Service design as a tool for sustainable development

Abstract

The objective of this study was to examine the use of Service Design Tools for the sustainable development process of organizations. This was limited to organizations in the arts and culture industry.

The theoretical section explores the current literature on sustainability and how the field has evolved over the years. A subchapter concentrates on sustainability and culture. This acknowledges certain characteristics of sustainability in the arts and culture field. Furthermore, an overview of the literature on Service De- sign is given. In addition, several Service Design Tools are introduced in the theoretical section of this thesis. The literature on sustainability and Service Design is brought together after both fields were introduced. The thesis presents the current status of scientific research on the use of Service Design for sustainability.

The empirical part consists of the case study of Kulturradius. The German arts and culture organization used Service Design Tools in their effort to become more sustainable. In this thesis, their Service Design Workshop was analyzed by doing a content analysis of the text output of the workshop. Moreover, semistructured interviews with the workshop participants were conducted and analyzed.

These results suggest that Service Design Tools are fit to help small and medium-sized arts and culture organizations in their sustainable development process. Kulturradius successfully used Service Design Tools in their process. Also, the literature on Service Design and Sustainability indicates that Service Design Tools are a hands-on approach for an organization when wanting to become more sustainable.

Further research is required to confirm the findings on the use of Service Design tools for sustainable development on a general level.