Service Design Show
Service Design Show
A show where we go beyond the basic service desig…
- 59 minutes 37 secondsMastering The Most Important Tool in Your Design Toolkit / Inside Service Design / Kara & Sidd / Ep. #10
Let's be real for a moment...
In the corporate context, what's the thing that usually gets rewarded the most?
It’s often the person who "just" grinds through the chaos, works overtime to fix a broken process, and absorbs all the organizational friction without complaining.
From very early on in our careers we are taught to treat ourselves like machines that just need to carry more weight.
But as Kara Snyder points out in our conversation, that is treating resilience as output. It’s performing professionalism when you are completely depleted. And it is a fast track to burnout.
Instead, Kara challenges us to think about resilience as capacity.
What do you actually need to sustain yourself so you can stay in this deeply human and emotionally demanding work?
Because at the end of the day, the most important tool in your service design toolkit isn't a journey map or a blueprint... well, it's you.
In this episode of Inside Service Design, I sit down with Kara and Siddhartha Saxena to talk about the inner game of being an in-house service design professional.
We step away from the frameworks and talk about how to actually survive and thrive in this beautifully complex role.
This conversation touches on topics like:
- How to stop measuring your worth by how much stress you can carry.
- How to create a "liminal space" between you and your work.
- And how to get to Friday and actually feel a sense of accomplishment, even when the work is messy.
So if you’ve been feeling the weight of driving positive change using service design, take a deep breath, slow down, and tune into this one.
How do you protect your own capacity? Have you found any specific rituals particularly helpful?
Let me know, I’d love to hear how you're dealing with this.
Be well,
~ Marc
--- [ 1. GUIDE ] ---
00:00 Welcome to the January 2026 Round Up!
03:30 Kara’s Journey: From Accounting to PWC
06:30 Facing Burnout and Personal Loss
09:00 Sidd’s Journey: From Architecture to Startups
11:30 Discovering Service Design as a Business Bridge
12:30 Remote Healthcare in India
14:00 Designing the "Nervous System" of an Organization
15:45 Navigating Complexity
19:00 Why Service Design Feels Like the "Wild West"
19:50 Tool Spotlight: Using the Emotional Culture Deck
21:30 Moving from Doing to Being
24:00 Resilience in Startups vs. Corporate Safety
26:15 How Personal Grief Shapes Professional Perspective
31:15 The Gap Between Self and Work
34:30 Why Service Designers are Natural "Absorbers"
38:30 Building a Protective Layer Against Burnout
41:15 Mapping the Invisible Organizational Nervous System
44:45 Managing Design at Scale
48:15 When to Say "No" to the Machine
52:30 The Power of Invisible Labor
56:15 Measuring the Value of What Can't Be Seen
59:00 Protecting Your Design Culture from Company Culture
1:00:15 Final Takeaways
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5 March 2026, 7:00 am - 1 hour 3 minutesHow to Use Your Design Skills to Build Strategic Allies / Belén Tello / Ep. #248
It’s the one thing they didn't teach in design school...
We spend years learning how to understand what drives our users, map out complex journeys, and deliver useful service prototypes.
But when it comes time to sit down with business stakeholders, compliance teams, or yes even legal departments? That’s when the friction sets in.
For this episode, we're joined by Belén Tello, who has a very interesting take on how we can overcome this struggle. As the Head of Design for the largest bank in Peru, Belén leads a massive team of over 150 designers.
As you might imagine, because they operate in the highly regulated financial sector, they are constantly in negotiations with the rest of the business.
Over the years, Belen has experienced firsthand that even the most talented design professionals often freeze up when talking to their business partners.
To our own demise, we often retreat to our comfort zones, simply handing over the work and letting the business decide whether it's "good or not". Deep down, we sometimes feel like the business folks just know more than we do (not the case!).
To fix this confidence gap, Belén started doing something quite radical, at least for design teams.
Before a big stakeholder meeting, she runs "role play" sessions with her team. Yes, almost like lawyers preparing for a mock trial!
They sit down and strategize. What do you want to say here? Who are your strongest stakeholders? Do you need me to step in and ask a specific question so you can explain your rationale?
Add to that that she's been helping her team learn to speak the "common language" of the bank. And that language? It's numbers and data, obviously.
As you'll hear Belén argues that we already do the hard work of gathering qualitative and quantitative insights, but we frequently fail to actually bring that data to the table in a convincing way.
