Multi-Channel Service Concept Design and Prototyping

Multi-Channel Service Concept Design and Prototyping C.P. Sperling TNO ICT1 [email protected]

L.P.A. Simons (corresponding author) Delft University of Technology & TNO ICT [email protected]

W.A.G.A. Bouwman Delft University of Technology [email protected]

Abstract Designing e-services which have to function in a multi-channel context has proved to be challenging for organizations. Previous research has shown that structured design methods are useful to structure the design process. In this paper we proceed from an existing method (which identifies multi-channel customer needs and functional requirements) based on QFD (Quality Function Deployment). We create a method to be used by teams for specifying detailed navigation structures and web page design. The output is a prototype that can be used in further design tasks. The method was validated in projects with three companies. Participants evaluated our method based on five design support requirements. The combination of speed, customer orientation, and involvement of relevant stakeholders, as well as the visualization of multi-channel and technical issues in an e-service prototype, are considered to be valuable contributions to the design (process).

1. Introduction Organizations face challenges in designing Internet services, or e-services, which have to function in a 1

multi-channel context [1-3]. This is due to: time pressures [4], an ill-structured design process [5, 6] and challenges in ensuring customer centricity [7]. This results in service failures or loss-generating services [8]. Besides, organizations have to arrange their service delivery in such a way that all the channels via which the service is delivered are complementary to each other: organizations have to find the right channel mix. For developing e-services within a multi-channel context better design support methods are needed. Previous research shows that structured design methods for the start of the design process are useful [6, 9]. This research builds further on a validated method for designing e-services that function in a multichannel context. In previous work it was labeled as ‘Xtended-QFD’ [10], more recently it has been renamed to Multi-Channel QFD or ‘MuCh-QFD’ [9]. This method encompasses an intake and a morning session, resulting in clear specifications for an eservice and associated multi-channel service components. Alter [11] distinguishes three phases in the design process: initiation, development and implementation. MuCh-QFD regards the initiation phase, see also figure 1. Evaluations with business participants indicate that they would also value a method for supporting the first tasks to be executed in

During the time of research, the author worked for TNO ICT. Currently, he works at Aepex.

the development phase. In their opinion, the service design would be complete if it included Web pages, navigation structure and an overall visualization of a prototype, as well as explicit multi-channel and back office links in relation to that prototype [9]. In terms of format, an additional afternoon session for these design tasks was deemed appropriate. Therefore the objective of this paper is to discuss an additional step in our design approach directed towards multi-channel service development. Our research questions are: 1) what are the requirements for the follow up session, 2) what are appropriate design tasks and 3) do those tasks perform as expected? In the theory section we describe design approaches. Section 4 shows the resulting design method. In the methodology section we describe the way we selected the design cases and how we collected data to validate our design approach. Finally, we present our results, discuss research limitations and draw conclusions.

focuses on defining customer priorities and specifying how different (Web and multi-channel) functions add value in relation to those customer priorities. The session that has to be developed will be aimed at several tasks addressed during the development phase. As indicated in figure 2, these are visualization tasks with a prototype as output. The visualization of the prototype can be used for testing purposes.

2. Theory

Design Traditions The method is based on different design approaches like Quality Function Deployment (QFD) [7, 12-15], the STOF method which designs Service, Technology, Organization and Finance in coherence [16], User Centered Design (UCD) [17], and XML and requirements engineering [18]. Within these traditions, we focus on possibilities to perform design tasks with groups of technical and non-technical professionals. Too often, design (language and methods) becomes highly specialized, which excludes non-technicians [19]. We aim to use language and methods that can form a bridge across disciplines. Quality Function Deployment (QFD), which originated in Japan, is a customer-centered design methodology for designing quality products and services [14]. It builds on the idea that quality should be considered early in the design process [20]. It uses a matrix format, ‘the House of Quality’ that is filled during the design process. In this matrix customer needs are used to evaluate importance of functions, see also Figure 3. ‘The House of Quality’ helps a design team to communicate with each other, even when their backgrounds are different. Faber et al. [16] describe a framework, the so-called STOF-model, which consists of four components that need attention during the design of a new electronic service. The first component is service design, providing a description of the value that is offered to a specific target group of users, by means of a service offering. The next step is technology design: a description of the technical architecture, which is

