Jānis Ķesa

Service design is always praised to be a human-centred practice dealing primarily with human needs by developing services that are well based on research rather than the personal insights of the designer. The research itself is a way of finding the commonalities among the spectrum of society that might require a service. Methods of such research vary but they always include some sort of data gathering be it desk research, simple surveys, interviews, service safaris, ethnographic observation or else. As human needs are put forward the sources of the data commonly are humans themselves. Humans in order are not perfect in a sense they are thinking and making decisions. In fact, we are all subjects of mistakes and errors made by our own thinking. Cognitive biases, errors and heuristics are mostly business of psychology rather than design nevertheless designing without acknowledging these pitfalls might lead to outcomes that are not addressing the problem very well.

It is not just the research phase of the service design and it is not only the people who are researched that are prone to making mistakes. Often common cognitive mistakes occur on the researcher’s part and touch other segments of service design methodology, like facilitation of co-creation / co-ideation workshops and even shaping the solution within the team of a seasoned design agency. There might be some thinking errors to avoid even at the final pitch of the service so this is crucial to understand our own imperfections.

Why is it so important? People make mistakes, all of us do, and mistakes sometimes shape our choices, preferences or even worldviews without having much effect on the quality of one’s life. Why can’t we just count mistakes as a part of the learning process and account for them at the very start of designing a service?

Service design is supposed to be an iterative, non-linear approach. This is exactly what makes understanding the ways we think and make mistakes so important – to iterate a designer has to understand which part of the process went not exactly right and more importantly why it went wrong. Understanding the cognitive biases and other thinking errors that are likely to cross the path of a service designer is crucial for identifying the root causes of things not working out well, not fitting in the picture or let’s put it harshly, just being plain wrong. Avoiding those mistakes ahead of time can significantly improve the effectiveness of designers’ work, save time for another round of iteration and, most importantly, deliver better services to people.

Specific examples of cognitive biases and thinking errors relevant to service design, including case studies and examples illustrating the impact of avoiding these mistakes in service design, will follow in the forthcoming posts of this blog.

#servicedesign #cognitivebiases