When you stop arguing based on subjective perception and start negotiating with facts, everything changes. You move away from being seen as just an "add-on" to the process and finally become a true strategic partner.
So if you've ever felt that imposter syndrome kick in during a big meeting, this episode is pretty much a masterclass in building your confidence and growing your influence.
As you listen to the episode, I’d love for you to reflect on your own work. How often are you actively translating your insights into a language the business understands? And what would help you to do that more often?
Enjoy the conversation and keep making a positive impact!
Be well,
~ Marc
--- [ 1. GUIDE ] ---
00:00 Welcome to Episode 248
05:00 Banking in Peru: Education over digital tools
09:00 The danger of designing only for the capital city
17:30 Negotiating with Legal and Compliance
21:00 Using data to find a common business language
23:00 Why designers struggle to speak up in business
27:00 Prepping for stakeholders like a mock trial
28:45 Finding internal sponsors who understand design
33:30 Quantifying design's impact on the business
36:15 Redesigning 200+ physical branches
41:00 Moving from transactional to relational models
45:30 Connecting with rural users
51:15 Using design's systemic view as an unfair advantage
55:30 Why listening is a designer's true superpower
58:00 Positioning design strategically
1:00:30 Closing thoughts
--- [ 2. LINKS ] ---
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26 February 2026, 7:00 am - 59 minutes 18 secondsSticky Notes vs. Software and The Fight for Our Legitimacy / Inside Service Design / Ep. #09
Are we being left behind...
Let's think about this for a moment.
Architects have AutoCAD. Finance folks have Excel. Sales teams have Salesforce. The list goes on.
But what do we as service design professionals have?
If we're a bit cynical, you could say that often it’s a wall of sticky notes (that the cleaners throw away at night).
This brings up a deep and often unspoken insecurity in our field.
Could it be that our work is seen as "fluffy" or "invisible" because we lack the "hard" tools that other departments have?
That is the provocative question Maxe van Heeswijk brought to the Circle community recently.
She challenged us to think about whether having "our own software" would help us claim our territory and be taken more seriously by stakeholders.
But to which extent can a tool be the answer to our problems?
Will Sharples joined the conversation with a different take.
He argues that stakeholders don't actually care about our process or our "proper" service design tools, they just want their problems solved.
So in this episode of Inside Service Design, we explore this tension between wanting to be "seen" as experts and the messy reality of getting work done in-house.
This conversation is packed with spicy topics like:
- Whether having a dedicated tool makes you more legitimate, or does it just create new silos?
- Why our most important work is often the hardest to measure (and get budget for).
- A brutal method for stripping away busy work to focus on the assets that actually tell a story.
- And why you are "always selling" the value of service design, even years after you’ve been hired.
So, if you’ve ever felt like you’re doing important work... that nobody sees, this episode is for you.
What do you feel is the service design tool at the moment? Do we even have one?
Let me know, I’m really curious to hear your take!
Be well,
~ Marc
--- [ 1. GUIDE ] ---
00:00 Welcome to December Round Up
01:00 Meet the Guests
04:00 From Physical Engineering to Digital Services
06:30 From Philosophy & Advertising to SD
10:15 Balancing Financial Goals vs. Trust
15:15 Securing Long-Term Funding
18:00 Why Patience is a Superpower
21:45 Thought Experiment
26:30 Do We Need Professional Software?
35:00 Is Design Too Democratized
44:15 Relationship Building is Slow Farming
51:00 Pragmatism vs. The Design Bibles
52:45 The Hidden Skill
55:45 Navigating Company Politics
59:30 Wrap-Up
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If you're an in-house service design professional and want to learn from the stories of your peers, take a look at the Circle, it might just be the thing you're looking for.
Join our private community for in-house service design professionals:
https://servicedesignshow.com/circle
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19 February 2026, 7:00 am - 58 minutes 43 secondsWhere did all the Service Designers go? / Giulia Di Gregorio / Ep. #247
If you look at the current job market, you might notice something strange...
The words "service design" seem to be slowly disappearing from job titles.
Does that mean our field is shrinking, or worse, becoming obsolete?
Well, according to our guest, Giulia Di Gregorio, that's definitely not the case.
If anything, the opposite is true.
Giulia argues that while the titles might be vanishing, the practice is actually spreading.
Service design is everywhere now; it's just hiding under different names.
But this "diversification" creates a new challenge.