In this section we first address the design process and design tasks. Next, we discuss the design approach used as a basis for the prototype development session. Initiation Phase Intake

Initiation Phase MuCh-QFD Session

• objectives • service processes • scope • target segment • competitors • other channels • financial feasibility • main stakeholders

• customer needs • functions • solutions, constraints • multi-channel needs • multi-chann’l functions • competitor services

Figure 1. Design tasks in initiation phase Alter [11] describes a traditional design process for information systems (IS), which covers the whole design cycle. The process exists of three phases: initiation, development and implementation. The first step in designing an information system is understanding the purposes and goals of the system. Also, the scope and feasibility have to be determined. In figure 1, we list design tasks to be executed in the initiation phase and the way these are addressed in the MuCh-QFD method. As can be observed, the intake addresses broad issues like scope, goals, marketing positioning and high-level financial feasibility. Once that context is provided, the MuCh-QFD session

Figure 2. Design tasks in development phase Development Phase Prototyping Session • storyboard • visual prototype • high level development plan

Development Phase (other) • user tests • in depth competitor analysis • in depth feasibility (finance, technology, organization) • implementation plan

needed to deliver the service offering exhibited in the service design. Next is organization design: a description of the configuration of actors (the value network) that is needed to deliver the particular resources and capabilities to deliver the service, the roles that each actor plays, making clear how the actor network creates value for end-users. And finally, finance issues are addressed: a description of how a value network intends to capture monetary value from a particular service offering and how risks, investments and revenues are divided over the different actors of a value network. Faber et al. [16] state that design issues within and between the four components must be balanced. Choices made in one component, influence other components. That is why it is important to address all components at the start of the design process. User centered design (UCD), or human-centered design, is a widely used term to refer to a development where users are involved early in the design process. A general definition of human-centered design is published as ISO 13407 [17]. It lists the following principles for user centered design: - Active involvement of users and understanding of user and task requirements - An appropriate allocation of functions between users and technology - The iteration of design solutions, and - Multidisciplinary approach. Translating a design concept to a real artifact often leads to problems; in literature this is called ‘the gap’ [21]. In a UCD process, instead of spending time on setting up specifications, early in the design process some kind of prototype is created. This is done to receive feedback of users and based on this, improve the concept. Cooper [21] mentions use case scenarios as a tool that can help in this translation. Cooper defines this tool as ‘making use of a specific story to both construct and illustrate design solutions’. The ultimate goals are to get more insight in which task a user must be able to carry out and how the user wants to do this. However, because of the fact that the drawing of scenarios is time-consuming a task analysis can be an alternative [18]. To define the tasks for a user it can be useful to make use of personas: ‘a precise descriptive model of the user, what he wishes to accomplish, and why’ [21]. When a persona is drawn, during the design process choices can be made based on the preferences of the persona. Because the persona is a symbol for the whole target group, choices are always made from the user’s perspective. Another advantage of a persona is that it

simplifies the communication (multidisciplinary) team.

within

a

3. Methodology Our research methodology addresses two issues. First we describe how we established the need for the design support and second how we evaluated our new method. In previous research the first part of the design session had been validated with six real life cases [9]. The evaluations with the business participants from these cases provided insights in the design support needs for the prototyping session. We used several ways to collect data. First, immediately after the first part of the session participants completed a questionnaire and explained their answers in face-toface interviews with the researchers. One of the questions was how complete the session was and what might be added. Secondly, participants from each case had a debriefing session with the researchers approximately one month after the session. Again, participants were asked what they thought of the design session and output. Thirdly, a half-year later, in depth interviews have been conducted with six of the session participants for the purpose of identifying the main design tasks following the MuCh-QFD session. Based on these data we developed an addition to the initial MuCh-QFD session. The development of the new method is described in section 4 in detail. Evaluation of the newly developed multi-channel prototyping method took place in two parts. First, the method has been pre-tested with a student group. Table 1. Overview of cases Case A: Employees Portal (n=4) B: Secure Message Portal (n=4) C: Mortgage Calculation (n=8)

