Jan Schmiedgen’s thesis: innovating user value

Via G Hill

We live in a hyper-competitive world, where whole industries either shift towards services or
become obsolete due to new market entrants, technologies or even social practices. A world,
where permanent interactions with customers, fast time-to-market, and the ability to innovate
»right« (e.g. the right thing or value) are the key to corporate success. On that score the business
sphere isn’t getting tired of emphasising the need for strategic innovation (which means
»creating superior customer value«, business model innovations or even the disruption and
creation of new markets).
This paper uncovers some of the often overlooked links of design (design thinking, designdriven
innovation and service design) to strategic innovation through the lens of »customer
value«. It will do so by …
1) Disenchanting the big corporate rhetoric on above claims by showing that prevailing and
too one-sided understandings of strategy and innovation, rather reinforce than escape old
industry paradigms.
2) Examining designs still undervalued contributions to strategy-making by approaching
business challenges with a user/value-centric and radical service logic.
3) Showing that every dimension of strategic innovation culminates in the concept of perceived
user value and meaning, which gets reviewed in detail (dimensions, forms, properties),
especially with regards to constructing value propositions.
4) Arguing that the current service design and business model innovation discourses cannot
be negotiated separately, as they may be good methodological complements.
So when speaking about the innovation of value for the customer, the paper argues, the above
stated and seemingly separated fields intersect. Therefore their most apparent systemic connections
and the facilitation of value creation by design are outlined and discussed.

Photocredit: ask_alaska

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