co-design – could add up to radical new models of service, organisations
services. For example, the education white paper of 2005 made and value.
proposals about school choice, and the creation of ‘choice advisers’
to help parents navigate a complex and hard-to-read system.35 Efficiency
Patients can now choose from a range of treatment centres (not Systems thinkers, health economists and others have for a long
all state-run) for where they access their treatment. time argued that we need a wider view of efficiency than current
• Devolution to the frontline is accompanied by checks and models allow for. It is not that achieving operational efficiency is not
measures to ensure that the local authorities and service desirable: it’s just that it is not the whole picture. Two further forms
organisations are responding to an agenda that remains of efficiency that service design focuses on include:
predominantly set by the centre. Peter Taylor-Gooby has • designing out waste. It has been estimated that between 30 per
characterised this kind of devolution as a ‘principal–agent’
cent and 70 per cent of any organisation’s time is spent on ‘failure
relationship.36 For example, inspections are carried out by
demand’ – the cost of getting it wrong the first time.37 These
semi-independent organisations such as Ofsted on behalf of the
costs are measurable not only in terms of time, but also in staff
centre, and local authorities continue to be measured primarily
morale. Finding that the system works against being able to focus
against systemic targets. Limited metrics of customer satisfaction
fully on meeting people’s needs has obvious implications for levels
have been introduced as a counterweight but, in the main, central
of staff motivation and satisfaction.
targets still drive assessments of performance.

• harnessing and unleashing the untapped resources of users’ time, Service design helps policy-makers and service providers to 84/85
energy and motivation. By focusing on relationships and counter this ‘choice bias’ through opening up new mechanisms and Politics
experiences, good service design enables policy-makers to channels for engaging people not only in choosing between services,
create services that engage people, services that invite them but also in shaping those services in the first place:
in to participate in the creation of positive outcomes.
• Service designers use methodologies that start with people,
Service design maximises existing resources and brings new not existing services or institutions. The lifestyle management
resources into the equation, as well as seeking to minimise costs. company TEN UK begins by asking its customers three simple
questions: Who are you? What do you want or need (and when,
Challenges
how and where)? How can we help? The organisations,
• How can prevention be measured meaningfully – the things that partnerships and forms of support flow from a deep
don’t happen – for example, a teenager resisting pressure to join a understanding of what those support needs are in the first place.
gang, or someone eating healthily? For good service designers, the unit of service is always the
• Can we develop efficiency metrics that consider efficiency over person, not the institution, patient, disease, or, worse still,
a lifecycle rather than through specific service episodes? We have the bed. Service design offers both a conceptual framework
developed lifetime costings for everything from photocopiers to and a set of tools for politicians and policy-makers seeking
weapons to cars and washing machines and yet we do not do the to create deeply personalised services.
same for vital public services. • Service designers focus on a specific kind of engagement:
• Can politicians find the courage to tell a story about efficiency engagement at the interface. Deliberation has to take place at the
that extends beyond the current political cycle? Can they make point of delivery to create the kind of engagement required for
the case for investing in public services for the long term, rather co-production – that where people are mobilised, coached, and
than a story that simply focuses on getting the most out of them encouraged to participate in the ‘common enterprise’ of generating
in the here and now? positive outcomes. The current emphasis on ‘public engagement’
in policy-making circles fails to see and reinforce the vital
Personalisation and co-production connection between engagement for co-production and
Choice has become the primary mechanism by which this experiences. Whether it is the setting up of foundation hospital
government is seeking to personalise services. It is seen as a means boards, the creation of community representative posts on local
of enabling greater user autonomy, and a way of engaging people strategic partnerships, or the current education bill’s emphasis
in the creation of outcomes. on parental involvement in school governance (rather than their
Of course it is true that the freedom to choose is a crucial part children’s learning), too often such engagement is seen to happen
of feeling in control. But making stressful, potentially life-changing in town halls, school gyms or conference centres, away from the
choices requires that those decisions are surrounded by dialogue, real action of service experiences. In contrast, service design offers
useful and accessible information, recognition and support. a powerful set of tools by which experiences can be shaped to
Being asked to choose from a menu of options, none of which meet the goal of genuine engagement.
appear to reflect your needs and the kinds of social and cultural
contexts you are operating within, can be as disengaging
and frustrating as a situation where there is no choice at all.

By starting with people themselves, not organisational norms or 86/87
institutional parameters, and by focusing on engagement at the Politics
interface, service design shapes an agenda for personalisation that
is about co-design and co-creation rather than mass customisation.
Challenges

• By starting with people, it will not always be the case that a
single organisation can meet that person’s needs. What cultural,
professional and technological environments and incentives are
needed for genuine partnership working? What forms of
governance can be developed to enhance a sense of collective
endeavour across services and between services and citizens?
• How can the many ‘ways in’ to services – the range of channels
– be designed to engage and enhance people’s experiences of
services, as well as simply being seen as a route to more efficient
delivery mechanisms?
• What kinds of data sharing and people-centred knowledge
management systems are needed to underpin these more fluid,
federating forms of support? Where are the opportunities to
learn from the most innovative technological developments in
this area?
Devolution
The commitment to devolving power from the centre to the local
has been part of the reform agenda since 1997. More recently,
the notion of ‘double devolution’ – where power is devolved from
the town hall to the neighbourhood – has become popular in
policy-making circles, further emphasising a commitment to create
flexible, responsive services appropriate for specific communities
and localities.
Devolution and frontline empowerment was certainly a crucial
characteristic of all the innovative service organisations we visited;
Photo by Martin Godwin

however, it was a very different kind of devolution that we
uncovered. For organisations like John Lewis Partnership or BUPA
or places like Kensington and Chelsea, the relationship between the
centre and the local or the frontline is characterised by trust and