Sector Employment agency Insurance Insurance

Next, it has been tested in sessions with three large companies. During every session at least one person represented a stakeholder perspective (customer focus, channel focus, marketing focus, operations/IT focus, and sometimes sales or service focus), ensuring that a multi-disciplinary team was present in a session. The intake was held with one person of the design team, several weeks before the design sessions. The selection of one case was more opportunistic and driven by a service idea from a previous training session with the same group. Hence for case C no real intake was held, and the service idea was presented in a short written

document plus presentation. For every case a different facilitator was used. All these facilitators had previous experience with facilitating groups and using MuChQFD. Data on performance of the design method was obtained via a multi-method approach. Firstly, participants were asked to fill in questionnaires on satisfaction and usefulness of agenda items in relation to the design requirements (during the session, and during debriefing approximately two weeks after each session). Secondly, an individual interview with the participants was held directly after filling out the questionnaires, based on the answers given. Thirdly, two persons analyzed the output of the sessions. Attention was given to the quantity (e.g. number of screens) and quality (level of detail etc) of the output. Finally, qualitative case observations while dealing with these companies guided our cross-case interpretations.

4. Development of multi-channel service prototyping method The multi-channel service prototyping method we developed was positioned as a session that followed the deployment of an existing method, ‘Multi-Channel QFD’ (MuCh-QFD). In the MuCh-QFD sessions multi-channel user needs and functional requirements were defined. The follow-up session built on the output of MuCh-QFD, specifying the service concept further. The result is a visual prototype and development plan. This section addresses two questions. Firstly, which are the requirements for the follow-up, based on feedback from business participants with previous MuCh-QFD experience? Secondly, what are the design steps of the new multi-channel service prototyping method and how are they expected to contribute to the design requirements? To start with, three requirements where MuCh-QFD had the largest contributions in previous tests [9] were maintained for evaluating the afternoon session: 1) customer orientation, 2) channel coherence and synergy, 3) contribution to communication of concept coherence to others. Next, in debriefing meetings several weeks after MuCh-QFD sessions, several participant wishes were identified that would make the design more complete. Most of the remarks had the goal of further specifying the e-service concept: - Elaborate functions (mentioned 3 times) - Build a prototype of the e-service (2 times) - Draw scenarios (2)

- Draw a flow of the interface of the e-service (1) Also, there was a request to explicitly address technical integration: connecting the back-office, the eservice and other channel services (mentioned 2 times). Next, there were several other desires: creating support with other parties (mentioned 3 times), check needs with real customers and create support with endusers (3), detailed investment plan (2) and project plan (2). During in depth interviews to prepare the followup method, business participants indicated that first a specification- and visualization step would be needed, and the other issues could best be discussed on the basis of the visual prototype. Hence, in total two additional requirements specifically for the follow-up session were extracted from participant feedback: 4) specifying service concept (visually) and 5) technical integration. The second topic of this section is the development of the method for prototyping the service collectively with a group of technical and non-technical participants. Since it builds further on MuCh-QFD we first summarize MuCh-QFD and then explain the new method. Overall, a service idea goes through four steps: - Intake (previous to sessions), - MuCh-QFD session, - Prototyping session (follow-up), - Debriefing and presenting results.

4.1. Intake The MuCh-QFD intake addresses tasks like: identification of main objectives, the scope of the service idea and its target segment of customers, a high level business case and listing the main stakeholders that have to be involved in the rest of the design process, see figure 1.

