Project evaluation is concerned with indicators setting and performance tracking along the life of a project. It plays an essential role to the success of any project and therefore demands special attention. At the heart of this process lies a system of criteria one has to take into account when performing the evaluation. Our thesis considers this problem in a particular context, namely New Service Development (NSD) projects. The topic is of our interest because innovation (hence NSD) has become an inherent aspect of service industry while the research dedicated to NSD project evaluation is rather limited. Our thesis aims at understanding the purposes, the process of evaluating NSD projects and pointing out specific criteria included during the evaluation of NSD projects. As a result, the research question pursuing is: ‘What are key Evaluation Criteria for New Service Development projects?’ From the literature review on project evaluation and new service development, our study reveals a list of eight important criteria of evaluation. This consists of three financial criteria: (1) profitability, (2) production cost, (3) return on investment; and five non-financial criteria: (4) strategic fit, (5) marketing criteria, (6) corporate social responsibilities, (7) information quality, and (8) facilitating factors. From empirical perspective, qualitative approach is applied to collect data through three case studies and a series of semi-structured interviews with seventeen respondents in Albania, Italy, Sweden and Vietnam, from companies offering various types of service. The case studies build comprehensive understanding on the process of new service development, of project evaluation for NSD whereas interviews check the transferability of the three cases and identify evaluation criteria employed in practice. The empirical results were analyzed in comparison with the arguments found from literature. Regarding the research question, the study found that the set of evaluation criteria collected from empirical study fits with the list of eight criteria proposed by literature. Among this set, two main criteria ‘strategic fit’ (4) and ‘customer satisfaction’ which is apart of ‘marketing criteria’ (5) are recommended as ‘must’ for the evaluation process on any type of NSD project. Findings of this research contribute to the existing knowledge provided by both academic and practitioners regarding both project management field and new service development area, by suggesting a set of key criteria that should be used as guidance in order to succeed with evaluation of NSD projects.

For a retailer, who has a close and everyday contact with its customers, understanding the customers can be of benefit if they know how to use the information in the right way. One way of using the customer is to integrate customers when developing new services, to enhance the possibility of the new service gaining market acceptance. Customer insight, Omnichannel retailing and Big Data are areas that recently have caught the interest of retailers. The latter two are of interest as these provide retailers with better possibilities of gaining customer insight, by taking the opportunities to observe the customers’ virtual footsteps to a whole new level. This thesis is a study made with the market research company Nepa as employer of the thesis, in order to develop their B2B offer with end-customer integration. Why and how customers are integrated were further studied through the frame of reference. The factors that were chosen to describe from a theoretical standpoint how customers can be integrated were type of integration, role of the customer, type of customer and timing of the integration. The underlying factors that were chosen to answer why retailers choose different alternatives among the above mentioned factors were market orientation, service/goods dominant logic, environmental uncertainty and market maturity. The study was made with a qualitative, positivistic approach using a collective case study. The case study is a good way to be able to answer both how and why-questions and was therefore chosen as method. By investigating multiple cases and performing a cross case analysis the authors were able to draw more generalizable conclusions. Five retailers took part in the study and for each of these a developed service was chosen as case for investigation. By doing low structured interviews using a method called story-telling, the authors let the respondents from each company speak freely about the chosen case, and that information could then be analyzed. The conclusions of the study concern the different ways retailers choose to integrate customers and the reasons they do it in different ways. A company’s market orientation affects if and what type of customer integration is used in the idea-generating phases. The degree of market orientation also affects the amount of occasions and what type of customer integration is used in the execution-oriented phases. Retailers’ turbulent technology environment has influenced their general perception of risk and the risk of unacceptance with the specific project. This results in that a company can initially integrate customers proactively to let them guide the company or the company can consider customer integration to be secondary. Retailers generally are guided by a goods dominant logic which leads to them not choosing to integrate the customers in active roles in the innovation process. Instead, the retailers combine different integration techniques to gain some of the advantages that active customer could have brought. This is also connected to the retailers wanting to get quickly through the early phases of the process and instead use agile development after the launch of the service. The retailers do not choose different types of customers for integration, but the combination of integration techniques can still provide them with some of the characteristics of the more knowledgeable customer.

