Clara Bassano

What Makes a System Smart? Wise?

The human-side of service engineering community has an opportunity to participate in an emerging trend to connect sociotechnical system research and engineering with the DIKIW (data-information-knowledge-intelligence-wisdom) hierarchy. The digital economy is grounded in big data and information systems. The knowledge economy is being redefined in the cognitive era by artificial intelligence, machine learning, and natural language processing capabilities, and as a result our systems are getting more intelligent or smarter. However, beyond smarter, what are wiser systems? Can these terms be made more rigorous and operational? The goal of this paper is to provide a jumping off point for the AHFE HSSE community on this topic, and to explore the concept of smart versus wise from three related socio-technical systems perspectives: polycentric systems, viable systems, and service systems.

The Viable Systems Approach (VSA) for Re-interpreting Network Business Dynamics

The variety of network-district businesses has in strategic terms, resulted in less efficiency within local systems and reflected negatively on the competitiveness of district production. The paper seeks to re-interpret the dynamics of network-districts from the Viable Systems Approach (VSA) perspective. In such a scenario, the limited or non-use of information and communication technology (ICT) tools risks affecting competitive capacity both in an individual and network-district perspective. The paper highlights how the creativity of the Italian network-district system gains momentum i.e. greater competitiveness by using ICT tools in a systems approach to facilitate cultural and management change and to integrate communication within and outside the network-district system.

Managing Change in Fractal Enterprises and IS Architectures from a Viable Systems Perspective

The paper aims to analyze the concept of viability in fractal enterprises and IS architectures from a holistic and viable systems perspective. The methodology is based on the conceptual framework of the Viable Systems Approach (VSA) whereby the monitoring of fractal enterprise viability is put in place thanks to the “abilities” of government to manage the operative structure efficiently and to govern the system strategically. In particular, by means of systems viability monitoring, fractal enterprises are governed in terms of structure (i.e. component and relational consonance) and system (interaction and performance resonance).

Social business as a sustainable business model: making capitalism anti-fragile

In the last two centuries, developed nations have had an unprecedented generation of wealth showing a strong economic progress. Unfortunately, such economic development has not been witnessed in all countries and it does not represent the holistic face of the social progress. The main reason stands in the ideological limitations of capitalism itself, often ignoring local communities and environment while focusing exclusively on profit maximization, market share, dividends and bonuses. This failure it is also because of the division between two basic entities: nonprofit and for profit sectors. The segregation created between the economic values and social values, has created a system where the two different entities have failed to capture and integrate the multi-dimensional nature of the human being to satisfy social needs. Because of this increasing tension, the society needs to find a common ground solution, where the social and economic benefits of these two entities are merged together to generate an anti-fragile system. This research is an attempt to determine if the social business (SB) is capable to solve the problems arose from the free market idealogy, nonprofit philosophy, and the consequent social and economic inefficiency. Thus, the boundaries between the private, public and nonprofit sectors need to be changed. In addition, it is aimed to show that SB can solve social, economic, and environmental problems by using the entrepreneurial engine and the profit instrument, proving at the end to be by default a sustainable business model that respects the triple bottom line approach. The investigation method is based on literature review and theory development from three different fields: economics, development studies, and nonprofit management.

Smart University for Sustainable Governance in Smart Local Service Systems

From the Service Science perspective, our work tends to provide a conceptual and methodological contribution to affirm the role of the university as the responsible agent for the growth and development of a local area. In this sense, the purpose is to promote a harmonious growth of the whole local service system, focused on academic quality and accountability through the approach to Social Responsibility, also involving government, business and society. The University as a place for higher education and research, at the same time, represents a privileged space of convergence of different growth perspectives of the local actors. This convergence should be seen as a “place” to share and develop a common sense of value that is smart, ethically, socially, and economically sustainable, i.e. a Smart Local Service System (S-LSS).

Digital Workers in Service Systems: Challenges and Opportunities

Early forms of AI systems (digital workers), from cognitive assistants to driverless vehicles, are beginning to appear in service systems, creating challenges and opportunities. Meanwhile, people (smarter workers) with an affinity for using advanced technologies are getting things done in new ways. Working scenarios today are guided by high resonant collaboration and wide spread knowledge communication among professionals. To analyze this scenario, we combine both a traditional analytical approach (focus on the parts) and a holistic approach (focus on the whole), privileging a transdisciplinary perspective based on the three frameworks: SSME+DAPP, VSA and IAD. This chapter aims to analyze the challenges and opportunities of digital workers coming to service systems, and provide recommendations for individuals, managers, policymaker, and academics. To mitigate the challenges and seize the opportunities, a wide range of professionals are transforming themselves into T-shaped adaptive innovators in Smart Working environments.

