What is Service Blueprint?
Put simply, Service Blueprint is a tool or a map that helps a customer see or experience the business process. When service blueprint is charted out, it helps the employees know and work on redundancies, avoid working in silos while increasing effectiveness to deliver the service.
Why create a Service Blueprint at all?
It helps the teams get,
.
.
.
on the same page.
It helps in getting team alignment and understanding.
Imagine this, you’ve a start up with let’s say 4 employees. You know who’s responsible for what, who’s doing what within your startup and if and when you expand with more work force, you will use the same blueprint you have in your existing organisation and expand your startup.
Now think about an organisation with 2000 employees. How easy or difficult do you think when you have numerous Business Units, departments etc. for you to even think about who does what? Who’s responsible for what?
Don’t we have the organisation structure for that?
Yes, now that is actually for your internal stakeholders. This is mostly owned by the Human resources or People and Talent department within your organisation.
So what’s the difference?
The difference in service blueprint and org structure is the target persona for which this is made.
The Service blueprint is usually made perceiving the customer touch points and their journey within the company.
Case study: Drilling down the Service Blueprint of Bhubaneswar Passport Seva Kendra:
About my service blueprint here:
Last year, At Bhubaneswar, my home state’s capital city, my husband and I recently applied for Passport. My husband was due for renewal and I never really made it (didn’t feel the need of it.) But because of my employer I had to make it as a passport number was mandatory for me to join.
We received the passport within 10 days of application, and this wasnt even tatkal (fast forward) application.
Through this service blueprint I want to show what could have gone inside and what would have taken it for the Passport office to run the admin work smoothly.
It’s been a year to this, and what I’ve listed over here is my own observation.
Service Blueprint division:
Customer Actions:
Starting from the customer actions here, I’m listing down the actions that I took in order to receive my passport. It started from filling up the passport application form on the internet to receiving the Passport through the courier.
Touchpoints:
I’m zooming in on the touchpoints that I came across to apply for the passport.
These include:
the online portal
SMS received on phone
Outside of the passport office
Inside of the passport office
Reception
Verification counters
Photograph counter
Police officer
Courier
Frontstage staffs:
We encountered:
Security personnel
Verification officers
Receptionists
Police officer (not in purview of passport office per se)
Courier delivery executive
Just before putting the front stage staff inline, I’m talking about the support process here that outlines the processes the staffs has to do when a new applicant comes to picture.
Getting them all together in the mix unveils the process and steps related to passport application process.
Download the hi-def version from here:
Opportunities to improve:
There improvements are based on what my observations are, I wish someone from the Passport asked me :D
1. Educate the people what’s required beforehand. My husband and I xeroxed everything under the sun to take it to the Passport office. We just didnt know which document would be helpful, which one would not be. We literally had booklet of print outs and originals, under the sun, which brings to my second point.
2. People who came on the day to collect the passport had to stand in queue for more than 1.5 hours.
Think about how differently abled citizens or senior citizens had to go through when they have to collect their passport?
3. You get to meet the hawkers/ agents outside of the passport office, which is not so pleasant. I’ve not included this in my service design because they are NOT the stakeholder that are going to get involved in this.
Opportunities to improve considering the Service blueprint:
If I have to measure the success of this workflow, then I’d use the metric CES (Customer Effort Score) to see how much of an effort does the application puts in place to get their passport.
Survey questions to ask:
On a scale of 1-10, how easy or difficult was it to get your documents verified at the office?
On a scale of 1-10, how easy or difficult was it to get your police verification done?
On a scale of 1-10, how would rate the overall experience to get your passport done?
I’d ask on a cohort/persona level: Cohort one: containing people of age 12 - 18, Cohort 2: 18 - 35, Cohort 3: Age 35 - 60 and so on, so that the process remains relevant to all the age group, and add or reduce some of the redundancies in the process.
For example, for me, the process was smooth. What about a senior citizen who do not want to go through the online application process? Could a toll-free line be applicable to him? We never know until we speak to them.
If I were a CX consultant for Passport Seva Kendra, I’d have made these RECOMMENDATIONS:
I’d ask the office to reduce the verification of document process from 3 to 1. I couldn't understand why were they asking the same question again and again.
I’d ask the office to let the applicant know which document would be required for renewal or new passport issue when they are applying for the Passport in the portal itself. One of the touch point was SMS as well, they can use that service to let the applicant know as well.
Create survey on each touchpoint to know if they are being served well or not, to go tot he granularity of the service and get the exact data where experience needs to be improved.
While the passport application and time to deliver the document has significantly improved over the last few years, it would help to know which of the components can still be improved.
By charting the service blueprint of this process, we got to know what are some of the gaps in the experience that could be improved on while getting all the team members on the same page.
What else would you recommend here?
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