a sense of mutual accountability: each holds the other to account that bridges the gap between the activities of policy-making and 88/89
for the part they play in the ultimate goal of great service. When the day-to-day activities that are currently called delivery or Politics
applied systemically, service design approaches focus on the ways in implementation.
which mutual accountability can grow; they shift the emphasis away
Challenges
from the notion of a principal–agent relationship:
• How can ‘evidence-based’ policy-making learn to take the insights
• The frontline is held to account for customer satisfaction, loyalty
of practitioners and frontline professionals as seriously as the
and the provision of good service, defined by customer
views of ‘experts’, academics and management consultants when
measures and my-metrics, rather than system goals alone.
making decisions?
These expectations are ‘designed in’ to innovative service
• What kinds of channels and feedback loops between the centre
organisations in every possible way – through appraisals and
and the frontline can be designed in to the early stages of policy
performance frameworks, through the stories told to keep the
formation? How can these approaches add up to more than
ethos of the organisation alive, through the clear sponsorship
consultation alone? How can policy itself be ‘co-produced’?
of a customer focus from the very top, and in the particular
• How can the lateral capacity of the public service system be
forms of success that are celebrated.
• Service designers seek to create more intimate relationships enhanced? How can we grow spaces where frontline professionals
and practitioners can work together, in order to create a system
between services and people. In order to achieve this they create
that is able to learn from itself?
channels for information to flow upwards as well as downwards
– forms of feedback and insights – which are then used to drive
Service design offers a model of change and a route
priorities and focus. Part of this is designing in ways in which the to transformation
frontline can hold the system or the organisation to account
for the part they need to play in creating great service. Staff are Is there, to use a phrase from a recent Audit Commission document,
expected to challenge those systems and processes that are not some ‘quantum leap’ – perhaps it’s the introduction of market
supporting them in their drive to develop intimate relationships disciplines; perhaps reorganisation (shared services), or new
with customers – and this kind of challenge is actively sought techniques for managing customer relations or information flows.38
out and encouraged. By demanding a focus on the interface, every
The treatment of services as commodities not only determines how
element of the system is held to account for the part they have to
the elements of the reform agenda are framed; it also shapes the
play in maintaining that focus. Service design approaches seek to
ways in which government and others approach change itself.
build in systems of mutual accountability flows to achieve this.
Markets have been part of the public service reform narrative
Service designers treat the centre and the frontline as playing for over 20 years now, most recently expressed through the
an equally crucial but different role in achieving the ultimate commitment to opening up service provision to a more diverse set
goal of great service. But part of great service is shortening of providers from all sectors. Improvement, in these terms, is
and strengthening the feedback loops from the shop floor wrought through increasing contestability, competition and
to the boardroom, from the neighbourhood to the Whitehall
department. Service design is a collaborative and recursive process

consumer choice. Contractual management, regulation and offers tools and techniques to build that adaptive capacity, from the 90/91
objective inspection, and performance frameworks are used to generation of particular kinds of data and insights, to the means of Politics
drive up standards. connecting these to organisational design and development.
Regardless of whether this emphasis is right or wrong, what The challenge for policy-makers is to focus on building this
underpins it is a more fundamental belief: that change to public adaptive capacity, alongside the current goal of developing better
services will come about through grafting alternative models and managerial capabilities. While the Capability Reviews announced
innovations onto existing institutions. Successive administrations by Gus O’Donnell in October 2005 may shed some insights into
have sought to harness the potential of such innovations from ‘how well the service is performing and not by its own measure
other sectors. From meritocracy and professionalisation in the but by independent, credible, objective assessment’, 39 they will
mid-nineteenth century, to mass production, to Thatcher’s focus not provide government with the tools it needs either to measure
on privatisation, agency-based delivery and contract-based adaptive capacity, or to develop it.
management, and from new public management to consumer
Investing in ‘in-between spaces’ as well as existing institutions
models of choice, public services now represent a hybrid of different
The Prudential took a bold and innovative step in providing
approaches to change applied at different periods over the last
Richard Duvall and his team with the space to come up with the
150 years.
concept of the online bank Egg. They realised that their particular
Building adaptive capacity alongside managerial capability model of banking was in decline, and that in the future they would
Service design is less interested in taking the models of one need to find an innovative business model in order to keep their
sector and overlaying them onto existing models of service. Instead, customers and maintain their profit margin. But, equally
through harnessing user participation, feedback, insight generation significantly, they realised that they would find it almost impossible
and connecting these things to organisational or system design to come up with this fresh model within the constraints of their
and development, service design’s model of change is focused on own organisation. They saw that the power of existing institutional
creating a system able to continuously adapt, reconfigure and, most patterns and norms would work against the kind of transformative
importantly, learn from itself. innovation they were looking for. So instead they set Richard the
We have already argued that engagement and ultimately challenge of coming up with something completely new – through
participation are vital to co-producing the outcomes that this setting him free from all the organisational routines and
government is looking to achieve. In that sense, successful and requirements. The results speak for themselves.
meaningful participation is a goal in itself. However, for service Similarly, Paul Hodgkin believes that his website
designers, participation brings additional benefits as a process of www.patientopinion.org.uk would not have been devised and
learning and change as well as an outcome. developed within the constraints of the NHS. Just like John Proctor
As the team at the Luton and Dunstable Head and Neck Cancer in our case study about Birmingham OwnHealth, Paul believes
Unit discovered, participation offers the opportunity of embedding that the most exciting innovations need new platforms and business
experiences in the process of continuous change, rather than having models in order to learn how such spaces might grow. Although he
an intermittent relationship between disjointed consultation sees the website as a resource that helps the system as well as
exercises and a permanent managerial revolution. Service design

