A generic model and design representation technique of service products

Service businesses have developed into an important economic force. Provision of various quality service products to more demanding customers is the key for organizations to retain a competitive advantage. Design is important for making such intangible products “visible” and manageable, and is considered as the key to service quality. A good understanding of the architectural aspects and a design representation technique of service products are needed to facilitate the product design practice and effective production and marketing. What constitutes a unit of service product and how is the product represented (depicted) formally? These questions remain unanswered. The fuzziness in identifying service product construction and the lack of an appropriate design representation method are recognized as the main reasons for the undeveloped design tradition for service products. In this paper, the architectural perspectives from which to view service products are provided by proposing a generic model based on the concept of customer service experience, which delineates the elements involved in specifying a service product design. Based on the model, an approach to the design representation of service products is proposed. The implications for service management are also presented.  2001 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.