4.2. MuCh-QFD session The MuCh-QFD session makes customer priorities explicit and links them to choices on multi-channel functions. A summary of the design tasks is provided in table 2, further details can be found in [9, 10]. Following QFD tradition [7, 12-14], one of its main outputs, alongside a comparison with competitor services in relation to customer priorities, is a ‘service matrix’, illustrated in Figure 3, which gauges the contribution of multi-channel functionality in relation to customer priorities, and thus creates a weighted prioritization of functions.

Table 2. Summary of MuCh-QFD session

Need X

Function Y

Weight 9 8,5 7

Fucntion 2

Customer need Need 1 Need 2 Need 3

Function 1

Functionality

Agenda item Introduction: summary of intake results I: Identify customer needs and Internet functions II: Define e-service - Correlate functions and needs in service matrix - Define service slogan that summarizes proposition - Discuss solutions and constraints for functions III: Tasks of other channels - Check the desired support from other channels - Check win-win between e-service and other channels - Extend matrix: multi-channel needs and functions IV: Competitive position - Strong and weak points in relation to competitors - Score new and competing services on customer needs

3

9 3 9

3

4 Importance rating Rank

9 26 170 3 1

57 2

Figure 3. Service matrix illustration The correlation method follows Pugh method, with 9’s for strong contributions and 3’s for weaker contributions as judged by the design team. This follows standard QFD practice, see [7]. Next, functions are ranked by multiplying customer needs weights with the contribution scores (9’s and 3’s). In the MuChQFD method, the matrix contains Internet as well as other channel functions. The competitor analysis is described elsewhere [10].

4.3. Multi-channel prototyping (follow-up) The main purpose of the follow-up session is to specify and visualize the service concept, as defined in the morning session. The agenda of the afternoon session is presented in table 3. In the text below the

design tasks are explained, including their links with theory and their expected contributions. The afternoon session starts in item V with the creation of a hierarchical overview of the functions that were defined in the morning session [18]. In agenda item VI, one or more personas are designed, including what they want to accomplish and why [21]. These personas are used as a basis for agenda item VII to elaborate on user tasks. During this item the tasks that an end user should be able to carry out are defined, plus the steps within tasks [18]. Table 3. Summary of prototyping session Agenda Item V: Identify hierarchy of functions VI: Designing persona(s) VII: Elaborate tasks VIII: Screen sketches of storyboard IX: Highlight multi-channel issues X: Technical integration XI: Roles and parties in actor network XII: Project plan In agenda item VIII a storyboard is created. Following the principles of UCD it is important to make a tangible ‘prototype’ of an artifact as early as possible. Grönroos [22] defines an e-service as ‘A series of activities of more or less intangible nature that normally, but not necessarily, take place in interactions between the customer and service employees and/or physical resources or goods and/or systems of the service provider, which are provided as solutions to customer problems.’ The intangible character of an eservice is one of the aspects that makes it hard to design a service. To get a visual impression of the eservice, the first sketches of this user interface, the website, are made. This is done based on the tasks (and steps) that are defined in the previous agenda item. For every step a screen is drawn, hence creating a storyboard. In item IX, the multi-channel issues discussed in the morning are highlighted per screen in the storyboards. This integrates user tasks across channels and makes channel contributions very specific [6]. In agenda item X, the same is done for the technical integration of the e-services: links with other, external systems are discussed. Thus, connections are made from the level of functions, to the levels of processes and supporting systems [7]. This is part of the technical design described by Faber et al [16]. A high level Organizational design is addressed in agenda item XI were roles and actors are listed. The session ends with

the formulation of a high level plan for service development. On the one hand we expect this to aid the subsequent design process, on the other hand it is an important aspect at the start of a design process, according to Alter [11].

the design requirements (customer orientation, multichannel coherence and synergy, concept communication, more detailed service specification, and technical integration) according to the business participants. Next, we extract design knowledge or ‘technological rules’ based on our experiences across the three cases.