individual users, he believes creating it as a social enterprise was an models. Alongside the commitment in the 2006 Budget to explore 92/93
essential factor in the success of his innovation – both in terms of the impact of the voluntary sector’s role in economic and social Politics
the service he offers, and the business model that underpins it. regeneration, looking at alternative business models for service
It is striking how many of the examples and case studies organisations could provide a rich seam of insight about how public
we found in the course of our research emerged out of these services can grow and form themselves around the needs of users
‘in-between spaces’ – partnerships and collaborations set up at and citizens.
arm’s length from the major public service institutions that are in Service design demands that the unit of service is the person,
operation. This pattern is mirrored in innovation literature. Many and that service is devised in collaboration with them in order to
markets are characterised by a handful of large stakeholders, and fit around their everyday lives. Too often, the power of institutional
a larger number of small enterprises, whose innovations are tested norms and practices stands in the way of this approach, regardless
and developed at a manageable scale, before the successful ones get of sector. Therefore the most likely places to grow capacity for the
incorporated and integrated into the larger organisations of that kinds of user-centred approaches service design advocates appear
sector. to be those ‘in-between’ spaces. It is in these spaces that small
In order to strengthen the system’s ability to learn from itself, organisations are really beginning to define very different notions
there is real merit in investing in these in-between spaces alongside of service and value. The challenge for policy-makers in these terms
strengthening the feedback loops between insights and is two-fold: first, to find innovative ways of investing in these spaces
organisational development. They are a means of experimenting, without legislating for everything that takes place within them;
learning and innovating on behalf of the wider system. Much and second, to learn more about how the lessons learnt in these
could be learnt from investigating and seeking to understand these spaces can be ‘scaled up’ to a system-wide approach.
collaborative models in more detail and government, both local
and central, urgently needs to create opportunities for the Challenges
development of these spaces.
• How can we strengthen the connections between people’s
There are many opportunities for focusing existing innovation
experiences of service and system priorities in order to drive
funds towards investing in these in-between spaces, whether that’s
greater adaptive capacity? What kinds of metrics are necessary?
the Invest to Save Budget looked after by the Treasury, 40 or the
How can these metrics be built into existing patterns such as
‘next practice projects’ sponsored by the Innovation Unit at the
inspections, spending reviews, target setting and so on?
Department for Education and Skills. 41 But in creating spaces
• How can the capacity of the system to continuously adapt
beyond organisations to experiment with new models of service,
to the dynamic, uncontrollable and unpredictable nature of
we should not assume that they need to be fully funded by
human activity be put at the forefront of the debate, rather
government.
than managerial capability alone?
We also found that these collaborative ‘in-between’ partnerships
• How can the government invest in these ‘in-between’ spaces
enable new forms of incentives for user focus to be designed in
without legislating for everything that takes place within them?
to the ways in which services are shaped and offered. It is notable
Beyond the straightforward deployment of existing innovation
that many of the organisations that had successfully closed the
funds, what other kinds of business models and partnerships
gap between what they were offering and what people want and
might help to grow these spaces to learn about what works?
need had partnership, subscription or social enterprise business

• How can the lessons learnt from ‘in-between’ spaces be used to and citizens are looking for this to be recognised by the politicians 94/95
inform changes to institutional models and relationships? How they elect. People are tiring of being told that services are improving Politics
bold are politicians willing to be in taking these lessons to focus when their experiences of those same services remain impersonal,
future efforts on public service transformation rather than and not on their terms. As one campaigner put it, ‘people were
incremental improvements alone? telling us, make this real for me’.

The politics of service design: a vision as well as a The risk element of efficiency (achieving CPA ratings) means that
route to transformation you might get the 3-star CPA ratings but the residents may not
A year into the third term of a Labour government, we are at think the service is 3-star.42
a point where the terms of the debate around public service reform At the heart of the problem with current approaches to public
are in flux. Many principles developed in 1997 – national standards, service reform is that the measures in place risk driving a wedge
devolution to the frontline, user focus, contestability – remain between ‘system priorities’ and people’s experiences of services.
central. More have been added since, most notably the idea of ‘invest Managerial approaches to service create self-sustaining frameworks
and reform’ and a growing interest in what contestability actually of determining priorities that do not do enough to take account
looks like in practice, alongside the commitment to greater choice of feedback from the interface – whether that’s through citizens
as a means of empowering users. or frontline professionals.
Where this debate goes next, however, is still an open question. Service design provides a way out of this conundrum.
Efficiency is clearly a crucial element of any agenda, as an ageing Through its focus on the interface between people and services,
population and increased expectations place more demands on and the way its methodologies use insights from the interface
our public service infrastructure than ever before, while at the to drive priorities and organisational change, it offers progressive
same time current levels of investment look unsustainable in the politicians an opportunity to create a single and unified picture
long term. of the system and what needs to happen next. It is through that
But there is a growing consensus across the whole political shared agenda that trust and legitimacy can grow.
spectrum that managerialism cannot be the sole solution to The transformation of public services will never emerge from a
the transformation of services. The question remains: what are simple shift in language and warm words about the importance of a
the elements of a reform agenda that can reconnect the activities user focus alone. Driving reform from the interface out has to grow
and priorities of government with the priorities and concerns from a deeper, richer understanding of how people see services. It is
of the electorate? The opportunity for a powerful story about from the vantage point of the interface that it is possible to generate
the importance of service to people’s lives is there for the taking; a genuinely shared set of priorities and actions that can be used to
as Cameron’s Conservatives begin to tackle public services, the align every stakeholder across the broad system of public services,
question remains: which party will be the first to seize it? from ministers and permanent secretaries to hospital porters.
The recent local elections should be seen at least in part as a kick Service design can help politicians, policy-makers and service
against incumbency: voters rejected councils that were perceived to providers make that long and difficult journey to the interface.
have lost sight of the bottom line of service – where user needs and
experiences, not targets, drive provision. There can be real and felt
differences between system success and the quality of experiences,