There is an increasing pressure on service firms to innovate and compete on new offerings. As our lives become more digitized through the ubiquitous connectivity by the usage of digital devices, companies are now able to collect vast amount of various data in real-time, and thus, know radically more about their customers. Companies could leverage on this growing body of data and developing relevant services based on customer demands accordingly. One industry compelled to benefit by utilizing customer information is the telecom industry due to fierce competition and a need of innovation in a saturated market. Hence, the purpose of this study is to investigate how telecom companies use customer information in their development process of new services by answering the research question: How do telecom companies use customer information within their New Service Development process? To illuminate this, a qualitative research was conducted on three Swedish telecom companies. The findings indicate that telecom companies possess a beneficial position since they are able to collect a vast amount of data about their customers due to the digital nature of their services. However, they struggle to efficiently integrate the data and seamlessly disseminate the obtained knowledge internally. Hence, leveraging customer information in new service development has not reached its full potential and how well it is incorporated is determined by the skills of key employees and their collaboration rather than deployed internal processes.

Submitted by Marlene Santos (marlene.bc.ufg@gmail.com) on 2016-04-04T21:12:54Z No. of bitstreams: 2 Dissertação - Luciana Padovez Cualheta - 2015.pdf: 1603506 bytes, checksum: 640fe4870b9279aeeca49723b2392ea9 (MD5) license_rdf: 19874 bytes, checksum: 38cb62ef53e6f513db2fb7e337df6485 (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Luciana Ferreira (lucgeral@gmail.com) on 2016-04-05T11:13:29Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 2 Dissertação - Luciana Padovez Cualheta - 2015.pdf: 1603506 bytes, checksum: 640fe4870b9279aeeca49723b2392ea9 (MD5) license_rdf: 19874 bytes, checksum: 38cb62ef53e6f513db2fb7e337df6485 (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2016-04-05T11:13:30Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 2 Dissertação - Luciana Padovez Cualheta - 2015.pdf: 1603506 bytes, checksum: 640fe4870b9279aeeca49723b2392ea9 (MD5) license_rdf: 19874 bytes, checksum: 38cb62ef53e6f513db2fb7e337df6485 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2015-10-30 / The air transport sector is highly relevant to the global economy and has grown about six times the global GDP in recent years. Nevertheless, it has not been able to generate the desired profitability, due to high costs and the inability to deliver differentiated services to customers. In this context, innovation in services is a priority. This study aimed to identify what are the main practices in the new service development process (NSDP) for companies in the air transport industry. Several NSDP practices are identified in the literature which make up a conceptual model. By conducting multiple case studies and comparing the results with the literature, ten of those practices are found to be recurrent in the air transport industry. They are: analyzing the external environment, analysis of the financial capacity of the company, the creation of support activities, the new service price definition, employee training, adaptation of the physical structure, the disclosure of the new service, disclosure of the benefits of the new service for the customer, obtaining customer feedback and the comparison of actual costs versus planned costs. Future research should try to understand how and why those activities occur. / O setor de serviços de transporte aéreo é altamente relevante para a economia global e tem crescido cerca de seis vezes mais que o PIB mundial nos últimos anos. Apesar disso, o setor não tem sido capaz de gerar a rentabilidade desejada devido aos altos custos e a incapacidade de entregar um serviço diferenciado ao cliente. Nesse contexto, a inovação em serviços tornase prioritária. O presente estudo teve como objetivo identificar quais são as principais práticas do processo de desenvolvimento de um novo serviço (PDNS) para empresas do setor de transporte aéreo. Para tanto, são identificadas as práticas de PDNS propostas na literatura, que compõem um modelo conceitual. Através da condução de estudos de casos múltiplos e da comparação dos seus resultados com a literatura, identificou-se que dez dessas práticas são recorrentes para as empresas do setor de transporte aéreo, sendo elas a análise do ambiente externo, análise da capacidade financeira da empresa, a criação de atividades de suporte, a definição do preço do novo serviço, o treinamento dos funcionários, a adaptação da estrutura física da empresa, a divulgação do novo serviço, evidenciação dos benefícios do novo serviço para o cliente, a obtenção de feedback dos clientes e a comparação dos custos realizados versus o planejado. Sugere-se que pesquisas futuras busquem compreender como e porque cada uma dessas práticas é realizada, ampliando a compreensão acerca do assunto

Das Service Engineering hat sich innerhalb der letzten Jahre zunehmend als eine wissenschaftliche Fachdisziplin etabliert. Das vorliegende Heft bietet in kompakter Form einen kurzen Abriss über die Entwicklung dieses Bereiches der Wissenschaft und kondensiert die Grundideen und bisher in der Forschung betrachteten Aspekte. Darüber hinaus erfolgt eine Auseinandersetzung mit neuen Anforderungen seitens der veränderten Dienstleistungswirtschaft. Aus diesen ergibt sich, dass bisherige Ansätze des Service Engineerings grundlegend weiterentwickelt und neue Ansätze bereitgestellt werden müssen. Diese bilden die Entwicklungspfade für ein Service Engineering 2.0.

