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    Approach To Service Blueprinting

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    nickymaxx06
    This document provides an overview of service blueprinting, including what a service blueprint is, when and why they are useful, the components of a service blueprint, and how to create one. A service blueprint is a diagram that maps all customer and organizational interactions throughout a service process. It shows touchpoints, internal systems, and the customer experience. Blueprints are useful for designing, implementing, and communicating about new or improved services by providing a common reference point. They depict the five components of a service: physical evidence, customer actions, visible contact/employee actions, invisible contact/employee actions, and support processes. To create one, map customer actions and work through the service step-by-step using research outputs and shared knowledge.

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    Approach To Service Blueprinting

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    nickymaxx06
    115 views4 pages
    This document provides an overview of service blueprinting, including what a service blueprint is, when and why they are useful, the components of a service blueprint, and how to create one. A service blueprint is a diagram that maps all customer and organizational interactions throughout a service process. It shows touchpoints, internal systems, and the customer experience. Blueprints are useful for designing, implementing, and communicating about new or improved services by providing a common reference point. They depict the five components of a service: physical evidence, customer actions, visible contact/employee actions, invisible contact/employee actions, and support processes. To create one, map customer actions and work through the service step-by-step using research outputs and shared knowledge.

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    Approach to Service Blueprinting

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    This document provides an overview of service blueprinting, including what a service blueprint is, when and why they are useful, the components of a service blueprint, and how to create one. A service blueprint is a diagram that maps all customer and organizational interactions throughout a service process. It shows touchpoints, internal systems, and the customer experience. Blueprints are useful for designing, implementing, and communicating about new or improved services by providing a common reference point. They depict the five components of a service: physical evidence, customer actions, visible contact/employee actions, invisible contact/employee actions, and support processes. To create one, map customer actions and work through the service step-by-step using research outputs and shared knowledge.

    Copyright:

    Attribution Non-Commercial (BY-NC)
    Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as docx, pdf, or txt
    115 views4 pages

    Approach To Service Blueprinting

    Uploaded by

    nickymaxx06
    This document provides an overview of service blueprinting, including what a service blueprint is, when and why they are useful, the components of a service blueprint, and how to create one. A service blueprint is a diagram that maps all customer and organizational interactions throughout a service process. It shows touchpoints, internal systems, and the customer experience. Blueprints are useful for designing, implementing, and communicating about new or improved services by providing a common reference point. They depict the five components of a service: physical evidence, customer actions, visible contact/employee actions, invisible contact/employee actions, and support processes. To create one, map customer actions and work through the service step-by-step using research outputs and shared knowledge.

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    Download as docx, pdf, or txt
    of 4

    What follows is my approach to service blueprinting.

    It’s a companion technique and output


    to customer experience mapping. And as with experience mapping it doesn’t and can’t exist
    in isolation from other techniques. Both blueprint and map provide a tangible means for
    businesses to assess the impact of change on customers and services. Businesses love
    business process modelling and context diagrams, but to avoid playing lip service to the
    impact on customers maps and blueprints and design thinking provides an evidence-based
    means.

    What is a service blueprint?


    A service blueprint is a schematic diagram that represents all the details of a service from the
    customer and organisation’s perspective. It shows how the different service components link
    into each other – showing the different touchpoints and options customers have to choose
    from and how the internal workings support those choices.

    Because it maps out chronologically and in sequence all the various interactions and actions
    that occur in parallel when customer and company meet, it shows all the interactions by and
    with the customer. So it also illustrates the stages and complexity of the encounter and
    distinguishes between the customer experiences (and decisions) and the systems, invisible to
    the customer, that operate backstage to ensure that these are delivered.

    When and why are they useful?


    Blueprints are flexible and powerful in that they depict a service at multiple levels of analysis
    – they can facilitate the refinement of a single step as well as the creation of an entire service
    process. It is a way of ‘seeing’ the service from the customer focus; the key part of the
    compliance outcome. In creating the current and future state blueprints it allows the Team to
    articulate and act upon customer insights, and focus on what’s working, what’s not working
    and what needs to be changed.