But service design has more to offer than a set of methodologies. An agenda for action 96/97
The discipline of service design itself grew out of an understanding Service design could focus and refresh many current efforts to Agenda
that services add up to far more than commodities. The value of improve public services. But its potential needs to be grasped at
service lies in the intangible sense that they are supporting you, multiple levels of the system, at the same time, in order to have a
understanding you, on your side. This is in line with the repeated powerful effect. Its core revolves around empowering users to play
findings of research which show that people see public services a more active part in shaping what they experience, and therefore in
as crucially important, not just in managerial terms, but also in far orchestrating more of the ‘moving parts’ – including people – in a
deeper terms that are about how the state relates to people’s lives, given system to also enhance outcomes.
and the kinds of values that shape the society in which we live. Government therefore needs to seize this agenda rhetorically
It is often said that rational argument is not the most effective and organisationally, and find ways to develop and spread service
way to move agendas on. It is time for politicians to grasp a new design approaches within the existing framework of services, rather
narrative of service that is braver and altogether more ambitious. than trying to impose them from without or implement them solely
The battle to regain trust and legitimacy, alongside the need to through existing levers of control.
create a sustainable and viable service infrastructure for tomorrow’s The opportunities are therefore as follows.
challenges as well as today’s, will not be won through speeding
up and intensifying current approaches to reform that, ultimately, The Treasury should:
• in the lead-up to the 2007 Comprehensive Spending Review, bring
continue to treat services as commodities.
There is a parallel here in the recent debates that have been together a diverse working group to explore broader definitions of
kickstarted about the importance of happiness and wellbeing over efficiency and public value; this group could help to build a critical
and above productivity. A similar debate needs to be led now, and mass of opinion about richer, long-term understanding of how
urgently, about how and why public services are so much more than to measure the impact and value of public service activity
• support all key service departments and local authorities in developing
goods to be provided at the lowest cost. The challenges of the future
rely on service infrastructures having a whole range of resources new metrics that focus on quality of experiences, to go alongside
– including money, but equally crucial are the resources of trust operational and customer satisfaction measures; in particular,
and legitimacy. general duties of wellbeing, such as those now carried by local
Trust grows out of relationships, which in turn rely on believing authorities, should be accompanied by regular surveys and
people are acting in your interests and telling you the truth. What feedback systems involving direct user feedback focused on
is needed now is a new story about public services that is rooted in quality and on user confidence, both in themselves and in service
relationships and experiences, in people and in places. The current providers
• use the Varney review of service delivery channels to focus on how
narrative and its focus on narrowly defined versions of efficiency,
personalisation and devolution is out of sync with this. Service alternative ‘ways-in’ to service can bring about better engagement
design has both the philosophy and the methods that could refocus and more positive experiences of public services; shared services and
the debate, and provide politicians with the elements of a more vital, new information and communications technology interfaces offer
vivid and practical agenda for transformation. great new flexibilities and economies of scale – a new
infrastructure for more cost-effective services; but users and
citizens must play an integral part in spelling out what

dimensions of services matter to them, and how different • create dedicated seed funding for local authorities and partnerships 98/99
channels can work together over time, to guide any further to reinvest in the development of ‘in-between spaces‘ wishing to Agenda
development of the public service infrastructure model new kinds of user-centred and user-led services; this could
• work with local authorities to explore alternative business models for include a proportion of annual underspend or preventive savings;
offering services in the ‘in-between spaces’ between existing at a time when public services will need to do more and more, for
institutions and organisations; for example, studying local networks less money, it is just as important to invest in social innovation as
of provider organisations, and the ‘add-on’ services that can it is in technological innovation.
emerge beyond their formal function, would uncover many
opportunities for service innovation not noticed by national The Cabinet Office should:
performance reviews; these studies should build on the review • focus public service leadership training on system leadership
and pilots of third-sector involvement in service delivery that – the ability and skills to lead that which you do not directly
are already underway control – which requires trust and legitimacy as well as
• experiment, as Egg did, with much more flexible and intensive financial resources
neighbourhood-based service models, possibly via the National • build on the Capability Reviews to investigate the extent of ‘upwards’
Programme for Neighbourhood Renewal; this approach would flows of information between the frontline and existing Whitehall
replace all targets and measurements with a single goal for five departments in order to assess how policy-making can become
years: to meet every person’s need; this approach could be piloted a collaborative process that bridges the gap between policy
in a small and already high-performing area development and implementation
• work with local authorities and local strategic partnerships • invest in training and development to help civil servants become
to map comprehensively the unintended consequences of existing specialists in systems and service design: systems thinking, futures
targets – and use these insights to refine and develop targets thinking, design methodologies and journey mapping45
for the future • in collaboration with other overarching service organisations,
• encourage the Lyons Inquiry of local government funding to including the voluntary and private sectors, set up a service design
maintain its focus on ‘place shaping’;43 accelerate the school that brings together a multitude of disciplines and offers
development of tools and methods that create shared purpose training for public servants and practitioners;46 give this school
across diverse groups of people working in public, private and a research and development function and ensure that its
voluntary sectors – users and practitioners – which in turn activities in this area adhere to service design principles as well
requires new forms of strategic leadership at local authority level – participatory approaches, collaboration, multidisciplinary
(see Local authorities below) teams and prototyping solutions
• through the Lyons Inquiry, find new ways of emphasising mutual • integrate the focus of e-government with the priorities mentioned
accountability, for example enabling local authorities to above: customer responsiveness, new feedback loops, co-design
commission the support they feel they need from central and co-development of user pathways, and so on
government rather than being told which consultants they have • work with individual spending departments and with the Local
to use44 Government Association and the Improvement and Development
Agency to establish the scope for using shared audit and feedback

