In June 2019, the excellence initiative in which the Service Research Centre (CTF) and Computer Science took part since 2014, came to an end. The initiative has allowed the research groups to grow and develop in order to continue producing world-class research. This is evident in the final reports from the groups.
In June 2019, the excellence initiative in which the Service Research Centre (CTF) and Computer Science took part since 2014, came to an end.
... you have spent two months in New Zealand, what did you do there?
"I spent two wonderful months as a visiting researcher at the University of Auckland Business School working with a large group of people including: Suvi Nenonen, Julia Fehrer, Rod Brodie, Charlotta Windahl and Kaj Storbacka at the University of Auckland, and Jonathan Baker at the Auckland University of Technology.
How is travel with demand responsive transport experienced? What factors play a significant role, and what can be done to create better travel experiences?
We are happy to welcome Anna Nilstomt, new PhD student in Psychology at CTF. She will, among other things, study how digitalized services can help improve peoples health.
What is your research focus?
"I will study how habitual behaviors, behavioral changes, motivation and information in the society and individually can be influenced in positive ways.
By launching a new survey researchers at CTF, Service Research Center at Karlstad University, want to investigate how people's habits, behaviors and experiences are changed and affected by the coronavirus.
This spring yet another PhD student has been affiliated with CTF. We are happy to welcome JanErik Odhe, PhD student in Machine Design at KTH, Stockholm, and university lecturer at Karlstad University.
JanErik Odhe is investigating how to measure servitization in manufacturing companies, which involve development processes and business models. He is involved in two current projects at CTF.
Innovating the meaning of services means dealing with the vague and intangible nature of meanings: companies risk not being able to transfer them from the strategic to the operational level.
….. you are since January 1st the new vice director at CTF. How does it feel, and can you tell us more about the new assignment?
"Thanks, it feels great! There are few working places where so many exciting things are going on at the same time, and it is fun to be in the middle of this."
"My most important function is to brainstorm with our director Per Kristensson.
What’s going on at CTF? How can research conducted at CTF make a difference and contribute to sustainable societal development? Read about this, and much more in our annual report.
The year 2019 was an eventful year marked by new research initiatives, collaboration and dissemination of knowledge.
Digital services can make physical places more attractive and competitive. But, to digitalize just because it is possible might have an opposite effect.
In the latest CTF blog, Charlotte Bäccman looks at the reactions to the Corona virus from a social psychological perspective.
Corona or COVID-19, is the virus that singlehandedly has isolated countries, crashed the world economy, and reduced pollution; and you have been forced to (re-)act in some way to its rampage. Today’s reality is contradictory, on one hand we are urged to extreme precautions before an imminent threat.
Congratulations to Josina Vink, Bo Edvardsson, Katarina Wetter-Edman and Bård Tronvoll for receiving the 2019 Robert Johnston Award: Outstanding Paper of the year for the article "Reshaping mental models - enabling innovation through service design" published in the Journal of Service Management, JOSM.
The 2019 Robert Johnston Award recognizes their contribution to JOSM and to the service field.
We welcome Qusay Hamdan, visiting Phd student from the University of Gent, who will be visiting us until the end of September. His research focuses on the influence of materialistic consumption on the well-being of the working class.
Qusay Hamdan is a PhD student in sustainable marketing at the University of Gent in Belgium, and a research associate at Vlerick Business School in Belgium.
Imagine you are a service provider, let’s say in healthcare. You know that service delivery is complex because many actors (e.g., patients, their friends and family, their general practitioners, their insurance providers, doctors, nurses etc.) need to interact. To get an overview of all the actors involved and their interdependencies, you usually try to visualize this network of actors.
Businesses and public organizations continuously work on developing new services or products in order to be innovative. One important part in this work is to know how ideas for new services and products are evaluated, since the idea screening determine whether an idea is considered good, and whether it will continue its development as an innovation project.
Businesses need service innovations to survive and strengthen their competitive advantage. By explaining how firms and key actors (such as entrepreneurs) manage to remain innovative, our research explains why innovation platforms are central.
Empirical observations show that key actors or entrepreneurs often drive change in service ecosystems and the development of innovation platforms.
In December 2019, CTF in collaboration with Karlstad Business School arranged a multidisciplinary seminar series to advance knowledge within the research area Service system transformation, and as part of a PhD course in Business administration.
The seminar series Service system transformation focused on global societal challenges, and how transformation of societal systems works.
We welcome Martina Caic, new postdoctoral researcher at CTF. During the next two years, she will, among other things, conduct research on how new technologies affects value co-creation within different networks of actors.
Martina Caic holds a PhD from Maastricht University, the Netherlands, where she was a Marie Curie Fellow within the EU-funded project Service Design for Innovation Network, SDIN. The SDIN project was funded by Horizon 2020 during 2015-2018.
