Understand
Service blueprint
Map a service from the customer's actions down to the staff, systems and processes behind them that the customer never sees.
- Time60 to 120 minutes
- People4 to 10 people, from front line and back office
- Steps5
What it's for
A journey map shows the customer's side. A blueprint adds what has to happen behind it: what staff do face to face, what they do out of sight, and the systems that support them. Most service failures start below the line the customer can see.
Bring people who do the work. A blueprint drawn only by managers shows the process as designed, not as run.
How to run it
Choose the scenario5 min
One service, one type of customer, one path through it. Rename the steps along the top.
Map customer actions10 min
Fill the customer row first, step by step.
Add what supports each action25 min
Front stage, backstage and support processes under each customer step.
Add the evidence10 min
What the customer sees or touches at each step: emails, screens, receipts.
Find the failure points10 min3 votes each
Mark hand-offs and waits that break, then vote on which to fix.
Tips
- Follow one real case end to end before generalising.
- Hand-offs across the line of visibility are where most things get lost. Look there first.
Where it comes from
Introduced by G. Lynn Shostack in "Designing Services That Deliver", Harvard Business Review, 1984.
Pairs well with
Journey map
Map what a person does, thinks and feels at each stage of getting something done, and find where it goes wrong.
Fishbone diagram
Sort the possible causes of a problem into categories along the bones of a fish, so the team looks wider than the first cause it thinks of.
RACI chart
For each task or decision, agree who is responsible, who is accountable, who is consulted and who is informed.