systems which encourage local integration of different improvement, from the combined efforts of a number of local bodies, irrespective 100/101
innovation and performance management regimes. of their formal responsibilities for particular elements of service Agenda
provision
Delivery departments should: • be aware that as local councils focus increasingly on ‘place shaping’
• deploy existing innovation funds to support and foster lateral
rather than service provision alone, their ability to commission
networks of practitioners and frontline providers – and commission services on the basis of public value will be critical to their ability to
these networks to develop responses to long-term issues on behalf create a service infrastructure that can generate long-term
of the system; these networks, not independent experts or positive outcomes; the Audit Commission and other inspection
consultants, are the people with the expertise required to tackle and regulatory bodies must develop new ways of assessing this
the most difficult issues capacity to commission services that are fit for purpose and
• make it a requirement that all civil servants at all grades visit
maximise people’s life chances
the frontline at least once every six months; senior civil servants • hold central government to account to the same extent as local
should be required to resolve at least ten customer complaints government is held to account: they are both players in a single
every year system that needs to be focused on great service and support
• develop new feedback channels for frontline staff to shape service
where people need it; central government cannot be seen as
mechanisms and infrastructure, for example through the greater hovering ‘above’ the system – it is part of it
use of online discussion forums, or through consultations that • place a requirement on themselves (the Audit Commission and
happen before decisions are made, not after other inspection bodies) to see their audience not only as service
• worry less about citizen engagement through new structures and
organisations, but also as citizens looking for feedback and
forums, and more about engagement at the point of delivery: make information on services; being given accessible, usable information
this the focus of public engagement activity and communicate is a crucial step in building trust and in empowering people to
that clearly as a priority for the centre as well as for local make decisions
government and local service organisations. • invest in technological innovations to make the provision of the
The Audit Commission and other inspection bodies should: information real-time: it is only in this way that citizens will really
• further develop the system’s capacity for self-regulation alongside be able to use the information provided to navigate services.
ongoing audit and inspection, for example by offering training to Local authorities should:
leaders of service organisations and reporting on the capacity of • set up a team responsible for looking after customer experiences – and
local authorities to respond to user feedback and mobilise wider give it the power to report directly to the senior team of the local
networks of users and service organisations for service re-design authority, so that customer experiences and insights play a central
• work with local authorities and HM Treasury to review metrics
role in setting priorities
(see Treasury above) • create, in collaboration with citizens, a set of personas based on
• devise new approaches to auditing the governance of the partnerships
sophisticated forms of segmentation combined with journeys,
through which outcomes and objectives will increasingly be achieved touchpoints and relationship maps
in recognition of the fact that often such outcomes will emerge

• add to existing requirements to measure customer satisfaction Service delivery organisations (eg schools, hospitals) should: 102/103
through developing richer metrics of experience; for example, • develop forms of governance that, by their nature, drive greater Agenda
measure the success of services in inviting, encouraging and engagement; for example, schools could devolve 1 per cent of
enabling people to participate; use the findings of this research their budget to parents in order to encourage them to collaborate
to shape strategic plans and prioritisation more,not only with the school but also with each other to
• use personas and other service design techniques to drive the strategy determine how best to invest that budget47
around shared services – to ensure that back-office integration • focus on mapping their users’ journeys – not only from the point at
does not simply create greater efficiencies but also focuses on which that person comes into contact with the institution but
offering better experiences that suit the needs and attitudes of from the point at which a child is interested in learning, or from
different citizens when someone feels unwell
• experiment with multidisciplinary teams that include users and • use these maps to prioritise activity and management decisions;
professionals as the team at Luton and Dunstable did use them to shape a strategy for key partnerships and collaborations
• prioritise the development of ‘very local’ data – for example about that need to be put in place – so that working together is about
crime and grime, ‘greening’ and so on – that is presented working smarter not harder
accessibly so that people can see what service improvements mean • work with users every quarter to review the things that are working
for them at a neighbourhood or street level, as a means of least well and engage those users in helping to identify solutions
fostering trust and greater faith in the system or approaches that can be prototyped and reviewed
• focus on developing career structures and compensation packages • give staff permission to experiment and fail – but make sure
which incentivise and focus progression on innovating to create that something is learned every time, and manage the risks of
great service experiences, engaging people in the design of experimentation through shortening and tightening feedback
services, working collaboratively with users loops, and strengthening a culture of openness
• commission services on the basis of a consistently applied, • treat expenditure on support to user-led support and development
collaboratively developed ‘public value’ framework – which does not groups as an investment: the more spaces and places created for
simply seek out the services offered for the lowest cost, as if they user involvement in service design and delivery, the more
were commodities – but instead focuses on building public trust resources that are released into the system.
and engagement through the provision of positive and engaging
experiences – whichever sector is delivering the service
• support the development of expert user groups and networks,
across local communities, and link them together through local
consultation and information strategies.

A shared language of service Designing a service proposition extends beyond the content of the
offer to an understanding of how its audience would like to engage with
104/105
Language
and use a service – and the emotional journey that each user will need
Journeys to take in order to benefit from it.
Services don’t happen in a vacuum and focusing on touchpoints alone
would not enable service providers and service designers to see how Touchpoints
each of those touchpoints interact with people’s wider lives. For Touchpoints are the tangible elements of service – everything that a
example, a service design approach for a hospital would start, not at person accessing the service sees, hears, touches, smells and interacts
the point the patient enters the hospital, but instead at the point at with. Recent trends in branding have focused less on logos and design,
which someone started to feel unwell. Tracing the person’s journey and more on these touchpoints and how every single touchpoint can
over time enables service providers to reflect on the effectiveness and ‘live the brand’ of any organisation. In public services, given the current
appropriateness of each intervention and service touchpoint in the focus on personalisation, the ‘brand’ might lead to the question: ‘Does
context of that person’s wider life. every touchpoint of my service empower the user to work with us to
achieve the desired outcome?’
Channels
Recent years have seen the expansion of the ways in which people can Architectures
find services. Rather than visiting a GP, people now have the option Service designers see services not as static but as dynamic architectures
of calling NHS Direct, visiting a drop-in medical centre, or checking of dialogues, systems, procedures, resources and so on – through which
out their condition online. Understanding the interaction between people have experiences and achieve outcomes. Touchpoints, journeys
these channels, when each is used, as well as what each one looks like, and channels tell us that we need to see these experiences as users
is another important element of being able to see the service from a do – as a series of critical encounters that take place over time.
person’s perspective. Using design techniques to visualise this complex picture often
represents a turning point for organisations focused on improving
Segmentation their services: it helps people to see where the priorities are and
The problem in public services organisations and local authorities lies where the service can be improved.
less with a paucity of data and more with how that data are used.
A range of techniques and increasingly powerful data sources are Service environments
available that can help an organisation to take raw data and turn it The idea of a service environment extends beyond the built
into insights about its users. The sophisticated segmentation approach environment to encompass any space and place in which service takes
that Tesco uses goes well beyond mapping the demographic and social place. Increasingly, websites and the tiny screens on mobile phones are
status of its customers; it also maps preferences, attitudes and beliefs. spaces within broader service environments. Seeing the building in
This in turn enables Tesco to tailor its offer ever more accurately to which service takes place as a service environment can be a valuable
its customers. conceptual step to make. Many schools, for example, don’t see
themselves as service providers and therefore don’t see their schools
Proposition as service environments – this may become increasingly necessary as
The notion of a proposition puts the onus on the provider to ‘package the role of a school extends to offer other services.
up’ a service that is useful, useable and desirable and to place it into the
market without any assumption that the audience knows the value of
the service on offer or how to access it. The assertion of a proposition
states the purpose of a service in terms of the benefits to users.