Made available in DSpace on 2015-03-05T18:40:07Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 0 Previous issue date: 29 / Nenhuma / O tópico de desenvolvimento de novos serviços (NSD – New Service Development) tem recebido bastante atenção nos últimos anos por sua importância na geração de diferencial competitivo para as empresas de serviços. No entanto, sua investigação empírica nas organizações tem sido lenta em função da escassez de escalas e itens de medição confiáveis e válidos. Recentemente, um constructo multidimensional denominado de competência em NSD foi proposto para refletir a capacidade da organização de utilizar recursos e rotinas, usualmente em combinação, a fim de atingir um determinado resultado no lançamento de um novo serviço. O constructo foi operacionalizado através de cinco escalas complementares entre si (foco no processo de NSD, acuidade de mercado, estratégia de NSD, cultura de NSD e experiência em TI) e validada em uma amostra de bancos de varejo americanos. A fim de analisar a validade externa da nova escala, esse estudo utilizou uma amostra oriunda de uma empresa brasileira prestadora de serviços de telecomuni / The topic of NSD (New Service Development) has received a lot of attention in the past years, especially given its important competitive necessity in many service industries. However, NSD empirical investigations have been hindered by the lack of sound measurement items and scales. Recently, a second-order multidimensional construct called NSD competence has been proposed to reflect an organization´s expertise in deploying resources and routines, usually in combination, to achieve a desired new service outcome. The construct was operationalized through five complementary multi-item scales (NSD process focus, market acuity, NSD strategy, NSD culture and information technology experience) that were validated in a sample of American retail banks. In order to assess the external validity of the NSD competence construct in a different cultural setting, a sample obtained from key informants of a specific Brazilian telecommunication service provider was used. The results showed a partially satisfactory construct

Ur ett företagsekonomiskt perspektiv finns det ett stort intresse av att utveckla innovativa tjänster då forskning visar att det skapar hållbara konkurrensfördelar. Fastighetsföretag arbetar med tjänsteutveckling för att fylla sina fastigheter och arbetar tätt ihop med sina kunder där efterfrågan styr utvecklingsprocessen. Föreliggande studie testar Wang & Tsais (2012) tjänsteutvecklingsmodell där metoderna tjänstekartläggning, ‘service blueprint’ och ‘axiomatic design’ utgör verktyg för fastighetsföretag. Med dessa metoder ska företaget identifiera kundernas behov och leverera en ny tjänst som uppfyller både interna och externa krav. Genom innovativ tjänsteutvecklingsprocess minskar på så sätt gapet mellan kunders förväntningar om vad företaget kan erbjuda för tjänster och fastighetsbolags uppfattningar om vilket behov kunderna har. Med denna utgångspunkt utformades studiens forskningsfrågor; -     Vilka tjänster kan fastighetsföretagen erbjuda för att matcha den efterfrågan som ställs av nyetablerade entreprenörer? -          Hur kan fastighetsföretag genom ’service blueprinting’, i ett nära samarbete med kunden, skapa innovativa tjänster med en långsiktig plan för lokalkontrakt? -          Hur arbetar fastighetsföretag med ’axiomatic design methodology’, för att konstruera tjänster som efterfrågas av nyetablerade entreprenörer, och på så sätt skapa hållbara konkurrensfördelar? / From a business perspective, there is a considerable interest in developing innovative services, as research shows that it creates sustainable competitive advantage. Real estate companies are working with service development to fill their properties and work closely with their customers where demand determines the development process. The present study tests the Wang & Tsai (2012) service development model where the methods service mapping, service blueprint and axiomatic design provides tools for real estate companies. With these methods, the company shall identify customer needs and deliver a new service that meets both internal and external requirements. Through innovative service development process, the gap between customers’ expectations of what services the company can offer and the real estate companies’ perceptions of what needs the customers have decreases. On this basis, the research questions of the study were designed; -          What services can property companies offer to match the demand made by newly established entrepreneurs? -          How can the real estate company through service blueprinting, in a close cooperation with the customer, create innovative service with a long-term plan for local contracts? -          How do real estate companies work with axiomatic design methodology, to construct the services demanded by newly established entrepreneurs, and thus create sustainable competitive advantage?

The power of digital technology serves developers of new services as an access funnel to the vast amount of customer behavioural information. The utilization of this information is forecasted to differentiate the winners from the losers in the market and benefit the new service development process. This study explores the phenomenon of customer information in new service development empirically by looking at the industry at the forefront, the gaming industry. By conducting three case studies with leading Swedish game developers, it challenges the previous research assumptions that acquired and disseminated customer information is implicitly used. This study has made significant contributions by investigating the broader context of customer information use and differentiating among three types of use. The findings show that behavioural information is used to backup own decisions or to enhance the developers understanding, but is not directly applied to the decision task. Despite the great potential, this advanced type of customer information is only used in the post-launch stages of new service development, for service iterations. To further validate the findings and explore information use in new service development more in-depth, future research generating contextual detailed realtime data is needed.

