Service System Design (SSD) Innovation through Consumer Participation

This study reports on the issue of consumer-led design ideas in service innovations. The research is conducted through a “service science” lens, which treats consumers, providers, and technologies as parts of a service system wherein their interaction results in potentially mutual benefits. However, do consumers want to provide input into the design of services, can their ideas be valuable, and how and when do we approach consumers are some questions, which need empirical investigation. Thus, the objective of this research is to uncover the dimensions of consumer participation in service design. We applied a qualitative research design using focus group discussions. The results show that consumers provide informative use-based ideas to the organization if there exists, a level of trust between the two. The paper makes two contributions; a framework, which is instructive to an organization in order to include consumers in SSD and it extends the service science literature, which states that consumers are service systems with operant resources to be utilized effectively for the creation of value.