If everyone has a different job title, where do you find your professional peers?
Where's that safe space where you can get together to commiserate, find inspiration, and learn from each other?
That's what Giulia and a few folks were thinking as well.
But instead of just thinking about it they rolled up their sleeves and decided to revive Service Design Drinks Milan.
This didn't become just another meetup; it became a "pirate version" of a community.
And it’s been a pretty successful one.
In this conversation, we explore what it looks like to run a community that's driven by volunteers, has no hierarchy, and is governed by the energy people actually have to give.
We also talk about building "synergies" with other communities instead of acting like isolated islands.
And we dig into why the best way to scale might be through small, independent nodes across the world rather than one big centralized network.
So if you’ve been feeling a bit "homeless" in your service design role lately, this is a great conversation about reclaiming your identity and connecting with your tribe.
What stuck with me is the idea that when a project starts feeling like "work," you might be heading in the wrong direction and should reconsider your options.
Something to think about both in our professional context as well as in our passion projects.
Enjoy the conversation and keep making a positive impact!
~ Marc
--- [ 1. GUIDE ] ---
00:00 Welcome to Episode 247
07:30 Flat Hierarchies & Freedom
09:30 Global Nodes vs. Centralized Networks
13:30 The Toolkit Takeover
17:45 Managing by Time
23:15 Pirates vs. The Navy
27:30 The Cost of Being Brave
31:45 The Un-conferenced Model
36:30 Turning Points: From Branding to COVID
43:00 Learning Effortless Leadership
48:00 How to Start Your Own Pirate Node
55:30 Question to ponder on
--- [ 2. LINKS ] ---
- https://www.linkedin.com/in/giulialogodigregorio/
- https://www.linkedin.com/company/service-design-drinks-milan
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12 February 2026, 7:00 am - 1 hour 5 minutesFrom The Experience Economy to The Transformation Economy / Joe Pine / Ep. #246
A few months ago I finally hit a major milestone...
After years of putting it off, I finally started taking golf lessons.
Jasper, my coach (or "pro" as they say in the golf world), has been helping me develop a proper swing. But being me, I just can't help but look at Jasper through a service design lens.
What is he actually selling me? Or better yet: what am I actually buying?
Right now, I pay by the hour. That buys me Jasper’s time and a bit of grass to practice on.
But what if I didn’t pay for the service, which is just time well saved, but rather for the outcome?
What if Jasper promised to take me from someone who barely knows how to hold a club to being a confident, competent golfer?
Because in the end, that’s truly the identity shift I’m actually looking for.
Just think about how much that proposition would change the dynamics, not just for me, but for Jasper’s entire business model.
When that offer is on the table, why would I ever settle for a coach selling me "practice time" (a commodity) when I could invest in the transformation I actually desire?
This shift toward "transformations" as an economic offering isn't new.
It was already described in the industry defining book The Experience Economy back in 1999.
We’ve been lucky enough to have Joe Pine, the book’s co-author, on the Show twice before. Now, he’s back.
It’s been 27 years since he published the book that influenced so many of us, and he has just published the long-awaited follow-up titled, you guessed it, The Transformation Economy.
In this episode, we sit down to chat about what this shift means for us as service design professionals and what it means for the future of business.
I’m fairly certain this is the very first podcast where Joe discusses the new book, so we’ve got a true exclusive on our hands.
So will this be the next chapter for our field? Listen to the episode to find out!
As you listen to the conversation, I’d love for you to think about your own projects. Are you designing for "time well spent," or are you ready to guide your customers through a real identity shift?
Enjoy the conversation and keep making a positive impact!
Be well,
~ Marc
--- [ 1. GUIDE ] ---
00:00 Welcome to Episode 246
04:45 Why the book is still relevant
06:15 Progression of Economic Value
11:00 Defining economic offerings
13:00 Birth of the Transformation Economy
17:30 Experience vs. Transformation
20:30 Focusing on the "Aspirant"
22:00 Time Saved vs. Time Well Spent
25:00 Experience design examples
27:00 Novelty and social bonding
31:15 Investment for time
32:30 Turning experiences into change
34:30 Service vs. Experience design
37:30 Moving to transformations
38:30 The power of intentionality
40:45 Using reflection to add value
43:30 Changing your identity
44:45 Goal: Human flourishing
47:30 What it means to flourish
49:30 Satisfaction vs. improvement
50:45 The drive for better
51:30 Designing for transformation
54:00 Transformative learning
56:30 The Golf Coach story
01:00:15 The new book release
01:01:00 Key takeaway from Joe Pine
01:02:45 Final thoughts
--- [ 2. LINKS ] ---
- LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/joepine/
- Website - https://strategichorizons.com
- Buy the book now
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3 February 2026, 7:00 am - 1 hour 7 minutes2026 Predictions ~ AI Agents, CX Engineers & The End of "Chat" / Jochem van der Veer / Episode #245
Imagine a world where you can simply look at your journey model and ask it why... Why, for example, is our customer churn spiking this quarter? How close are we to that reality?