Personas enable organisations to distribute the responsibility for holding people 106/107
In designing new services, many organisations will use their customer to account on offering excellent service through being treated as an
Language
insights to create a series of personas – or archetypes – and experiment open resource freely accessible to anyone in the organisation.
with how they might interact with the service or the architectures of
the service environment. This helps to refine and improve what’s being Communities of practice
offered. Creating ‘real’ people can really animate discussions and enable Communities of practice bring together people with shared expertise
service providers to engage emotionally as well as rationally with their or experiences from across conventional organisational boundaries.
users. The methodology of personas can also be used to better Such communities learn together through action and in doing so build
understand the experiences and needs of staff. the capacity of all the organisations involved to innovate locally.
Supporting such lateral learning opportunities releases the potential
Guardians of the customer experience for knowledge to be shared across organisations and silos and supports
Service innovators invest in the design of people’s jobs – and the the shift towards creating systems that can learn from themselves.
systems that surround them – to ensure that frontline staff are free
and supported to act as guardians of the customer experience. This role Experience metrics
isn’t limited to frontline staff. As one contributor from Orange told us: Experience metrics are derived through research with users and help
‘Even the engineers maintaining the network and the finance guys who organisations to design and measure the performance of a service
determine the tariffs we offer have an effect on our ability to deliver a against what people – rather than their organisation – value.
great service to customers – they need to be aware of the impact of Experience metrics are not measures of high-level outcomes but of the
their job on customer satisfaction.’ quality of the experience at the interface (see also My-metrics).

Mutual accountability My-metrics
Instead of devolution being accompanied by a series of incentives, There isn’t a single debate about public service reform where targets
checks and balances to ensure that every part of the system is are not criticised for creating unintended consequences. However,
encouraged to focus on the key issues as set by government, mutual arguably, it is not the targets themselves, but what they are focused
accountability demands that those at all levels of service hold each on that is the cause of the problem. Some of the most successful
other to account for achieving the principal goal of high-quality and customer-focused service organisations create targets with and for their
effective service to users – accountability flows in both directions. users. These my-metrics are then used to assess the performance of the
In this collaboration, frontline staff are not held to account on the service as an important counterpoint to other operational measures.
performance of the system primarily, but instead, on the satisfaction
of users and the quality of the experience. Similarly, frontline staff have Collective wisdom
a range of channels by which they can hold the centre to account on In his book, The Wisdom of Crowds: Why the many are smarter than the
the effective design of large-scale systems and processes to support an few, James Surowiecki explores the science of engaging communities
unstinting focus on successful experiences for users. of interest, rather than individual experts in creating new insights and
knowledge. 48 The collective wisdom of crowds is already exploited by
Excellence profiles software businesses that have recognised that they alone can’t keep up
Beyond job descriptions – excellence profiles describe service roles with the rate of change in technology and have implemented platforms
in terms of aspirations, values and behaviours that can guide staff to and principles – not solutions – and engaged their community of users
deliver quality service. To be excellent means to understand in very to determine, build and refine what is needed.
practical ways what it means to do your job well. They are designed to

