NUDGE: IMPROVING DECISIONS ABOUT HEALTH, WEALTH, AND HAPPINESS by Richard H. Thaler and Cass R. Sunstein Penguin Books, 2009, 312 pp, ISBN 978-0-14-311526-7This book is best described formally as a general explanation of and advocacy for libertarian paternalism, a term coined by the authors in earlier publications. Informally, it is about how leaders, systems, organizations, and governments can nudge people to do the things the nudgers want and need done for the betterment of the nudgees, or of society. It is paternalism in the sense that "it is legitimate for choice architects to try to influence people's behavior in order to make their lives longer, healthier, and better", (p. 5) It is libertarian in that "people should be free to do what they like - and to opt out of undesirable arrangements if they want to do so", (p. 5) The built-in possibility of opting out or making a different choice preserves freedom of choice even though people's behavior has been influenced by the nature of the presentation of the information or by the structure of the decisionmaking system. I had never heard of libertarian paternalism before reading this book, and I now find it fascinating.Written for a general audience, this book contains mostly social and behavioral science theory and models, but there is considerable discussion of structure and process that has roots in mathematical and quantitative modeling. One of the main applications of this social system is economic choice in investing, selecting and purchasing products and services, systems of taxes, banking (mortgages, borrowing, savings), and retirement systems. Other quantitative social choice systems discussed include environmental effects, health care plans, gambling, and organ donations. Softer issues that are also subject to a nudge-based approach are marriage, education, eating, drinking, smoking, influence, spread of information, and politics. There is something in this book for everyone.The basis for this libertarian paternalism concept is in the social theory called "science of choice", the study of the design and implementation of influence systems on various kinds of people. The terms Econs and Humans, are used to refer to people with either considerable or little rational decision-making talent, respectively. The various libertarian paternalism concepts and systems presented are tested and compared in light of these two types of people. Two foundational issues that this book has in common with another book, Network of Echoes: Imitation, Innovation and Invisible Leaders, that was also reviewed for this issue of the Journal are that 1 ) there are two modes of thinking (or components of the brain) - an automatic (intuitive) process and a reflective (rational) process and 2) the need for conformity and the desire for imitation are powerful forces in human behavior. …

Nudge: Improving Decisions about Health, Wealth, and Happiness

THE FUTURE OF COMPETITION: CO-CREATING UNIQUE VALUE WITH CUSTOMERSC.K. Prahalad & Venkat RamaswamyThe authors - C.K. Prahlad and Venkat Ramaswamy, are known for their non-traditional approach and that has made possible to bring out this path breaking book. Unlearning age old management practices and understanding the changes that is sweeping the business world and giving a framework to the still evolving concept of co-creation of value where customer is at the centre stage is indeed a tough task. And authors have accomplished that with aplomb.Our industrial system is generating more goods and services than before but customer satisfaction remains low in spite of having overwhelming choices, profit level of companies is shrinking though many more decision making tools are at its disposal. What is going wrong and how to set this right? Companies are grappling with these issues and trying to fathom these problems. With the emerging technologies, customers are well informed, well connected with their peer groups and very active in their domain. Now customers have started playing dominant role in the value chain through co-creation of experience which enhances the value.The book can be divided into three distinct parts covering twelve chapters, highlighting future of competition and the role to be played by consumers, markets and companies. First six chapters develop the framework of consumers' role in the changing scenario. Early chapters give a brief account of the change that is taking place; how autonomy of companies in creating product value and satisfying consumers, is slowly and surely giving way to consumer-centric approach? How consumer and firm interact and co-create value, and how the cocreation experience becomes the very basis of value? The authors develop the co-creation experience framework in the subsequent chapters very cogently and lucidly. It goes like this, the co-creation experience depends highly on individuals. Each person's uniqueness affects co-creation process as well as co-creation experience. Dialogue, access, risk assessment and transparency (DART) are the building blocks of value co-creation process and companies use this to engage customer effectively as collaborator. In the domain of competition, co-creation experience plays the most important role in decision making. This process further gains momentum in the later chapters of first part as co-creation experience is shaped by dimensions such as choice of channels, options made available, quality of transaction and price-experience relationship. This experience will vary from consumer to consumer due to the different traits of individual. To ensure that the transaction between the consumer and the firm produces positive co-creation experience, the presence of an appropriate environment is imperative, authors develop this concept very carefully. This environments accommodate the heterogeneity of consumer and facilitate a variety of co-creation experience. In the present day world, emerging technology acts as an experience enabler, facilitating innovation in experience environment. With intense competition, sky high consumer expectation; consumer looks for uniqueness which is possible only through personalized co-creation experience. …

The Future of Competition: Co-Creating Unique Value with Customers

Co-production is currently one of cornerstones of public policy reform across the globe. Inter alia, it is articulated as a valuable route to public service reform and to the planning and delivery of effective public services, a response to the democratic deficit and a route to active citizenship and active communities, and as a means by which to lever in additional resources to public service delivery. Despite these varied roles, co-production is actually poorly formulated and has become one of a series of ‘woolly-words’ in public policy. This paper presents a conceptualization of co-production that is theoretically rooted in both public management and service management theory. It argues that this is a robust starting point for the evolution of new research and knowledge about co-production and for the development of evidence-based public policymaking and implementation.