I invited my good friend Jochem van der Veer, CEO of TheyDo, back onto the show to find out. It’s become a bit of a tradition to start the year with Jochem, looking back at our past predictions and setting the stage for what’s next in the world of Journey Management.
Not so long ago, "Journey Management" was really just an emerging term. Fast forward to today, and I think it's fair to say that the conversation has shifted entirely. We're seeing organizations big and small adopt this practice as a framework that drives real business decisions.
In last year's episode, Jochem predicted that by now we’d be able to ask our journeys "Why?" and get instant (and meaningful) answers. In this conversation, we discuss how the technology has arrived and why "Journey Anarchy" is the new hurdle we have to clear.
Next, we play a round of "Objection Bingo" where we address the most common roadblocks we hear every day that stand in the way of wider adoption of journey management. From "we don't have the data" to the classic "It’s too expensive". And of course, Jochem shares some practical strategies to help you overcome these roadblocks when you encounter them.
Finally, Jochem makes some spicy predictions for 2026. Like the emergence of a completely new role in the CX space. So, if you want to stay one step ahead and hear where our field is heading, this is the conversation for you.
I would love to know: how do you feel about the state of journey management heading into 2026? A) Mostly "meh" B) Excited! C) Something else...
Leave a comment (if you're on Spotify).
Be well,
~ Marc
--- [ 1. GUIDE ] ---
00:00 Welcome to Episode 245
05:30 Revisiting 2025 Predictions
10:00 The One Question Most Marketers Forget to Ask
12:45 Role of Human Judgment vs. AI Clues
14:30 4-Step Journey Framework for 2026
17:00 Why Journey Mapping is "Dead"
21:15 #1 Reason Companies Fail at Implementation
24:45 The "Journey Anarchy" Crisis
28:00 improving decision making
31:00 How Siloed Teams Kill Revenue
38:30:00 Another Objection: "It's Too Expensive"
42:30 Objection Bingo: Flipping the Script on Stakeholder Pushback
46:15 Wildcard: AI Agents vs. Simple Chatbowildcard: AI
48:45 Credit Card/Budget Reality Check
53:00 Predictions for 2026
54:15 Shift from Efficiency Cuts to Innovation Growth
57:00 Why "Operationalizing Empathy" is the New Competitive Edge
58:00 Other Challenges to Watch for in 2026
59:30 Near Real-Time Journey Monitoring
1:03:00 The 10 Million Dollar Problem
1:05:00 Connect with Jochem
--- [ 2. LINKS ] ---
- https://www.linkedin.com/in/jochemvanderveer
- The Experience Edge Podcast - https://open.spotify.com/show/4M2BsaT4jC5Oz54eyek0SZ
- https://www.theydo.com/
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15 January 2026, 7:00 am - 1 hour 7 minutesThe Hidden Cost of the "Perfect" Journey (and how to avoid it) / Kendra Shimmell / Ep. #244
Sorry, but I have to say it...
We are optimizing our way to boredom.
Measure everything, test every variation, and optimize the customer journey until it’s "perfect".
That seems to be the mantra of modern business today.
But in this first episode of 2026, our guest Kendra Shimmell throws a big wrench in this machinery.
Kendra argues that while things like A/B testing validate what works right now, they often come at a steep cost.
Because if we rely solely on reacting to quantitative data to make small, incremental improvements, we eventually, you guessed it, optimize our way to mediocrity and boredom.
We lose the soul in our services.
Kendra shares a painful example of this phenomenon in action: social media algorithms.
You click on a cool backpack once, and the system thinks it has you figured out. Suddenly, your entire feed is just backpacks. A lot of backpacks.
The algorithm is "optimized," sure.
But it has stripped away all the serendipity, turning a place of discovery into a repetitive, boring experience.