Proejct plan

Roles

5.1. Contributions to design requirements Technical

Storyboard

Multi-channel links

Persona(s)

Tasks

Design requirements

Relation functions

Table 4. Expected contributions of design tasks

3 9 9 9 3 1. Customer Orientation 2. Channel Coherence & 3 9 3 3 Synergy 9 3 9 3 3 3 3. Communication 3 9 9 3 3 3 4. Specification of concept 3 9 3 5. Technical integration 9 = strong- & 3 = moderate contribution – authors’ opinion

Like figure 3, table 4 uses Pugh method [7] to show expected contributions of the design tasks in relation to the design requirements. Regarding multi-channel and technical integration issues, design progress is expected to be relatively localized. It mostly occurs after storyboarding is done. Contributions to customer orientation, communication and specification are seen as more spread out through the agenda, although the main impacts are expected in the early design tasks leading up to the storyboard. In short, storyboarding fulfills a pivotal role in the design activity of the follow-up session.

4.4. Output Debriefing The final step in our approach is translating the Web drawings to a prototype based service concept presentation for a debriefing one or two weeks after the design sessions. The second session creates design progress to the extent that creating a visual prototype based on the Web screen sketches only takes a few hours. In the next section we describe how participants from three cases evaluated this multi-channel design approach. An example of resulting prototype screens is shown at the end of the paper (figure 6).

First we evaluate the prototyping session in relation to the design requirements. Figure 4 shows percentage agreement of participants on the question how much design tasks contribute to requirement 1, customer orientation. Results are largely in line with expectations listed in table 4. Exceptions are the personas task, which participants judge to be not very supportive of customer orientation, and identifying functional hierarchie, which was judged more useful than expected. Regarding requirement 2, channel coherence and synergy, the results were as expected (94% agreement on the contribution of item IX, multichannel issues, 56% on item X, technical integration, and 35% for storyboarding and for roles). Customer-Oriented Design 0

0,2

0,4

0,6

0,8

1

Relation Functions Persona(s) Tasks Storyboard Multi-Channel Technical Integration Define Roles and Parties Formulate Project Plan

Figure 4. Contributions to customer orientation For requirement 3, communication, most scores are as expected: 69% contribution for storyboarding and 56% for personas. Unexpected was that the highest scores were for item V, defining hierarchy relations between functions (75%), and item VII, defining tasks (75%). According to participants those detailed specifications are very important for being able to communicate the service concept to others. Specification of Service Concept 0

0,2

0,4

0,6

0,8

1

Relation Functions

5. Results

Persona(s) Tasks Storyboard

The results of the three “field experiments” are described in two steps. First we describe how the design tasks of the prototyping session contributed to

Multi-Channel Technical Integration Define Roles and Parties Formulate Project Plan

Figure 5. Contributions to service specification

In figure 5 participant opinions for requirement 4, specification of service concept, are presented. The scores are largely as expected, except that technical integration, roles of other parties and the hierarchy between functions were less viewed by participants as contributing to the service specification: they value the visual tasks more for this requirement. Finally, the contributions to requirement 5, technical integration, were completely as expected (a 100% score for agenda item X, technical integration, and a 56% score for item IX, multi-channel issues).

Figure 6. Prototype example screens In figure 6 two screens from a resulting prototype are shown. The orange column on the left contains the main menu items of the e-service, which correlates with the functional hierarchy as specified in agenda item V. The orange call outs are used to indicate either multi-channel connections, technical integration issues, explanations of functionality, conditions for functions to appear or not, and navigational links.