Chapter 12 The Use of Smart Tourism Systems to Improve the Destination’s Appeal: A Case Study from Caserta in Italy

Abstract This chapter aims to qualify Local Area as Smart Tourism Local Service Systems (S-TLSS), whose competitiveness and reputation depend on sharing strategies and processes of cohesion based on equifinality among/for stakeholder. The methodology envisages the integration of Service Science Management Engineering and Design (SSME+D) and the Viable Systems Approach (VSA). Thus it describes a S-TLSS in terms of local service system, whose viability requires a ‘smart governmentality’, able to guarantee the management of equity, sustainability and resilience. Referring to human resources coherent with value co-creation processes, S-TLSS implies T-shaped professionals: new kind of individuals who have proficiency in a specific field/discipline (deep professionality) and, at the same time, show capacity to understand and participate in complex projects/systems (broad professionality). Finally, the authors will show a practical application of the system attempting to enhance an Italian territory that is not very attractive to tourists and local residents.

Re-defining the Role of Artificial Intelligence (AI) in Wiser Service Systems

Advances in Artificial Intelligence (AI) are raising important questions for companies, employees, consumers and policy makers. Researchers predict that intelligent machine will outperform humans in a wide range of tasks in the coming decade. Our purpose is to re-define the role of AI technologies and their relationship with people by re-thinking the concept of Intelligence Augmentation (IA), an interaction between AI technologies and people that, more than amplifying human capacities, produce a cognitive transformation. This transformation modifies the structure of humans thought, changing people’s cognitive processes and providing new tools to optimize interpretative schemas, useful to analyze the real world. In line with the need to define new directions in Service Science, new rules should be formulated to create a synergic and collaborative processes between humans (people) and machines. In order to design a wiser service system, this paper proposes T-shaped professionals as especially well-adapted for augmented and collaborative intelligence.

Learning the Models of Customer Behavior: From Television Advertising to Online Marketing

ABSTRACT Marketing, advertising, and communications processes have changed to strategically capitalize on an increasingly digitally transformed, technologically empowered, globally interconnected consumer, or what service-dominant logic refers to as actors that are resource integrators. Customers are co-creators of value in the collaborative or sharing economy, and seek to actively reap the benefits of new knowledge growing at an exponential rate. However, developing models of customer behavior, especially the influence of a new kind of advertising based on the integrated use of television, web, and social networks, is a challenge. Our study starts from a preliminary empirical observation of the impact of television cooking shows on the variations of potential demand (queries on Google) and the purchase of branded/unbranded culinary products used on the show. Neural networks were used to determine significant correlations, which resulted in an operative Marketing 3.0 model. This model clearly explicates this impact factor on the consumer-purchasing process generated by a new mode of creating information and communications technology–based communication. As a result, by using these types of models businesses can more strategically plan the presence of products of interest on television programs designed according to M@SECI and M@BA (a pervasive smart-space model for online marketing).

T-Shape Professionals Co-working in Smart Contexts: VEGA(ST) – Venice Gateway for Science and Technology

The places where people routinely gather to interact and work can be thought of as territories with boundaries that provide a smart context to achieve personal and professional goals. For example, the Venice Gateway for Science and Technology of VEGA(ST) is such a smart context, in the form of a co-working space. In this paper, smart contexts are explored using the integrated framework of Service Science, Management Engineering, Design Arts Public Policy (SSME+DAPP) and the Viable Systems Approach (VSA) research methods, which encourage the development of T-shaped professionals with depth and breadth. We explore the importance of: (1) adopting a win-win logic between the external environment and the resource holders of the wider enterprise-territory system, (2) the creation of smart contexts, as a symbol of sharing, where interaction and actor involvement facilitate the co-creation of value for the collective welfare, and (3) co-working spaces as a way to encourage T-shape professionals to develop their broad dynamic capabilities and their in depth competencies.