As Kendra put it, just because you can keep a user clicking doesn't mean you aren't exhausting them.
So, the question is: Why do organizations default to this?
Why are we so focused on squeezing out efficiency rather than exploring new avenues?
When I asked Kendra, her answer was blunt: "Greed, Fear, and Confusion." Ouch.
The greed to squeeze out the last 1% of revenue.
The fear that if they try something new, they won't find product-market fit again. And the confusion that comes from ignoring the fact that humans are wildly irrational beings driven by feelings, not spreadsheets.
This conversation is a wake-up call to stop treating our customers like subjects in a scientific experiment and start treating them as people to co-create with.
And if your organization isn't ready to hear that? Well, Kendra has some advice on how to be a little "sneaky" to get the work done anyway!
The conversation ends with a question that pairs perfectly with a long walk, somewhere where you can let a little serendipity back into your day: "When, where, and how is it most important to be human?".
Happy New Year and keep making a positive impact!
Be well,
~ Marc
--- [ 1. GUIDE ] ---
00:00 Welcome to Episode 244
04:30 Why We Need Co-Creation Over Experimentation
08:30 The Twitch Lesson
14:30 Why Excessive Optimization Leads to "Beige"
16:03 Social Media & the Algorithm
23:45 Backpack Rabbit Hole
25:30 3 Forces of Stagnation
32:30 Funding Analogous Thinking
35:00 Creating Space for Change
38:30 The Compliance Pilot Strategy
44:15 MVW (Minimum Viable Working Model)
45:45 Permission vs. Action
48:45 Moments of irrationality: taxes vs buying
52:45 Doing Things Better vs. Doing Better Things
56:15 Living Inside the Algorithm
58:15 Why We Must Learn to be Bored Again
1:01:45 The Role of the "Human in the Loop" in the Age of AI
1:04:15 Case Study: Designing for Distance
1:06:15 Question to ponder
--- [ 2. LINKS ] ---
--- [ 3. CIRCLE ] ---
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1 January 2026, 7:00 am - 1 hour 1 minuteDesigning for Truth in an Era of AI Hallucinations / Inside Service Design / Episode #08
We need to talk about the "intern" sitting on your desktop...
Come on, you know the one.
Sure, they are fast, very eager to please, and can process data at lightning speeds.
But they also have a bad habit of hallucinating facts and making things up just to make you happy.
Of course, I’m talking about AI.
It is fair to say that we are past the initial "wow" phase of generative AI.
Now, for us service design professionals, the real question is: How do we actually hire, train, and trust this new digital colleague?
That is the focus of this episode of our Inside Service Design series.
We sit down for a chat with two brilliant professionals: Jessica Dugan and Judith Buhmann.
They share a grounded, hype-free look at how they are integrating AI into their own existing workflows. Not as a replacement for our work, but as a "Junior Associate" who needs some (sometimes a lot) management.
To make this real, Jess walks us through the framework she uses for building her own custom AI agents. She explains how to define their "persona," scope their tasks, and curate their knowledge base so they can actually be useful (and safe).
And Judith shares a critical perspective on why we can’t fully trust AI yet. We explore why we need to treat AI as an "unreliable narrator" especially when working with vulnerable groups.
So if you are feeling a bit somewhat by the pressure to "use AI" but aren't sure how to do it responsibly, this conversation has some key insights you don't want to miss.
Here's a question: If you had to give your current AI tools a "performance" review, what rating would you give them? A) Employee of the month B) Promising intern (needs supervision) C) Chaos agent (fires random info at me).
Let me know, I’m really curious where we are all at!
Be well,
~ Marc
--- [ 1. GUIDE ] ---
00:00 Welcome to the November Round Up
04:00 Jess's journey into service desig
09:45 Judith's challenge
12:30 Designing for the employee experience and internal systems
14:00 The "Pros" of in-house service design
15:30 The necessity of patience and deep knowledge for in-house success
18:30 Judith topic
19:00 Jess topic: Building (and trusting) your own AI agent
23:00 Why we cannot fully trust any AI
27:00 Scoping the AI agent's role and understanding user need
29:00 Designing the "Human" side: Setting personality and tone for your agent
33:45 Accessibility: Is it actually hard to build your own agent?
