Problem solving within professional services: evidence from the medical field

Service operations: what have we learned?

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to identify research themes in service operations that have great potential for exciting and innovative conceptual and empirical work. To frame these research themes, the paper provides a systematic literature review of operations articles published in the Journal of Service Management (JOSM). The thorough review of published work in JOSM and proposed research themes are presented in hopes that they will inspire impactful research on service operations. These themes are further developed in a companion paper, “Service operations: what’s next?” (Field et al., 2018).

Design/methodology/approach

The JOSM Service Operations Expert Research Panel conducted a Delphi study to generate research themes where leading-edge research on service operations is being done or has yet to be done. Nearly 700 articles published in JOSM from its inception through 2016 were reviewed and classified by discipline focus. The subset of service operations articles was then further categorized according to the eight identified research themes plus an additional category that primarily represented traditional manufacturing approaches applied in service settings.

Findings

From the Delphi study, the following key themes emerged: service supply networks, evaluating and measuring service operations performance, understanding customer and employee behavior in service operations, managing servitization, managing knowledge-based service contexts, managing participation roles and responsibilities in service operations, addressing society’s challenges through service operations, and the operational implications of the sharing economy. Based on the literature review, approximately 20 percent of the published work in JOSM is operations focused, with earlier articles predominantly applying traditional manufacturing approaches in service settings. However, the percentage of these traditional types of articles has been steadily decreasing, suggesting a trend toward dedicated research frameworks and themes that are unique to the design and management of services operations.

Originality/value

The paper presents key research themes for advancing conceptual and empirical research on service operations. Additionally, a review of the past and current landscape of operations articles published in JOSM offers an understanding of the scholarly conversation so far and sets a foundation from which to build future research.

Examining the effects of patient characteristics and prior value needs on the patient-doctor encounter process in healthcare service delivery

Purpose

Considering the increasing conceptualization of value creation, this paper aims to empirically examine the influence of pre-encounter value needs of patients on the clinical encounter process and how this impacts on their perceived experiential value, and contributes to the patient’s role in value creation in healthcare service delivery.

Design/methodology/approach

A model is proposed to suggest the antecedent and consequences of key elements of the patient–doctor encounter process. Following survey design approach, data collected from 332 outpatients from two clinics in Accra, Ghana, are examined through structural equation modeling using AMOS 23.0.

Findings

The findings reveal that patient pre-encounter value needs significantly influence key elements of the patient–doctor encounter process (care delivery approach, level of trust and shared-decision making approach). This in turn affects patient’s perceived experiential value and satisfaction evaluation. The results also suggest that patient characteristics (e.g. educational background and frequency of visit) had no significant effect on the encounter process leading to perceived experiential value; however, patient’s age had significant influence on the encounter process.

Research limitations/implications

This study empirically establishes a need to understand patient’s pre-encounter value needs, which fundamentally influence the patient-doctor encounter process and their perceived experiential value. However, the research only focused on the patient, which could limit the findings considering the multi-actors involved in the service delivery.

Practical implications

Creating value with patients suggests a need for providers to understand patient value needs or goals and adopt an approach to engage in a holistic manner that would result in positive experiences. This would empower and increase confidence of patients in consultations.

Originality/value

Using a quantitative research approach, this research engages in a highly focused investigation of the influence of patient’s pre-encounter value needs on key elements of the patient–doctor encounter process, which has received limited attention in the extant literature. The study also furthers our understanding of the effects of fundamental patient characteristics on encounter process and how this influence actor perceived experiential value.

THE ROLE OF KNOWLEDGE-INTEGRATION PRACTICES IN SERVICE INNOVATION PROJECTS

Services comprise an increasingly bigger proportion of contemporary economies, making service innovation more relevant than ever. However, the practices and processes related to the utilisation of knowledge for service development are not very well understood in this context. To narrow this gap, this study focuses on how Knowledge-Intensive Business Service (KIBS) firms utilise knowledge-integration practices in different phases of the service-innovation projects they carry out for their customers. A multiple-case study with in-depth qualitative data is conducted, focusing on four case firms in the Finnish KIBS sector. Case-by-case and cross-case analyses are reflected against four categories of knowledge-integration practices: Rules and directives, sequencing, decision-making, and group problem-solving and routines. The results show the detailed evidence on how these practices are utilised in different types of service-innovation projects. Furthermore, two generic types of service-innovation projects are identified with different implications for knowledge-integration and problem-solving.