Making Service Design in a Digital Business

Digital businesses involve multiple stakeholders, each with their own distinct sets of values. In addition to the business value of the global digital ecosystem, a complex web of socio-cultural human values has emerged from digital development. In this research paper, this ecosystem is examined in a Finnish context, through business-led research and development consortia (Nee d for Speed, N4S). The aim of the paper is to present insights into a more socio-culturally sensitive research framework for a digital service development through three experiments using participatory and co-design tools: a stakeholder mapping tool, a value network mapping tool and a design game. The experiments follow the framework of three approaches to making the co-designs (i.e., probes, toolkits and prototyping) presented by Sanders and Stappers (2014). The theoretical framework is pragmatic, developing the process holistically through trial and error or, as a pragmatist would say, through the experience of disruption and crisis. (Kilpinen 2012).