35:30 Human-in-the-loop: Regulation and ensuring data accuracy
40:00 Why transparency matters more than just "trust"
47:00 Getting organizational buy-in for AI tools
54:45 Markers of success: How service blueprints live on after the workshop
56:30 Closing thoughts and Question to Ponder
--- [ 2. LINKS ] ---
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25 December 2025, 7:00 am - 1 hour 13 minutesFighting the "Enshittification" of Experience / Dan Saffer / Ep. #243
Sure, design might be going through a tough period...
But as the saying goes, "never waste a good crisis."
So this moment of uncertainty, where everyone is wondering if (or rather when) AI will take over their job, might actually be our biggest opportunity to rise up.
It is a unique chance to reclaim our core focus of designing services that genuinely improve people's lives, rather than just extracting value to maximize shareholder returns.
Of course to discuss an existential topic like this we had to find someone who's been around the block for some time. And boy did we find someone!
For this episode we sit down with the legendary Dan Saffer to chat about what we can learn from the last two decades of design evolution.
We try to wrap our heads around what caused the erosion of strategic design from its heyday, which, frankly, wasn't even that long ago.
We look into how we somehow got identified with the outputs, like running workshops or creating interfaces in Figma, rather than the outcomes. And more importantly, what we can do to prevent that from happening again, whether that’s with journey management or crafting smart prompts.
And finally we also tackle the big question of why design isn't having a greater influence on the current wave of AI, and how we can change that.
So bring your cassette player for this one, because we're going back in time for some nostalgia and a healthy dose of hope.
Enjoy the conversation and keep making a positive impact!
~ Marc
--- [ 1. GUIDE ] ---
00:00 Welcome to Episode 243
03:00 Why Design Has Failed the Enterprise
07:15 Defining a 'Well-Designed Service'
11:00 4 Stages of Design Maturity
13:45 The Critical Challenge of Design at Scale
16:30 Debunking the Myth being Design as a 'Luxury'
19:30 Is Service Design an Attitude or a Practice?
20:45 Impact of Cloud & Mobile on Design Challenges
23:15 Designing for the 'Cloud Age'
29:00 Service Design vs. Interaction Design
31:45 Focus on the System, Not Just the Artifact
35:00 The Challenge of Hiring True System-Level Designers
37:30 Moving Design from Extractive to Generative
44:45 Only Way to Win Is to Not Play the Game
48:15 Driving Organizational Change Through Design Culture
52:45 Why Designers Burn Out
56:45 How to Measure the Impact of Generative Design
1:00:00 Why AI is a People Problem
1:03:15 What Makes a Great Design Leader?
1:06:15 The Essential Mindset Shift for Modern Design Leadership
1:09:15 The Great Opportunity of AI in Service Design
1:13:45 Final Takeaway
1:14:15 Question to Ponder
--- [ 2. LINKS ] ---
- LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/dansaffer/
- Blue Sky - https://blueskydirectory.com/profiles/odannyboy.bsky.social
- Medium - https://medium.com/ui-for-ai/welcome-to-ui-for-ai-eb22aef8d26c
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18 December 2025, 7:00 am - 1 hour 1 minuteHow To Stay "Stubbornly Human" in an AI World / Inside Service Design / Ep. #07
Here is a hot take, empathy is becoming "theater"...
I mean, it's that feeling you get when you receive a "hyper-personalized" yet clearly automated email saying "We are so deeply sorry to see you go".
To me, it just feels insincere. Actually, it even feels manipulative.
Instead of a genuine connection, it’s a performance designed to "manage" me, not help me.
As every business out there is in a race to automate and integrate AI, the actual human connection is often the first thing to get outsourced.
And when we try to paste humanity back onto technology, we often end up in a digital uncanny valley.
So, how do we push back?
How do we remain "stubbornly human" when the systems around us only care about efficiency?
That is the battle we explore in the latest episode of our Inside Service Design series.
In this conversation, I sit down with two service design professionals from very different worlds: Jeff, who works in the highly digital fintech space, and Emilie, an Innovation Partner at a faith-based nonprofit.
Despite their different contexts, they share some great insights on keeping the "human" in human-centered design.
Jeff breaks down the concept of Empathy Theater and challenges us to spot when a friendly tone in a digital interface crosses the line into manipulation. And Emilie walks us through a future scenario where VR headsets are the default for education, forcing us to ask: how do we design for belonging when we are physically apart?
So, if you are tired of seeing the human element get optimized out of existence, this conversation will give you some strong arguments you need to stand your ground.
