history

This network started with this call-out from Yoko (RMIT) and Dianne (ex-VEIL + Watershed) to their collective networks of like-minded people:

"Service Design is still a nascent field in Australia, yet it is one of the leading service + innovation industries in Europe. Currently, there are many interesting research centres and professionals in Melbourne undertaking service design-led projects, which we don't know much about. We think its time to establish a 'loose' and informal network of kindred spirits to initiate knowledge generation, foster dialogue and collaboration and knowledge transfer to strengthen the role of service design for business, public sectors and communities."

Since its launch in March 2010, SDNMelbourne has been funded by the Design Research Institute, RMIT University, which supported events, website design and general administration during 2010. However, SDNMelbourne is not owned or controlled by anyone. 

This network has hosted a variety of events so far:

First drinks and thinks (30th March 2010)

The SDNMelbourne was launched at this event in March 2010. 25 participants attended, who had a design, education, government or business background, reflecting the diverse mix of skills, knowledge, disciplines, motivations and contexts. The photos show the participants using the butchers' paper to write their thoughts and discussion down. The discussions centred on themes, such as social innovation, information technology, commercial opportunities, human-centred design, academic inquiry and sustainability. 

Second drinks and thinks event (21st July 2010)

The second event was kindly hosted by Huddle, titled 'Are you being served?' From the discussions here, it became clear that SDNMelbourne needed an on-line presence. A vox pop was also recorded by Dianne, Vanjya and Mark. Have a look at the pics too.

An evening with Cameron Tonkinwise: Social Innovation in NYC (21st October 2010)

Cameron, an Australian academic at the Parsons New School of Design, NY, gave a talk on service design in the American context, which is largely driven by industry, consultancies and commercial incentives. He highlighted the critical neglect of public services in America and how service design is one key area that can create social change. He is part of the DESIS USA network and runs a project called 'Amplify', which he also discussed. Read more about it on Dianne's blog post.

Melbourne knowledge week (17th November 2010)

In conjunction with Melbourne Knowledge Week, SDNMelbourne organised a workshop on using service design methods for several contexts. Read more about how this went on Vanja's blog or Tania's blog.

An evening with Daria Loi: Enabling new experiences through user research (6th December 2010)

Daria is a Senior Researcher Scientist at Intel, US (though, she is also a participatory design researcher). She gave us an insight into the role she plays in accessing, interpreting and translating user-insight within a interdisciplinary team. Read more about this on Patti's blog. 

Global Service Jam, Melbourne (11th March 2011)

This event was hosted by Huddle, Swinburne and Michelle from Neoteny in a global service jam. On 11 March, 2011, in a spirit of experimentation, co-operation and friendly competition, teams had 48 hours to develop brand new services inspired by a shared theme.

Victoria India Service Design Jam (20-24 July 2011)

This event coincided with Melbourne's State of Design Festival. True to the formula for Service Jams as established during the recent Global Service Jam, a brief was announced ‘real time’ in India and Melbourne and groups of designers developed and shared ideas using rapid prototyping techniques and design processes to provide vibrant and creative solutions to community problems.

Service Design Q+A panel (28th July 2011)

This was a hugely successful event, gathering close to 50 people to put questions, take part in discussion and listen to the six panelists debate the issues, contexts and 'real-world' challenges to service design. You can see more and listen to the discussion on the vod-cast or pod-cast.

First Book Club on 'This is Service Design Thinking' (2nd August 2011)

Thanks to Tania's initiative, we had our first inaugural Service Design Bookclub where Marc Stickdorn and Jacob Schneider's 2010 book was reviewed. A bit of the discussion of what happened is captured in this discussion.

Visiting international scholar, Anna Meroni (24th October 2011)

It was great privilege to host Anna Meroni from Politecnico de Milano University, Italy, at RMIT University for a talk on Designing for Services: discussing projects and approaches. You can see this on the vod-cast (to come) and photos from the evening here (to come).

Meet Marc Stickdorn - Co-author of 'This is Service Design Thinking' (10th November 2011)

The last event of 2011 ended on a high note with a talk / mini-workshop by Marc, introducing some of the tools that are featured in his co-authored book. See more here for the video and photos from the evening.

Service design research - talk by Fabian Segelström + panel (21st March 2012)

Taking advantage of Fabian's short stay in Melbourne from Linköping University, Sweeden, we invited him to give a brief overview of his PhD research in service design. Joined by panelists, Vanja Misic, Jared Bon and Päivi Oinonen. Read more about this on Janine and Kate's blog, and some photos from the evening. 

Tools and methods workshop - led by Mark Strachan and Harriet Wakelam (18th April 2012)

This was an enormously successful workshop that introduced participants to some service design methods so that they had a hands-on experience of using it. Read more in Emma's account of the evening and see some of the highlights from the evening!

Q&A discussion panel on Design for Social Innovation and Sustainability (26th June 2012)

Following the first successful Q&A panel event in 2011, we gathered a top-notch line up of panelists for a great discussion including Cameron Tonkinwise (Carnegie Mellon University, US); Mel Edwards and Justin Barrie (Design Managers Australia); Kate Archdeacon (VEIL) and David Hood (Doing Something Good).

Skill Building for Design Innovation by Steve Portigal (4th Sept 2012)

Taking advantage of Steve's visit to Australia for the UX12 Conference, he did a fantastic talk on 'muscle building' which drew in max capacity for this lecture hall - and as you can see, it started some really interesting discussions! Read more on Jared's account of the evening.

Hands-on workshop on designing for ageing by Chris Vanstone, TACSI (28th Sept 2012)

This engaging workshop gave an introduction to TACSI's Radical Re-design team's methods and hands-on experience to tackle one of the complex issues on ageing. Janine's impression provides interesting perspectives.

Sarah Drummond from Snook (18th and 20th Feb 2013)
It was with great pleasure to host Sarah, co-founder of Snook, a Social Innovation and Service Design outfit in Scotland, sponsored by DESIS-Lab Melbourne and DRI. She gave a great talk on 'Designing for Social Innovation' and photos from the workshop captures some idea of the methods she introduced to explore the problematic issue of the Myki system. Natasha's account is a good summary of Sarah's workshop experience.