Moving towards user-centred services in the public sector

A movement has begun in the Irish public sector to embed Service Design as an innovative approach to conquer political and cultural divides in public organisations. Service Design utilises practical and scalable tools and techniques to address everyday problems by creating services which are more useful, usable, efficient and user-centred. There are many steps on the road to introducing Service Design as a sustainable approach to the point that it becomes instilled into the culture of an organisation across all departments and staff levels. This article examines approaches to enable public sector organisations to embrace and implement Service Design tools and methodologies as demonstrated through two stories; one from a higher education institution and the other a local county council.