5.2. Design knowledge via case observations According to van Aken [23], it is important to use the rich context of design cases to extract design knowledge in the form of ‘technological rules’. We now describe the particularities per case insofar as they illustrate specific design mechanisms and technological rules. Case A: Employees portal For case A, the multi-channel discussions appeared relatively easy for participants, in comparison to other cases. The participants were relatively well acquainted with customer interactions at the branche offices. Hence, closeness to customers appears to stimulate multi-channel thinking. Secondly, what stands out in this case is that the last items of the day (define needed roles and parties, and formulation of project plan) were more appreciated than in the other two cases. In the other companies, appreciation was lower since formal, centralized planning cycles were in place. Hence the absence of formal, centralized project planning processes in companies appears to increase the usefulness of the last two agenda items. Case B: Secure message portal In case B participants were particularly enthusiastic about the use of the Group Systems™ during the morning session. They indicated that in their (very large) company design decisions generally take much longer and are less focused than during our sessions. Hence, Group Systems™ appears particularly useful for large organizations with multi-party decisionmaking processes. Secondly, participants in this case were initially struggling with the multi-channel items (during morning and afternoon), but explicitly appreciated them. It was called ‘out-of-the-box thinking’. This was especially remarkable because of the fact that one of the participants did work in the multi-channel department of the company. Thirdly, the persona item (VI) showed its value in increasing participation and ownership. One participant, who had been quiet and skeptical so far, became very enthusiastic during this item and enhanced his contribution. Case C: Mortgage calculation As explained in the methodology section, this case was executed in a slightly different way. For case C no real intake was held, and the group did not ‘own’ the service idea. It was presented to them in a short written document plus presentation. The morning session was conducted with a group of eight people. In the

afternoon session, the group was split in two groups of four. These groups worked in parallel, and each had one facilitator. Some of the participants had limited experience with the context of the service and they mentioned that it was hard to stay focused. Hence, the design rule of selecting participants who feel ownership for the service concept [9] is confirmed. Secondly, one of the groups tried to design a storyboard based on a real person, a colleague (who participated in the other group). This proves to be impractical: it resulted in finding out what the facts were, instead of using creativity. Hence, personas must be fictional and are simply a means to focus on user goals, context and tasks. Overall All participants were equally satisfied with the MuCh-QFD and the prototyping sessions (MuChQFD: avg. 7.2 when asked for a grade on a scale of 1 10, stand dev. 0.7; prototyping: avg. 7.3, stand dev. 0.8), where case A: Employees portal, scored relatively highest (avg. 8 for both sessions). The difference was not significant (due to small number of observations). Several weeks after the sessions the same grades were given: participant satisfaction had not changed. Satisfaction questions on process and outcomes on a 7point Likert scale showed similar results. Next, participants indicated (except for three ‘neutrals’) that the prototyping session was a (very) useful continuation of MuCh-QFD. Overall, our tests confirm that closing ‘the gap’ mentioned in literature between concept and a real design [21] requires additional design activity and that steps towards a visual prototype add value. In terms of the form chosen for the design tasks, the MuCh-QFD session received praise for the degree of focus and progression created with the aid of GroupSystems™. The prototyping session had many typical ‘creativity tasks’ where the group had for example to draw a persona and list personality traits, or to draw web pages throughout a storyboard. This resulted in high participation levels. A group size of four is very suitable for performing this type of collective tasks. The design tasks of the prototyping session perform largely as expected, except for the personas item (VI), for which we received mixed signals. In the questionnaire participants indicate that it does not contribute directly to customer orientation. At the same time participants indicate after the session that it helps as a basis for design decisions like a task analysis or discussing multi-channel issues. Hence, it appears that the use of a persona happens mostly implicitly, which might be a strong point: focusing the design in a way

that ‘feels natural’. The value of the last two items of the agenda, discussing roles and project planning, appears to depend heavily on existing company practices: hence it is wise to discuss their inclusion in the agenda during the intake. Looking at MuCh-QFD and prototyping sessions together, we found that repeated attention for channels cooperating with e-services leads to a great number of new ideas, not only for the service that is designed, but ideas that cover the whole service delivery. This confirms design theory [24] that when only one aspect (channel) of the service delivery is designed, it is always important to consider the wider context. Finally, participants are impressed by what can be achieved in one day, from initiation and competitive context scanning to prototyping. During the debriefings, participants were pleasantly surprised how much of their input is reflected in the prototype, and judge it to be a useful basis for communicating the service concept to others (customers, business partners as well as colleagues).

