Participatory Design as an Approach to Social Innovation

First Nordic Conference on Service Design and Service …, 2009

In the discourse of service design, terms such as platforms, transformation and co-creation have become part of what seems to be an emergent lingua franca. In the participatory design discourse, and the surrounding design traditions, related terms and ideas were developed. The development of the discourse of participatory design, during the last three decades of the 20 th century, influence the way we understand the provisions for and possibilities of service design. The analysis is performed along three themes collected from the development of participatory design, and examples of how the legacy of participatory design has been appropriated are given. We conclude that the two disciplines share a basic structure consisting of involvement techniques, cooperative approaches, and emancipatory objectives. Moreover, some areas of future research for service design are identified.

2004

This paper introduces service design as a potential Participatory Design (PD) theme. It proposes that the success of designing good services can be increased by including the perspectives and practices of the future service participants into the design process. Through the description of an action-research project, the paper explores the potentials and limitations of using an ethnographic approach and Activity Theory to frame the service design process and interpret the complexity of services.

""The authors draw a parallel between a set of fast co-design activities within an action research called ‘Ideas Sharing stall’, and a series of systematic co-design sessions in the framework of the ‘Creative Citizens’ project. The two experimentations result from a renewed activism on the part of city dwellers, which can be currently observed in the city of Milan. Both the research projects move in the field of service design for social innovation adopting a participatory approach known as community centred design. The paper describes the work done in the two contexts discussing their purposes and tools and outlining two formats of intervention for co-designing services with citizen participation. The first model relates to people’s engagement, while the second is more linked to their empowerment. Thus the discussion focuses on the relation between them, highlighting the role and form of service designer action in the shift from engaging to empowering people in enhancing social innovation. In conclusion the importance of service designers collaborating with other local actors in the project development is underlined, suggesting they be seen not so much as facilitators but as vision bearers, triggering, inspiring and leading the community centred design process ""

2016

Piia Rytilahti (M.Soc.Sc, BA) works as a researcher at the University of Lapland, Faculty of Art and Design. She is experienced in design research, especially regional research and development projects, technology-and design-led development projects and academic research. She is finalizing her dissertation on the social aspect of design. Her research interests are social practices, embodiment and interaction, co-creation and empathic design methodologies. Professor Satu Miettinen's (PhD) research interests include female empowerment, the role of women at the interface of art and science, methods of engaging design in the Arctic region, methods for the inclusion of service design, the participatory development of services and socially responsible ways to perform art and design. Miettinen has vast experience in leading and managing research projects, and both her research and artistic work apply design methods to develop services. Jaana Jeminen has a BA in design and an MA in business economics (management). She has extensive experience in both entrepreneurship and the management of research and development projects through her design consultancy. She works as a project manager for a service design project at the University of Lapland. Previously, she managed projects for universities, regional development agencies and businesses in the private sector. Her specialities are service design thinking, co-creation and creativity management methodologies for innovation management. Jeminen constantly works with companies from various industries. Simo Rontti (MA) is a service design project manager and lecturer at the University of Lapland, Finland. Since 2009, Rontti has been researching and developing technology-aided prototyping methods in close collaboration with dozens of case companies, such as Kone, Volkswagen and Danskebank. Prior to that, he worked for seven years as an in-house industrial designer at Lappset Group, which operates globally in the playground equipment industry. Rontti is also a service design entrepreneur and has helped businesses, such as those in the automotive, education and energy sectors. See more on technology-aided prototyping methods: www.sinco.fi. Titta Jylkäs received a master's of art and design in Industrial Design with a focus on service design. Jylkäs has been working with partner companies as a designer and junior researcher in several research projects at the University of Lapland. She has also experience in research exchange with international universities, such as Parsons School of Design, University of California, Berkeley and Umeå Design Institute. While pursuing her PhD, Jylkäs uses a user-driven approach and focuses on service ecosystem design in the field of transportation. Heikki Tikkanen received a master's of art and design in Audiovisual Media Culture from the University of Lapland. He has training and experience regarding the design and production of different forms of digital media, such as web journalism and social media, audio and video content and interactive experiences like video games. He is interested in combining broad technological knowledge with creative expression and a phenomenological understanding of personal human experiences in order to produce new research findings and business opportunities. Mira Alhonsuo (Master of Arts) is a PhD candidate and works as a research coordinator for multiple service design projects at the University of Lapland. She has examined research cases in digital services, health care services as well as with different companies and organizations. Service Innovation Corner, SINCO laboratory, is her favourite place for co-designing and ideation with prototyping methods. Her research interests include service design methods, empathy, narratives, process visualization and public service development, especially in the health care sector. Essi Kuure is a researcher at the Culture-Based Service Design Doctoral School at the University of Lapland, Finland. She has worked for several years at the University on multiple local, national and international design projects, and she has taught students and organizations about service design. She holds a master's degree in Industrial Design and is currently pursuing a doctoral degree at the University of Lapland. The title of her PhD is 'Designing Common Good-Reframing the Service Design Process with Communities'. Her research emphasizes knowledge and the methods of service design, social design and co-design. Kuure enjoys working with different communities and the collaborative process of designing better solutions for all. She believes that there is a designer's spirit inside all humans and that we all want to make our everyday lives easier and more enjoyable. Henna Marttila (MA) specializes in service design. She comes from a small country village in Lapland. She loves to do things with her hands, like drawing and creating games, as well as fish, pick berries and hunt. Nature means a lot to her, and she respects its power and what it can offer: energy and inspiration. She is passionate about designing products and services that could help other people by improving their wellbeing and safety. She believes communication plays a big role in achieving this outcome. In particular, she focuses on developing ways for the elderly to live in their own homes for as long as they want and prepare for exceptional circumstances.

