For the first time in Ukraine
For the first time in Ukraine, Lviv Polytechnic has introduced a new elective course Service Design and Innovation. Its purpose is a creative human-centred process of creating new services or improving existing ones.
The special course was developed by its curator, Volodymyr Maik, Professor at the Department of Printing Technologies and Packaging, the Institute of Printing Art and Media Technologies, Lviv Polytechnic. Oleh Koss, founder of the service design agency Lanka.CX, provided methodological assistance. Volodymyr Maik told the Centre for Communication that Lanka.CX is number one in service design in Ukraine, and its founder is well recognised in the field of customer-centric transformations.
Teaching innovative thinking
- What prompted you to introduce the Service Design and Innovation course?
- For many years, I have been teaching such disciplines as “Fundamentals of Technical Creativity”, “Research Methods” and “Methodology and Organisation of Research Activities” to bachelor's, master's and postgraduate students. The focus is on the technical development of new solutions, says Volodymyr Maik. However, their practical application often depends on an effective interaction process with users.
The term “service design” was coined by Lynn Shostak, Citibank Vice President, who explained in her articles “How to Create a Service” and “Creating Services that Work” that the design process can be documented and codified by mapping the sequence of events in a service. Therefore, even the mere introduction of service design into organisations' workflows can create innovations that allow them to take into account real customer needs. The Service Design and Innovation course is designed to teach students the skills of innovative thinking, as well as how to create services and products that are of real value to users.
- What was the reasoning behind adding the special course to the university's general academic disciplines?
- In a modern higher education institution, it is necessary to constantly update academic disciplines and introduce new ones to meet the requirements of the times. The introduction of the discipline “Service Design and Innovation” is in line with the university's strategy for innovative education and the development of practice-oriented learning. The developed course systematically explains how to transform ideas into real services that work in market or social conditions.
