Tiina Tuominen

Emergence of innovations in services

Along with the ‘servicisation’ of society, innovation in services has become a topical issue. However, analytical and detailed discussion about the nature of service innovations and their emergence is only beginning. This article aims to contribute to this discussion through a theoretical analysis supplemented with findings from two empirical case studies. The theories examined are multi-disciplinary including general service theories, general innovation theories and theories linked to new service development and innovation management. The empirical studies have been carried out in Finland in the fields of real estate and construction services and of knowledge-intensive business services.

Employees and users as resource integrators in service innovation: a learning framework

In order to exploit the emerging opportunities in the marketplace or in society, service organizations are increasingly interested in new innovation models and effective innovative practices. The involvement of users and stakeholders is an essential aspect in these models. This is also the basis of the service-dominant (S-D) logic. This framework replaces the traditional producer-centric view with an actor-to-actor perspective and considers the integration of resources an essential activity in the co-creation of value. Even though S-D logic has apparent implications for theorizing about service innovation, managerially-oriented research in this area is at an early stage. Product- and producer-centric practices and in-house R&D are still the focus of innovation studies, and they also dominate innovation efforts in organizations. The particular interest of this chapter concerns the integration of user-based and employee-driven perspectives in innovation. The two perspectives have until now developed separately, the latter having very few linkages to the S-D logic discussion. However, grassroots-level employees are in a key position as receivers of user insights and as collaborators with users. We suggest a new integrated approach by analyzing the user–employee interaction in innovation both theoretically and in two empirical cases.

Co-development and Retooling as New Roles for Applied Research

Knowledge creation dynamics is in transition in modern information-loaded society. We need to see a researcher’s role in a new way: not only as a constructor of scientific facts but as a co-developer of practical tools. We analyse how co-development occurs between researchers and practitioners as a learning process in the context of a multi-actor application-orientated project. The co-development of a practical tool for supporting co-innovation in the public sector was organised as a learning journey. The chapter explicates the researchers’ various methods for enhancing learning between actors and between practice contexts. The co-development unfolds as a temporary, fragile path through different artefacts in a knowledge creation process guided by the researchers. It may also be characterised as an interplay between local practice-specific and generalised knowledge, which enables retooling practitioners for their future.

Involving Customers in the Service Innovation Process

This chapter examines practices of involving customers in the service innovation process. Even though customer-centric views are increasingly gaining ground in the literature, there is not much research into the organisation of innovation processes in which customers actually participate. In this chapter we describe an action-research project where we, together with a case company, developed and tested several methods for customer participation. The company is a medium-sized Finnish insurance company which has developed several incremental service innovations during recent years. As the next step it wanted to adopt a systematic, genuinely customer-oriented innovation model.