The Design classroom at Welingkar Institute was abuzz with activity as it became the high voltage play field of creativity, talent, entrepreneurship and design thinking coupled with out- of- box thinking. Over forty professionals from diverse backgrounds including designers, entrepreneurs, students from NID, MIT and established businessmen had assembled at Welingkar Institute of Management Development and Research, Mumbai, to put their heads together for designing business plans over a fun filled weekend of jamming.

The occasion was the Global Service Design Jam -2012. The jam, an annual global affair, brings together professionals from diverse backgrounds who are passionately interested in designing service  and are game for a design-based approach to create a commercially feasible, sustainable and competitive strategy/proposition and to bring the same into existence. In a spirit of experimentation, co-operation and friendly competition, the teams from the world over have to develop services/service- model inspired by a common theme. The theme for the year 2012 was ‘Hidden Treasure’. And by the time it was announced around 1200 participants from over 100 cities all over the globe were eagerly waiting to hit the button .

Creativity, talent, out of box thinking, a strong dedication to the purpose, people skills, a strong incisive insight into the respective scenarios for which the service is intended are a few of the quintessential elements of the event. The jam which started last year  borrows a leaf from the musical jamming sessions wherein the pros and amateurs are equally welcome to join in to play and synergize without any previous preparation or set structure; they come, play and dovetail their efforts with each other to come out with the most impressive piece; all put together, extempore. In the same spirit, the participants at Welingkar were given a time frame of 48 hours to design their service ideas and publish them to the world in a structured and commercially feasible manner; If these would get the support of like-minded groups these may parlay into a business proposition; if not these can be further worked upon and fine tuned to make commercially viable.

The participants at Welingkar, split into four groups that conceptualized the service they had on minds and designed it around the given theme of Hidden Treasure.  Challenging was the task of zeroing in on one idea/service out of so many pouring in. Then they had to fine tune the same to remove the vagueness and give it a more concrete and commercially feasible shape. The finale was a real treat to be a part of since the initially difficult to comprehend ideas had parlayed into convincing business propositions.

These varied from services that would capture clients’ precious moments and memories, give them the desired shape and deliver these at a time pre-decided juncture in shape of a ‘Mystery Box’ to tourism services that bridged the rural and urban divide, giving a boost to rural pride and commerce too. Also there were ideas to give customized gifts and   plans to help one rediscover the passionately valued yet deep buried in shape of a service concept by the name of ‘Discover U’. There were also plans of customized gifts with a high emotional quotient.

Talking about the rationale behind  the event Prof (Dr) Pradeep Pendse, Dean IT& Business Design , Faculty- MIS, IT project Management, Business Analysis said, “The Jam provided a good platform for creating awareness about design thinking, particularly service design and experience design. Since it was not a contest, it provided fun -filled experience to participants to stretch their imagination. Many of the participants though engaged in design or creative fields agreed that tactical nature of their work prohibits a free flow through design /innovation methodology which the jam allowed. Welingkar students are already doing projects with students from VJTI, such joint projects bring together business management with technological skills and so do the events like the global service jam that provides a platform to multidisciplinary play of talent, creativity and design.”

Welingkar philosophy attaches a lot of salience to design thinking, collaborative and interdisciplinary /multi disciplinary approaches. Such events not only bring to the fore the importance of design and out of box thinking which have become the driving forces in the industry but also unveil some totally unthought-of- approaches which despite sounding unconvincing initially deliver the desired  results.

Dr Uday Salunkhe, Group Director, Welingkar Institute of Management Development and Research during interactions with media said, “Welingkar has always evangelized interdisciplinary and multi disciplinary approach and such events are  practical manifestations of the same;  the group composition can be so diverse; a techie may find himself clubbed together with a designer, and an academic may be partnered with a businessman; n number of combinations are possible and this renders a completely unparalleled advantage to the group since each one brings in to the coterie his perspective and design to solve and deliver the service model that is sustainable and gives the best in terms of customer satisfaction.”Welingkar is already joined hands with TISS, IDC-IIT and VJTI for such cross-disciplinary collaborations and projects.

The final presentations of the  Jam can be seen on the following site: http://planet.globalservicejam.org/