Navigating in the Youth Service Ecosystem - Using a service design approach to improve services and customer experience in the City of Turku’s youth services

Abstract

The master’s thesis was a research and development project conducted for the Central Administration of the City of Turku. The work was strongly related to ongoing local government pilots on employment and Smart and Wise Turku project, one of the main priorities of which is the prevention of exclusion. The thesis’ research and development work focused on services targeted at young people aged 15-29 who are unemployed, without education or otherwise in a challenging position.

At the heart of the research and development work of the thesis was service development of youth services that support employment and prevent exclusion. The purpose of the thesis was to support the preparation and implementation of the local government pilot on employment in Turku youth employment services and to improve the customer experience in the long run. The aim was not only to map, streamline and unify the service model but also to increase customer orientation and common understanding of the services’ development needs between different service ecosystem actors. The research questions were the following: 1. What are the service ecosystem and the service model of youth services like in the local government pilot on employment in Turku? 2. How could youth services and service processes be improved from the perspective of young people and people working in youth counselling?

The frame of reference of the thesis included the following topics: systems thinking and ecological systems theory, social exclusion and its prevention and service design thinking. The main research and development methods and tools were in-depth interviews, co-creative workshops, service safari, personas, customer journey maps and system maps.

The study highlighted that services for young people are already comprehensive and that instead of developing entirely new services, more attention should be paid to improving existing services, improving visibility and information of the youth service entity and also increasing allocating resources to preventive services and to low-threshold mental health services. In contrast, related to service processes more development needs were seen and they were associated with, comprehensibility of service processes, service accessibility, service encounters, information flow, and feedback system. In addition, a need to improve and increase the interaction and cooperation of ecosystem actors emerged. A common interaction platform, service integration and placing more service providers under one roof were seen as ways to improve cooperation and interaction between ecosystem actors.