Co-creation is a new approach to the development of videogames, films, television, music and other creative services. It is a manifestation of open innovation paradigm where the firm collaborates with customers in new service development (NSD) activities. Firm can either co-create with individual customers, or with customer communities. Customers may substantially contribute to ideation, design, production, testing, marketing or distribution of a new or existing service. Customer networks, because of their intrinsic and extrinsic motivations, contribute to the development of services. They have a potential to innovate, as their ideas come from the outside of the organization and reflect their need-related knowledge. Via co-creation a firm can also learn about unarticulated or future customer needs, and what kind of service features they would pay the most for. Co-creation has also benefits for marketing. By inviting customers to participate in their activities, firms can capitalize on positive word of mouth and increased value ascribed to their services. They can also engage in new models of raising finance, i.e. crowdfunding. We studied thirteen videogames firms in North America and in Western Europe. Our goal was to gain insight into their NSD activities when customers were also involved. We observed those studios’ co-creation practices, tracked their communications with customers, and spoke to employees in all levels and functions of those firms. We also participated in various related events. We identified three ideal types of co-creation practice: structured, semi-structured, and loose, and ordered the firms into three cases according to these types. We investigate the main factors that determine co-creation’s practice in firms, as well as firms’ ability co-create. This includes a firm’s propensity for and style of co-creation. We identify four relevant co-creation competences which, together with funding arrangements and organizational culture, influence co-creation. We find that co-creation can occur via formal, as well as informal channels. Informal co-creation takes place on the level of individual interactions between employees and customers (and is linked to hidden innovation), while formal relies on the strategic use of contests, volunteer programs, as well as other legally-regulated exchanges. Firms can use co-creation in NSD to source ideas from the customers, as well as to enhance their marketing by redefining customer relationship. Still, co-creation also has a profound transformative effect on the organization itself. We identify the sites within a firm that are affected by co-creation. Those sites go beyond just the content of the service, and include functions of the firm that normally are hidden from customers (back-end and service design functions). The new service development is also affected. Similarly, the way that firm interacts with its customers is transformed, too.

In this thesis, we present a review of the current practices of user involvement. Different methods and tools have proliferated for user-involvement, however, to comprehend the explicit features of a small and medium-sized web-based platform service companies, we contrast our findings with previous experiences and research of user involvement in big companies. In the basis of the aforementioned, we identify methods and contexts that may be appropriate in the context of small and medium-sized web-based platform service companies. Mainly, we reviewed the research field of: user-involvement and new service development.   The central purpose of this study is to determine how do small and medium-sized web-based platform service companies utilize the process of the user involvement across the stages of new service development. Building on previous researches, we suggested that there are different methods to consider under the service development stage (i.e. ideation, development and testing). These methods are grouped under the following terms user-involvement ecosystem, user-involvement interactions, user-involvement platform and user-involvement personnel. The aforementioned methods are suggested to help web-based platform service companies utilize user involvement across the new service development stages. This study is of qualitative nature with a deductive approach. We conducted eight semi-structured interviews in order to get insights from high-level managers responsible of the user-involvement process. All the small and medium-sized companies operated in the service sector and provided a web-based platform. The theoretical framework was utilized in order to analyze the empirical data gathered. We used thematic analysis for our deductive study approach, to interpret the gathered material in order to conclude the results and answer the research question.   Our results revealed that in the ideation and development stages the following is vital: involving lead-users or those who are tech-savvy and tolerant to ambiguity, educating users to familiarize them with the company’s system, moderate rules and structure, mixing focus groups, encouraging user-to-user communication, small number of participants, multi-media approach and online tools, and encouraging idea hunting culture among company’s staff. However, in testing the following is recommended: involving average-users or those who are open-minded and tolerant to risk and innovation, unifying goals and common view by tangibilizing the service, setting rules and regulations for testing the service, having permanent interactions with users, and large number of participants. Finally, it is important to ensure a close relationship, transparency, motivation, face-to-face interactions, and to have an entrepreneurial leader to oversee the whole process across all the former three stages of NSD. To improve on this study, we would recommend the investigation on the user perspective to gain insights on their views of the process of user-involvement across the NSD, as they are directly involved in the development of a new service. Hence, a more extensive research on the user-involvement in web-based platform service companies on both, internal and external facets instantaneously would be of great significance.