Service Design in Healthcare Inside Multiple Business Contexts with Jessica Dugan — DT101 E22

Welcome to the Design Thinking podcast! I’m Dawan Stanford, your host. I’m excited to welcome Jessica Dugan to today’s episode. Jessica is a Design Principal on the Healthcare Design team at 3M Design. She has worked in the healthcare industry for over five years. In our chat today, you’ll learn about her journey as a designer into her current role, her experience as a service designer in healthcare, and the lessons she’s learned that might serve others.

As Jess will explain today, she also comes from a non-traditional background. Her undergraduate degree is in writing and journalism, but she soon realized that wasn’t her path. She began getting into design, and realized that the part of writing that resonated with her was the ability to connect with people. She went back to graduate school for design, and joined a service design consulting firm.

Because Jess has worked in various significantly different environments, it’s fascinating to hear her perspective on how they differ, as well as what the transitions were like. She’ll also explore her experience in the healthcare industry in general, and share some of the key lessons she took away from her experience at United Health.

In addition to exploring these topics, Jess will also dive into the potential value in service design, using service design from a Scrum perspective, and what she has had to deal with in healthcare that might be invisible to people in other design fields. She’ll recommend several powerful resources that have been invaluable for her, and share some insight into topics that she recommends for future episodes.

Learn More About Today’s Guest

Jessica Dugan on LinkedIn
@jess_dugan on Twitter
@3MDesign on Twitter
3M Design

In This Episode

[00:32] — Dawan introduces today’s guest, Jessica Dugan.
[01:55] — Jess starts things off by describing her journey as a designer. Like many of the guests on this show, her journey has been full of fascinating twists and turns. She also talks about her role at 3M Design now.
[10:38] — We hear more about Jess’ transitions between the various environments that she has worked in.
[16:18] — As a designer, what are some of the key lessons that Jess took away from her experience at United Health?
[18:42] — Jess shares a piece of advice that she would give to someone having their first experience doing service design inside a large healthcare organization.
[21:30] — Jess talks more about the role of language and its nuances across different roles, and as an indicator of experience.
[22:35] — We hear more about Jess’ transition into 3M.
[25:44] — How has Jess noticed her approach as a designer shift with the shift in the group of people she’s designing for?
[28:24] — Jess explains how she explains what’s possible and the potential value in service design.
[30:59] — Dawan expands on what Jess has been saying about connecting the aspirational to the operational.
[34:23] — We hear more about the early days of taking service design into a Scrum process as is used at 3M.
[37:54] — From a healthcare perspective, what kinds of things has Jess dealt with that might be invisible to designers working in other fields?
[41:42] — Jess talks about how she has seen prototyping play out differently.
[43:23] — What are some of the books and resources that have helped Jess along the way?
[48:10] — Jess talks about whether there are any open questions she’s wrestling with, or other topics that she would like to see on the show.
[52:12] — Where can listeners learn more about Jess and her work?

Links and Resources

Jessica Dugan on LinkedIn
@jess_dugan on Twitter
@3MDesign on Twitter
3M Design
Communicating the New by Kim Erwin
101 Design Methods by Vijay Kumar
Moments of Impact by Chris Ertel and Lisa Kay Solomon
Service Design Tools
Practical Service Design