2014

The paper discusses the connections between social innovation and design practice/research outlining possible challenges for innovating in the service field. Social Innovation is one of the most promising frameworks for delivering service innovation that is receiving increasing attention from governments, academy, and businesses alike. Design is described as a privileged path to innovation, because it can establish a link with creativity and outline more efficient processes. The paper aims to provide a platform for discussion and learning that can ground a connection between the two topics. Moreover, it offers a critique of what has been achieved while highlighting the main questions for future development.

The Design Journal

There is an evident need to shift from focusing merely on designers' tasks and methods towards taking a more holistic approach to socially responsible design. In order to do this, this paper looks firstly in retrospect at the global design research work done by the World Design Research Group and secondly examines an ongoing research project in the development context. In both cases, the connections and differences between social design and service design are highlighted. As a concrete outcome this paper proposes a framework that can be applied to the development context. In other words, in design cases where the aim is to collaborate, share knowledge and experiences as well as co-design change in a multinational group. The framework itself gives designers an understanding of how to both navigate in the development field and work for improving the livelihoods of communities.

2018

Design has a long tradition of relation with the social. A recent British report classified social design into social entrepreneurship, socially responsible design, and design activism [1]. Social design has gained momentum in design research during the last ten years, a development which can be seen as having several roots. Some of these roots go back a few decades, to the writings of Papanek [2] in 1984, while others are of newer origin, as for instance in the area of service design that intersects with public sector innovation and the emergence of new societal challenges.

2012

The purpose of this paper is to explore the challenges of engaging stakeholders in a co-creation process to bring an innovation culture into their daily working routine.

2009

Design, as an area of knowledge, is subject to changes that affect it through different approaches, both theoretical and practical; its include matters related with responsibility, environment, social worries, and things alike. Commensurately, such contemporary aspects open room for social initiatives. This scenario begins to be looked at, especially in creative communities. Such proposal for a systemic approach of design is seen as a way to involve the stakeholders in the processes of investigation and of social innovation, which can decisively contribute for the development of traditional local communities. As a theoretical basis for the research, this paper outlines some especial features of design and social innovation, in their particular and in their complementary aspects, as well as in the way they relate with each other.

2013

This paper presents and discusses an in-progress action format developed through a reflection on several design experiments aiming to make things happen. It brings to the already rich debate on social innovation a designer’s perspective mainly focused on action research and field actions. It is an action format of design for social innovation, the ‘Social Innovation Journey’, structured on a non-linear sequence of steps and actions that progressively engage a community and help it to set up and prototype a social innovation. This happens through an event-like pilot initiative: a ‘farewell’ initiative that, while prototyping the innovation, releases its full ownership to the community. The action format is illustrated through research projects and training activities which have brought designers to design ‘with’ the social innovators, that’s to say side by side with the them, in a pretty immersive way. The ‘Social Innovation Journey’ is an open, in-progress, framework for intervention set up by the Polimi DESIS Lab, the Politecnico di Milano based laboratory of the international network DESIS – Design for Social Innovation and Sustainability. It comprises a network of researchers adopting a strategic and systemic approach to design, with a specific focus on designing for services and design activism. It explores how design can enable people, communities, enterprises and organisations to kick off and manage innovation processes by co-designing and setting in place experiments of new services and solutions.