Quick question: Have you received an email recently that felt like "Empathy Theater"? If yes, send me a quick reply with "Guilty" (bonus points if you can share the example)!
I'm trying to get a sense of how widespread this is becoming.
Enjoy the conversation and keep making a positive impact.
Be well,
~ Marc
--- [ 1. GUIDE ] ---
00:00 Welcome to October Round Up
05:00 Emilie's Service Design Journey
07:30 Jeff from Interior Design to FinTech
12:30 Jeff's Biggest In-House Design Challenge
15:00 Challenges in Non-Profit Design
18:00 Emilie's True Measure of Success
20:00 How Jeff Measures Success in Long-Term Projects
25:00 Emilie's topic: Education in 2038
29:00 Jeff's topic: Keep Things 'Stubbornly Human'
33:45 The Circle Reacts to Insincere Digital Tone
36:45 How Emilie's group responded
39:00 Emilie's Hopeful Reflection on the Future of Design
40:00 The Practical Tweak Jeff Made
43:00 Emilie's #1 Hard-Won Career Lesson
45:30 Jeff's Hard-Won Lesson in Service Design
46:30 When Jeff Stopped Focusing on Deliverables
51:00 Why Beautiful Artifacts Don't Impress Executives
53:00 How to Stop the Treadmill
54:30 Emilie's Question to the Audience
55:30 Jeff Answers the Question He Wants to Ask
57:30 Emilie Answers Her Own Deep Question
59:00 Final words of wisdom
--- [ 2. LINKS ] ---
--- [ 3. CIRCLE ] ---
Join our private community for in-house service design professionals.
https://servicedesignshow.com/circle
--- [4. FIND THE SHOW ON] ---
11 December 2025, 7:00 am - 1 hour 9 minutesDesigning for the Long Game: Self-Care as Professional Rigor / Rachael Dietkus / Ep. #242
We often hear the "mantra" to move fast and break things...
But what happens when the thing that breaks is you?
For many service design professionals, this is the reality of their calendar: back-to-back meetings, a rush to deliver, and very little space to actually think.
In many organizations, there is a culture that views this busyness as a badge of honor.
But our guest in this episode, Rachael Dietkus, has quite a different -and healthier- approach.
She has a rule written on a post-it note right next to her desk: "No meetings before 10 AM".
This might sound like a luxury, doesn't it?
But Rachael, who's a licensed clinical social worker and designer, argues that rules like this are actually a professional necessity.
Rachael is the founder of Social Workers Who Design, where she is bridging the gap between the deep, ethical frameworks of social work and the often frantic pace of design.
This is an eye-opening episode where we explore why service design might be missing a "manual" that social workers have had for decades.
You'll hear about:
- Why we need to move beyond just empathy to genuine care and compassion.
- The importance of having a structured "safe space" to process your work (social workers spend at least 1 hour in supervision for every 40 hours of work!).
- Why setting hard boundaries is actually a sign of competence and professionalism, not weakness.
So, if you sometimes feel the weight of the work is getting too much and you're looking for ways to create a healthier, more sustainable work environment, this conversation offers practical clues.
As we are almost wrapping up the year, it's an important reminder that reflection on our work isn't a nice to have, but a healthy habit we should all embrace.
Enjoy the conversation and keep making a positive impact.
Be well,
~ Marc
--- [ 1. GUIDE ] ---
00:00 Welcome to Episode 242
04:00 Making Care an Integral Part of Practice
09:00 Recognizing Care (or the Lack Thereof) in Project Pacing
14:00 Difference Between 'Careless' and 'Care-full' Design
17:30 How Rachel's Path to Care Began
26:30 Human Rights and Social Work Foundation
38:45 What Design Can Learn from Social Work
46:15 Radical Act of Slowing Down
52:30 Practical Steps to Build Spaciousness & Combat Workaholism
57:45 Setting Boundaries
1:01:15 Boundaries as Professional Resistance
1:03:45 Takeaway She Hopes You Get
1:05:15 Piece of Advice
1:05:45 Question to ponder
--- [ 2. LINKS ] ---
- https://www.linkedin.com/in/rachaeldietkuslcsw
- Social Workers Who Design - https://www.socialworkerswho.design/
--- [ 3. CIRCLE ] ---
Join our private community for in-house service design professionals.
https://servicedesignshow.com/circle
--- [4. FIND THE SHOW ON] ---
4 December 2025, 7:00 am - More Episodes? Get the App