    For designing:

     The development of new services, assessment and improvement of existing services


     Capturing how long processes within the service take, and how that equates to cost
    because they are presented with a base of time
     Comparison of differences in basic services, standards and processes
     Capturing of processes, architecture and systems in the context of service, not in
    isolation or solely from the internal business perspective
     Testing of assumptions on paper to identify fail points and thoroughly work out the
    bugs
     Cuts down time and inefficiency of random service development

    For implementing:

     Becomes a reference for planning and change


     Represents the new or changed service for a staff member to see during integration
    activity
     Forms a common point of reference for all parties (project team, affected staff and
    management) concerned with achieving a successful launch – also serves as focal
    point for later refinements or last-minute changes
     Can be stored electronically for later reference, available for everyone involved
     Facilitates comparison of the desired and actual service

    As a communication tool:

     Provides a focus for conversations


     Is more precise than verbal descriptions, and less subject to misinterpretation
     Can be a formalised way to inspire corporate-wide change directed at integrating
    customer focus across the organisation
     Can help convince the organisation that changes are in order and what specifically can
    be done

    What’s in a service blueprint


    The blueprint sets out how the customer and organisation (back-office supporting people,
    processes and systems) interact through five components and three lines:

    Physical evidence
    Customer actions
    ————————–Line of interaction
    Visible contact, employee actions (onstage)
    ————————–Line of visibility
    Invisible contact, employee actions (backstage)
    ————————–Line of internal interaction
    Support processes

    Unlike a customer experience map this framework remains the same for each map. How you
    plot within that is up to the intent of the problem/opportunity, information you have (current
    or future state) and the nature of the service itself.

    So how do you make one?


    Ideally begin as a team, using the research and business analysis elicitation outputs (customer
    experience map, frameworks, models, insights, business processes, use cases, cotext
    diagrams) and shared knowledge to plot the service. As with mapping, the point of the initial
    blueprinting is generating team conversation about how the service works.

    Ask a simple question, then through the blueprint, try and find the answer. For example:
    “How does the drive-through work?”

    1. Start with the customer actions as you’ve described from the mapping exercise, these
    will serve as the foundation for all other elements of the blueprint.
    2. Go through the service process step by step using the five components as your
    framework for the gathered data and knowledge
    3. Break down the information into as much detail as is appropriate to the service, its
    complexity, and the scale of change proposed by the Initiative. For example, the level
    of detail for blueprinting how a drive-through works will differ from an initiative
    looking to change the process of how food gets delivered to the drive-through pick-up
    counter. For the latter the more detail described the better, as describing very small
    steps will help to more easily identify problem areas and resolution opportunities
    4. Delineate each component of the service by indicating sequentially how each is
    connected
    5. Represent time in relation to the activities both standard execution time and the
    allowable deviation (e.g. 5 working days, but 10 are acceptable)
    6. Do the blueprint once, then do it again. You will refine iteratively to the point a final
    comprehensive blueprint can be produced

    Then look at the process – understand how customers relate to it (utilise the customer
    experience mapping concurrently). When does the service start and stop from the customers
    point of view?” Where are the bottlenecks and areas where service quality can be improved?

     Examine customers perceptions of the anticipated experience – this includes defining


    the internal and external activities that deliver to these expectations (actual not ideal)
     Identify fail points to show where the customer may experience quality or consistency
    problems
     Look at what is revealed and/or what areas that should be focused on for change. e.g.
    Does:
    o Customer expectation and management perception of customer expectation
    match?
    o Management perception of customer expectations and service quality
    specifications (i.e. how it’s supposed to work) match?
    o Service quality specifications and the service actually delivered match?
    o The service delivered and what is communicated about the service to
    customers match?

    Blueprints and Customer Experience Maps


    While the Service Blueprint represents the service from the customer and business
    perspective, a Customer Experience Map represents the experience from the customers
    perspective. The map can include customer goals, points of pain (challenges/obstacles),
    points of delight (opportunities), roles and relationships, motivations, etc. It represents what
    customers and users think, do, use from the beginning, middle, and end of their experience.
    As such the representation is not as standardised as with blueprints.

    Together the map and blueprint represent the two key components of service – how it’s
    experienced and how it works

    Acknowledgments
    Again, description of blueprints to this point was not done alone. Key sources were KISD –
    Practical Access to an Evolving Field, G. Lynn Shostack (various), Bill Hollins – UK Des
    Council, Michael Jay Polonsky and Adrian Sargeant ‘Managing the Conation Experience’
    (2007) Mary Jo Bitner, Amy Ostorm, Felicia Morgan: ‘Service Blueprinting’ (2008),
    Knowledge @ WP Carey. And thanks also to Irene Chong for pointing me in the direction of
    many of these academic papers and Ramari Slattery for lending me and using me for her
    System Thinking paper that used the technique.
    Disclaimer: Design process is a misnomer. In order to do a map or blueprint one must start.
    Process is just a guide, doing is the best way to do.

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