Prototyping
People we spoke with 108/109
People’s needs are complex; services need to be able to respond to that
complexity rather than seek to drive it out. Trying to get everything Greg Beales Prime Minister’s Delivery Unit, Cabinet Office People
right first time at scale is a terrifying prospect in this context. Instead, Paul Bello Customer Experience Manager, Orange
as the founder of the online bank Egg said, ‘I learnt most from getting Prof. Bernard Crump NHS Institute for Innovation and Improvement
it wrong, wrong and wrong again’. Prototyping – an approach that Sean Blair Design Strategist
informs every design-led project – at a small scale is a means of Martin Bontoft Design Strategist
David Brindle The Guardian Newspaper
managing risk and learning from doing. Storyboards are examples of
Andy Carroll Change Strategy Team, The Pensions Service
very early prototypes.
Alex Cheatle Chief Executive, TEN UK
Cass Chideock Cabinet Office
Relationship maps
Chris Downs Director, live|work
Services are configured from touchpoints, systems and resources
Chris Gerry Head, New Line Learning Federation
but they are brought to life by the dynamic relationships between
Peter Gilroy Chief Executive, Kent County Council
individuals, communities and organisations – and influenced by the Richard Grice Head of Strategy and Policy, Improvement
wider social context. Mapping the critical relationships between people and Development Agency
that animate an existing service allow those designing it to understand Paul Hodgkin Patient Opinion
which are working, which are not – and why – and to begin to identify Claire Hutchinson Marketing team, Eurostar
the important journeys and procedures that have, over time, come Nick Jones Cabinet Office
to drive the quality of these relationships. Through this process, Nick C Jones PricewaterhouseCoopers
opportunities emerge to make change happen. William Jordan Comprehensive Spending Review team, HM Treasury
Andrew Knott PricewaterhouseCoopers
Moments of truth Duncan Lampard Director, PricewaterhouseCoopers
Service designers work with users to understand the critical moments Jackie Lee-Joe Head of Brand Experience, Orange
of truth of a service experience – the moments shape peoples’ Joel Levy Head of Strategy, Penn Schoen Berlande (London)
perceptions and responses. These moments of truth can be as simple as Patrick Lewis Supply Chain Director, John Lewis Partnership
the confirmation that an application for a benefit has been successful Seema Malhotra Management Consultant, PricewaterhouseCoopers
– or as complex as the experience of a victim of a violent crime hearing Jim Maxmin Author
the sentencing of their attacker. Many of these moments of truth are David Mercer Head of Design, British Telecom
un-designed – a resident seeing yet more graffiti on a wall in their street Alison Miller Local Government Association
Adam Morgan Director, Eatbig fish
might decide that the local council has given up on dealing with
Oona Muirhead Local Government Association
anti-social behaviour in their neighbourhood. The points at which a
David North Director of Public Affairs, Tesco
person most depends on a provider are often the very points at which
Greg Nugent Head of Marketing, Eurostar
the provider performs least well – and it’s at these moments that William Perrin Cabinet Office
someone, disheartened and frustrated, may walk away from that Alison Platt Head of BUPA Hospitals
service never to return. Alexander Popple Network Intelligence Manager, MSN UK
John Proctor Pfizer Health Solutions/Birmingham OwnHealth
Isobel Rickard Kensington and Chelsea Tenant Management
Organisation
Clive Schlee Pret a Manger
Andrew Sheffield Cabinet Office

Peter Simpson first direct Lynne Maher Head of Service Innovation, NHS 110/111
Owen Smith Pfizer Global Pharmaceuticals Seema Malhotra PricewaterhouseCoopers
People
Roy Stephenson Cabinet Office Lyn McDonald Head of Change Strategy, The Pensions Service
Angus Struthers Service Design Manager, Virgin Atlantic David Mercer Head of Design, British Telecom
Deborah Szebeko thinkpublic ltd Greg Nugent Head of Marketing, Eurostar
John Thackara Author Alexander Popple Network Intelligence Manager, MSN UK
Ed Straw Partner, PriceWaterhouseCoopers
Deborah Szebeko thinkpublic ltd
Seminar 1: Exploring a new language for the design
Martin Vowels Ispeaktoyou
of services
Andrea Baron Policy Adviser, Audit Commission
Seminar 3: The journey to the interface for
Clive Blair-Stevens National Social Marketing Centre for Excellence
local government
Martin Bontoft Design Strategist
Dan Dixon Headshift Alison Adams Consultation Manager, Hertfordshire County Council
Kate Dowling Service Designer, Engine Jill Bailey City of London
Eddie Gibb Demos Lindsay Barker Head of Corporate Services, Colchester Borough Council
Richard Grice Head of Strategy and Policy, Improvement and Sarah Bird Older People and Disability Project Manager,
Development Agency Department of Health
Valerie Hannon Director of the Innovation Unit, Department for Joy Brindle Assistant Chief Executive, Easington District Council
Education and Skills Geoff Brown Head of Performance Improvement, Hertfordshire
Nick Jones Cabinet Office County Council
Nick C Jones PricewaterhouseCoopers Brigitte Gohdes Head of Strategy and Policy, London Borough of Camden
Oliver King Director, Engine David Hilson Leeds City Council
Andrew Knott PricewaterhouseCoopers Philip Hume Head of Policy, Kirklees Metropolitan Borough Council
Duncan Lampard Director, PricewaterhouseCoopers Sue Hyde Head of Communications and Design, Dorset
William Perrin Cabinet Office County Council
Ben Reason Director, live|work Joanna Killian Director of Policy, Resources and Performance, Essex
Jonathan Slater Prime Minister’s Delivery Unit, Cabinet Office County Council
Deborah Szebeko thinkpublic ltd Chris Naylor Head of Customer First, London Borough of
Jennie Winhall Design Strategist, Design Council Hammersmith & Fulham
David Parry Head of Public Affairs, St Helens Metropolitan
Borough Council
Seminar 2: The common challenge of service
Balraj Sandhu Home Office
Paul Bello Customer Experience Manager, Orange Peter Savage Assistant Chief Executive, London Borough of
Andy Carroll Change Strategy Team, The Pensions Service Hammersmith & Fulham
Alex Cheatle Chief Executive, TEN UK
Chris Gerry Head, New Line Learning Federation
Adam Heathfield Head of Government Relations and Corporate Affairs,
Pfizer Global Pharmaceuticals
Claire Hutchinson Marketing team, Eurostar
Duncan Lampard Director, PricewaterhouseCoopers

