Several years ago, colleagues and I at IBM Research suggested that one key challenge in developing a new science of service is in finding appropriate methods for modeling service systems. Service systems ...

As we know, the wealth of Western economies has come primarily from the production and the sales of services, or in other words, goods that are intangible or “invisible.” But the “invisible” nature of these services mean they come with specific risks, and it is important for providers to understand how best to manage them. In this column, we provide some guidance for risk managers confronted with this complex problem.

Service Science (ISBN978-0-470-52588-3, Copyright  2010) by Mark Daskin was recently published by Wiley, A John Wiley & Sons, Inc., Publication. The book is the first of its kind using an operations research approach to systematically discuss how optimization and queuing theory can be applied to solve a variety of problems in service systems, aimed at facilitating decision-making during their operations and management.

Name three service sectors whose costs to customers have exceeded the rate of inflation by more than a factor of three: health care, higher education and some sectors of government. The public is becoming exasperated and involved. Isn’t it time to rethink some of the decades long (and in some cases, centuries long) traditional organizational forms in these heretofore protected sectors? ...

As a continuation of a study directed at identifying the similarities and differences between companies that operate in either the Goods or Services Sector of the economy, the authors employ a technique called “Data Surface Mining” (DSM). This simple technique utilizes data previously published in the business press or elsewhere that were gathered for other reasons are further analyzed for a purpose of interest here. As such, data were generated in a recent study conducted by FORBES for the purpose of identifying the world’s 2000 best companies according to the metrics of Sales, Profits, Assets and Market Value. These data were further analyzed and are presented here to ascertain the relative presence of these companies in the two economic sectors, Goods and Services. The understanding of such issues is of critical importance in light of the fact that the Services Sector represents more than 80% (GDP and/or employment) of the United States economy and is of increasing importance in the global economy in both developed and emerging nations.

This issue of the Journal of Service Science is dedicated to the inferences of system thinking upon recent service research advances, and in particular upon service science and SD logic. The special issue is based upon the scientific proposals deriving from the “2009 Naples Forum on Service”, and specifically to its sessions dedicated to system thinking and its relation to service research (www.naplesforumonservice.it). The forum, held in the island of Capri, Italy, has addressed intriguing issues such as complexity, system thinking, human behavior, vitality, service systems, and in particular was based upon Service Science, Service Dominant logic and network theories. These topics represented the forum pillars since they constitute an attempt in proposing new marketing and management theories in line with the evolution of economic contexts, cultural and behavioral change of customers, globalization of systems and competition, information and communication technology with the Internet and web service, and other changes. ...

Education is a service industry comprising 10 percent of the US GDP, second only to health care at 17 percent. In the U.S. and over much of the world, classroom education remains a labor-intensive craft profession, essentially unchanged since the 19th Century... In summary, there are important stirrings in education, the World’s most important service sector. These go far beyond the ‘time and motion’ improvements of typical IE/OR studies and can extend into the classroom and into the learning process in new and transformational ways. But there remains much to be done. We hope that you find time to join the effort!

Service science is a big umbrella under which many new and traditional results can find their comfortable places... Connected, interdependent value cocreation is networking: the dynamic multiple connections of people, organizations, resources, and institutions as service systems which may scale down to persons, up to the whole economy, and transformational to new production functions and value chains. If we understand this networking, then we may be able to see through the business strategies and system design laws that optimize connected value cocreation.

Emmanuel Fragnière, a Professor at Haute Ecole de Gestion de Genève, shows in this editorial column that the Taylor organizational model, which originated in the industrial world, no longer has a place in today’s service sector. In fact, the modern service sector is actually less standardized, and has begun to incorporate specific expertise and skills more and more heavily. This evolution supposes a different organizational model that relies more on creativity and on “implicit knowledge, ” which is the essence of expertise. This new organizational model, which is starting to be sketched out in certain larger service enterprises, has yet to be fully created.

It becomes essential for us to develop a revolutionary science capable of helping enterprises invest effectively to capitalize on a competitive and adaptable configuration of service systems under uncertain circumstance, aimed at accordingly realizing more predicable outcomes in a smart, efficient, and cost-effective way. Apparently, as the world is getting better instrumented and interconnected, and more intelligent, it is of a great need for service systems to be studied using computational thinking, resulting in the creation and development of service science with the potential of much broader applicability.