/pdf/co-production-and-the-co-creation-of-value-in-public-4u7rqr2wyd.pdf

Co-production and the co-creation of value in public services: A suitable case for treatment?

How Users Matter: The Co-Construction of Users and Technology:

This paper identifies four sets of textual practices that researchers in the field of organization and management theory (OMT) have used in their attempts to be reflexive. We characterize them as multi-perspective, multi-voicing, positioning and destabilizing. We show how each set of practices can help to produce reflexive research, but also how each embodies limitations and paradoxes. Finally, we consider the interplay among these sets of practices to develop ideas for new avenues for reflexive practice by OMT researchers.

Colloquium with Mats Alvesson : Mats Alvesson in dialog with Patrizia Hoyer: "Reflecting on Reflexivity: Reflexive Textual Practices in Organization and Management Theory"

In many service design projects, co-design is seen as critical to success and a range of benefits are attributed to co-design. In this paper, we present an overview of benefits of co-design in service design projects, in order to help the people involved to articulate more precisely and realistically which benefits to aim for. Based on a literature review and a discussion of three service design projects, we identified three types of benefits: for the service design project; for the service’s customers or users; and for the organization(s) involved. These benefits are related to improving the creative process, the service, project management, or longer-term effects. We propose that the people involved in co-design first identify the goals of the service design project and then align their co-design activities, and the associated benefits, to these goals. The paper closes with a brief discussion on the need for developing ways to monitor and evaluate whether the intended benefits are indeed realized, and the need to assess and take into account the costs and risks of co-design.

/pdf/benefits-of-co-design-in-service-design-projects-56cdhky8pw.pdf

Benefits of co-design in service design projects

Co-Design as a Process of Joint Inquiry and Imagination

In human-centred design (HCD), researchers and designers attempt to cooperate with and learn from potential users of the products or services which they are developing. Their goal is to develop products or services that match users' practices, needs and preferences. In this position paper it is argued that HCD practitioners need to deal with two tensions that are inherent in HCD: they need to combine and balance users' knowledge and ideas with their own knowledge and ideas; and they need to combine and balance a concern for understanding current or past practices with a concern for envisioning alternative or future practices. Six HCD approaches - participatory design, ethnography, the lead user approach, contextual design, codesign and empathic design - are discussed in order to argue that these different approaches are different ways to cope with the two tensions. In addition, several examples from practice are provided to illustrate these tensions. Moreover, it is advocated that HCD practitioners critically reflect on their practices, their methods and their own involvement, so that they can more consciously follow specific HCD approaches and more mindfully cope with the two tensions.

Tensions in human-centred design

Introduction The provisioning of mobile ICT services often requires firms with different resources (e.g. financial support and consumer base) and capabilities (e.g. telecommunication, payment, and security) that co-operate to create value for end users. Given the low success rate of inter-firm co operations (see e.g. Levine & Byrne, 1986; Harrigan, 1988; and Bleeke & Ernst, 1993) and the risks and cost involved introducing new technological innovations, it is not surprisingly that there is much attention of practitioners and academia for the concept of business models. We see a business model as the way a network of companies intends to create and capture value from the employment of technological opportunities. Designing business models is a complex undertaking because different requirements (e.g. technical, user, organisational and financial requirements) need to be accommodated and balanced. Design choices in one domain (e.g. technical domain) may effect those of the other domains (e.g. user domain). This interrelatedness of design choices complicates the design of viable business models for mobile services.

https://www.marcsteen.nl/docs/PanelBled03.pdf

Designing business models for mobile ICT services

In this essay several virtues are discussed that are needed in people who work in participatory design (PD). The term PD is used here to refer specifically to an approach in designing information systems with its roots in Scandinavia in the 1970s and 1980s. Through the lens of virtue ethics and based on key texts in PD, the virtues of cooperation, curiosity, creativity, empowerment and reflexivity are discussed. Cooperation helps people in PD projects to engage in cooperative curiosity and cooperative creativity. Curiosity helps them to empathize with others and their experiences, and to engage in joint learning. Creativity helps them to envision, try out and materialize ideas, and to jointly create new products and services. Empowerment helps them to share power and to enable other people to flourish. Moreover, reflexivity helps them to perceive and to modify their own thoughts, feelings and actions. In the spirit of virtue ethics—which focuses on specific people in concrete situations—several examples from one PD project are provided. Virtue ethics is likely to appeal to people in PD projects because it is practice-oriented, provides room for exploration and experimentation, and promotes professional and personal development. In closing, some ideas for practical application, for education and for further research are discussed.

M.G.D. Steen

Papers

Benefits of co-design in service design projects

Co-Design as a Process of Joint Inquiry and Imagination

Tensions in human-centred design

Designing business models for mobile ICT services

Virtues in Participatory Design: Cooperation, Curiosity, Creativity, Empowerment and Reflexivity