It's complicated...
Navigating complexity in an increasingly fractured world - the ASD way
Al Turner
9/8/20252 min read
It's complicated. Ain't that the truth.
Tech stacks, dependencies, swim lanes, networks, hierarchies; all managed by sprawling corporate entities across multiple timezones; with varying divisions, departments and teams all nested within them. And half of them aren't even hooked up to the same phone system.
And that's just the internal service map: the customers served by these gelatinous amorphous juggernauts-from-outer-space are spread all over the globe, using myriad devices in every language imaginable and they all want something different, except those folks who don't really know what they want - they only know that they want it NOW.
It's all just a little...messy. Clearly, gone are the days when a simple linear user journey would suffice to sum up all the interactions needed to deliver a successful product or service. Service design practices can help to cut through a lot of that noise, break it all down into manageable chunks so we can isolate the useful stuff and sweep away all the useless bits into the bin.
But here's the thing: service design can be complicated too. It's about as proportionately complicated as the challenges it seeks to resolve. This is why so many companies recognise the value in hiring dedicated professional service designers to help steer their metaphorical starship through the treacherous asteroid field of broken dependencies, floppy tech stacks and conflicting business goals.
But not every team has the resources (or indeed the business need) to hire a permanent service designer and engaging contractors can be equally expensive. Even for those who do keep an in-house crack-squad of service designers on their books, the complex nature of their field means that they, just like the services they design, cannot work alone. As 'tis said:
"In space, no one can hear you scream..."
So if we don't want our ears to ring in the depths of night to the screams of exasperated service designers while we're only trying to get some sleep, it makes sense to embed some light systems-thinking awareness across our whole organisations. This can't be done overnight, but not everyone in a company has to become a part-time service designer for this approach to work. It's a gentle, gradual cultural shift (like when Klingons started out as bad guys, but then they joined the Federation and had to wrap their heads around crazy new cultural norms like not greeting a stranger by challenging them to a duel to the death, say)
In ASD workshops, we introduce some of these practices and test them out in a safe environment, far away from the hustle and bustle of the daily grind. We do this through exercises like making sure your new fairytale city has a viable tech stack (how many blacksmiths do we really need?), identifying all the potential user groups for your genetically-engineered dinosaur petting-zoo (best. Hen do. EVER) or conducting a risk assessment in a zero-gravity starship canteen (will that thing that froths the milk up for cappuccinos even still work in zero-G?)
It might all sound a bit frivolous, but by ignoring the real world, participants get to know and understand the methods and principles in isolation, so they can be applied elsewhere. Plus it's fun.