6. Discussion This research has several limitations. First of all, it was tested with only 16 business participants and three different cases. This provides a relatively narrow basis and the results must be interpreted with some care. Secondly, we did not use control group sessions as comparison (preferably with comparable representatives from the same firms and for the same service ideas). Hence, it is impossible to single out self-selection effects, case-dependent disturbances, researcher influences [25] as possible explanations for the positive effects we found. Thirdly, the ‘technological rules’ we formulated are more the result of theory generation than of rigorous theory testing. Despite the fact that we observed several effects that were in line with expectations, our research design does not enable rigorous hypothesis testing. Regarding design task and design approach effectiveness, several findings are interesting. Firstly, it turns out that the multi-channel and technical integration tasks overlap in contributions. Multichannel discussions contribute to technical integration and vice versa. Intuitively, this is plausible due to the interdependencies between processes and IT: supporting customer tasks nowadays often requires multi-channel cooperation [26-28] and it requires information processing and technical integration. To our knowledge, the underlying research is the first empirical academic study confirming this overlap. In terms of practical implications, it is disconcerting that

experts on technical integration are rarely aware of multi-channel customer preferences and vice versa [9, 29]. Our findings show that these aspects are closely connected, and that the challenges as well as solutions must be discussed together. We hope that our findings help promote cooperation between both disciplines in creating optimal customer process support. This first point leads to a second observation with regard to the design approach of using a multidisciplinary design team. In the concurrent engineering tradition [20], multi-disciplinary teams are advised for complex, cross-departmental design challenges. Our research confirms the prudence of this approach for multi-channel services. A third finding is that different facilitators can facilitate the sessions. During the tests three different facilitators facilitated the sessions. We found no indications that the facilitator has (significant) influence on the session. Also it has been shown that the session formats are transferable in a reasonable time between different facilitators. Fourthly, we found that personas, making goals and priorities of the target segment explicit, were mostly useful in an implicit way. They aid in focusing the design effort: ‘For whose goals are we working?’ And they aid as a reference point: ‘It would better fit Bob’s purposes to choose solution B.’ But several participants felt personas to be slightly incongruent to the other design tasks which were more functional in nature. Fifthly, we found that translating a list of functions, via functional hierarchy analysis, and task analysis to storyboards in the form of web pages with a navigation structure, is highly appreciated by participants as a way to make a service concept specific and to cross the gap between service concept and design [21]. Finally, participants explicitly appreciate the combination of both sessions in one day. Marketing and technology, strategy and operations, customer- and business priorities: they are all addressed in coherence. Participants feel that through a logical sequence of choices outputs are created that are supported across disciplines and are based on a sensible balance between business priorities and customer preferences.

7. Conclusion QFD has been described as a design method that incorporates the voice of the customer [12, 14, 19]. Our multi-channel service design method could be paraphrased as incorporating the voice of the ‘business-and-technology team’. We created a design approach suitable for a collective design effort of engineers and marketing people. Moreover, design

projects tend to consume more time than marketing, sales and service professionals are willing to invest [4]. Hence we created an approach that can be completed in one day and still generates a very concise prototype of the service, together with a marketing underpinning of the choices made. Our method was tested with three cases. Our tests confirmed the importance of incorporating various stakeholders when designing multi-channel services. Next, the prototype plus marketing underpinning were judged a useful basis for on the one hand the next design steps like user testing and competitive analysis and on the other hand communication with colleagues and business partners. These findings confirm the importance of making service designs visible [22], and that this helps crossing the gap between the specification of a service design and the real design. Based on the first visual storyboard it was shown to be easier and more precise to discuss multi-channel, technology and process issues, because the issues had been made more tangible. Overall, the findings confirm that the new method adds value by the combination of speed, customer orientation, integrating engineering, business and customer perspectives, and by visualizing multichannel and technical issues in an e-service prototype, which makes design choices very tangible.

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