Human‐Centered Design: Integrating Services & Systems Around People By Providing A Common Ground for Action

Service engineering and service design, though distinct in their origins, theories, concepts, methods and practices, share that they are both consequential productive arts for people who depend on their outcomes. The ideas, methods and practices of human‐centred design are therefore relevant to both professional fields. Yet, how human‐centered design is being practiced and applied depends on the interpretation of the concept, or the “designer’s stance” (Buchanan 2011). In this paper, I trace the shifts in design thinking and the role of people in service engineering and in service design. I argue that human-centered design challenges the systems view of service engineers and service designers and requires them to reach out to each other. For this reason, I conclude that for these two disciplines, human-centered design provides a common ground for purposeful action: to arrive at the best solutions that work for people inside and outside of organizations and to conceive of, plan and deliver services that embrace the full human being, not merely a person’s purchasing power or cognitive abilities.