Notes 112/113
10 See www.rsa.org.uk/events/textdetail.asp?ReadID=656 (accessed 5 Jun 2006). 22 Of 23,000 people with a long-term health condition. Quoted at Nuffield Trust
seminar, 13 Feb 2006. Notes
20 See Budget 2006, available at www.hm-treasury.gov.uk/budget/budget_06/
bud_bud06_index.cfm (accessed 5 Jun 2006). 23 Zuboff and Maxmin, Support Economy.
30 Presentation by Ben Page, ‘Understanding trust in a “show me” world’, MORI/ 24 H Green and S Parker, The Other Glass Ceiling: The domestic politics of parenting
Demos seminar, Apr 2006. (London: Demos, 2006).
40 U Beck, Risk Society: Towards a new modernity (London: Sage, 1992). 25 Speech by T Blair to the Confederation of British Industry, 29 Nov 2005.
50 M Willmott and W Nelson, Complicated Lives: Sophisticated consumers, intricate 26 I Illich, Deschooling Society (London: Marion Boyars Publishers, 1970, reissued
lifestyles, simple solutions (London: John Wiley and Sons, 2003). 2002).
60 S Zuboff and J Maxmin, The Support Economy: Why corporations are failing 27 D Miliband, speech to Guardian Public Services Summit, 2 Feb 2005.
individuals and the next episode of capitalism (New York: Viking Adult, 2002). 28 C Leadbeater, ‘Production by the masses: professionals and postindustrial
70 W Hutton, ‘Are you being served?’, Observer, 9 Oct 2005, see http://observer. public services’ in J Craig (ed), Production Values: Futures for professionalism
guardian.co.uk/columnists/story/0,,1735352,00.html (accessed 5 Jun 2006). (London: Demos, 2006).
80 P Cullum, The Stupid Company: How British businesses throw away money by 29 L Bassi and D McMurrer, ‘Are skills costs or assets?’, Milken Institute Review Q3
alienating customers (London: National Consumer Council, 2006), see www. (2004), quoted in C Humphries, Skills in a Global Economy (London: City &
ncc.org.uk/publications/stupid_company.pdf (accessed 5 Jun 2006). Guilds, 2005).
90 S Goss, ‘The reform of public service reform’, Renewal 12, no 2/3 (2005). 30 S Bevan, M Cowling and L Horner, Workplace Trends Survey (London: The
10 See P Gershon, Spending Review 2004: Releasing resources for the frontline: Work Foundation, 2004), see www.theworkfoundation.com/publications/
Independent review of public sector efficiency (London: HM Treasury, 2004), authors.jsp (accessed 11 Jun 2006).
available at www.hm-treasury.gov.uk/spending_review/spend_sr04/ 31 Also known as the ‘stages of change model’, the theory is concerned with how
associated_documents/spending_sr04_efficiency.cfm (accessed 11 Jun people modify ‘problem’ behaviours or engender positive behaviours. Outcome
2006); and M Lyons, ‘Lyons Inquiry into local government’, available at www. measures are concerned with the capacity to resist temptations and the ability
lyonsinquiry.org.uk/ (accessed 11 Jun 2006). to make decisions. See www.uri.edu/research/cprc/TTM/detailedoverview.
11 P Taylor-Gooby, ‘Trust vs efficiency: why is it that the NHS can deliver the htm (accessed 11 Jun 2006).
goods, and yet still not command public trust?’, Prospect (Apr 2006), see www. 32 Department for Constitutional Affairs/PricewaterhouseCooper, Research on
prospect-magazine.co.uk/article_details.php?id=7370 (accessed 5 Jun 2006). the consumer experience of the civil justice system, 2004 (unpublished).
12 W Gibson, quoted in Economist, 23 Jun 2000. 33 FF Reichheld, ‘The one number you need to grow’, Harvard Business Review 81,
13 MOSAIC UK, see www.business-strategies.co.uk/Content.asp?ArticleID=566 no 12 (2003).
(accessed 6 Jun 2006). 34 See Gershon, Spending Review 2004.
14 J Murphy, speaking at Demos, 11 Apr 2006. 35 Available at www.dfes.gov.uk/publications/schoolswhitepaper/pdfs/DfES-
15 Comment at local authority seminar as part of the research for this project, 11 Schools%20White%20Paper.pdf (accessed 8 Jun 2006).
May 2006. 36 Taylor-Gooby, ‘Trust vs efficiency’.
16 Marcus Buckingham, former research chief at Gallup. 37 See J Seddon, Freedom from Command and Control: A better way to make the
17 Virgin brand book, quoted in P Ing, Living the Brand: How to transform every work work (Buckingham: Vanguard Education Ltd, 2003).
member of your organisation into a brand champion (London: Kogan Page, 2001). 38 Guardian Public, editorial, May 2005.
18 C Burke and I Grosvenor, The School I’d Like: Children and young people’s 39 See www.civilservice.gov.uk/reform/capabilities/ (accessed 8 Jun 2006).
reflections on an education for the 21st century (London: Routledge, 2002). 40 The Invest to Save Budget is a mechanism to ‘encourage innovation and
19 Cabinet Office, Transformational Government: Enabled by technology, Cm 6683 partnership throughout the public sector, in order to improve the efficiency and
(London: Cabinet Office, Nov 2005), see www.cio.gov.uk/documents/pdf/ quality of public services’. See www.isb.gov.uk/hmt.isb.application.2/ (accessed
transgov/transgov-strategy.pdf (accessed 6 Jun 2006). 11 Jun 2006).
20 Ibid. 41 See www.standards.dfes.gov.uk/innovation-unit/investigation/nextpractice_
21 See www.guardian.co.uk/drugs/Story/0,2763,961014,00.html (accessed 7 main/?version=1 (accessed 11 Jun 2006).
Jun 2006).

42 Comment from local authority interviewee on comprehensive performance 114/115
assessment (CPA) ratings. Notes
43 The Lyons Inquiry is looking at the function, future role and funding of
local government. It published its latest findings on 8 May 2006. See www.
lyonsinquiry.org.uk/ (accessed 11 Jun 2006).
44 See H Lownsbrough and D O’Leary, The Leadership Imperative: Reforming
children’s services from the ground up (Demos: London, 2005).
45 See E Straw, The Dead Generalist: Reforming the civil service and public services
(Demos: London, 2004).
46 This has also been recommended by Geoff Mulgan, Michael Bichard and
Charles Leadbeater.
47 This was a recommendation in J Craig, Schools Out: Can teachers, social workers
and health staff learn to live together (Demos/ContinYou: London, 2005).
48 J Surowiecki, The Wisdom of Crowds: Why the many are smarter than the few
and how collective wisdom shapes business, economies, societies and nations (New
York: Random House, 2004).

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