The full transcript of my conversation with Turki
This transcript was generated using Descript. So it might contain some creative mistakes.
Daniele Catalanotto: Hi Turki! I'm so excited to have you here today.
Turki Fageera: Pleasure to be here, Daniele. I'm so happy to be part of this book review and I've been a fan of your previous two books and happy to bring whatever I can do, to launch this amazing project. Thanks so
Daniele Catalanotto: much. We live in different worlds you being in Saudi, me being in Switzerland, but at the same time, we're in very same worlds, being in the service design world Saudi being very touristic, Switzerland being very touristic too, we have a bit of the same language.
And so I'm excited to see what will be the differences, in our cultures and in our approaches to service design. But also what are the common things that we feel like these are just international common things of humans all around the world. So I'm super
Turki Fageera: excited about that.
The Universality of Service Design
Turki Fageera: You'll be surprised, Daniele, how people are extremely...
Connected, and especially as service designers, most of the services that people are complaining with or actually give them joy are triggered by the same things. So being universal designers at this time and phase is very important and honestly, one of the reasons why I was excited to be here is because I was able to connect and get inspired by some of the stories that you have just mentioned in all of your books.
It's the same pain, it's the same excitement and the same experience that everybody can actually have in any part of the world.
Daniele Catalanotto: Yeah, so maybe let's start with that, in the, everywhere in the world, we do one thing, which is we have birthday parties and we have parties. When you arrive in a birthday party and you don't know everybody, there is a guy coming to you and say, Hey, who are you by the way? How do you present yourself to
Turki Fageera: that person?
Meet Turki
Turki Fageera: Okay, so I have four kids of my own and we have lots of birthdays happening throughout the year, so I think I got these questions a lot.
I always start, by focusing on not what you have done before but more about what you can do in the future. What are your aspirations and dreams? What is your mission? Because it's very difficult to define ourselves as experts in the innovation or service design field because these words are not as popular, I think, in the job industry.
So I always start by saying that I solve problems, simply. I'm in the business of problem solving and creating amazing experiences. Building innovators while I'm gone and I get the follow up question, what do you mean by that? Yeah, exactly. What do you mean by that? Trying to explain what do we do.
Daniele Catalanotto: And I'm very curious because you have one of these. These are just resumes, who, who would make anyone jealous, it's like a, it's like a super long list of positions and and experiences. Could you maybe just highlight a few, which you think, made a big difference in your in how you think today about the work in service design and the work you're doing?
And maybe just give us a bit of a highlight. You told me a word, which is, you have a new word that you're using about what you're doing today. And I'm quite curious if you could share more about that.
Career Journey and Influence of Service Design
Turki Fageera: So I think I've been born and raised in a service design family, some sort of. So my father used to work as a flight attendant in the airline industry.
He used to travel a lot, definitely. And he was always. He was sharing stories whenever he comes back from a trip I met these people, I met somebody new we had this incident in the airplane, and I was really fascinated by the notion that he was able to meet people from all over the world, from different cultures.
That actually was very inspiring for me, so my first job was actually in the aviation and airline business. And I was in developing digital services and the IT teams that were able to design services for booking experience, understanding the whole journey of passengers. iT gave me this, I think access to the notion of front and behind and back this backstage the notion of front and backstage where.
I was able to get into the airport's hidden areas and be able to interact with people and understanding their pains and challenges.
Service Design in Saudi Arabia
Turki Fageera: I started from there and then I, Saudi has suddenly started to change within Vision 2030. Announcements and this is I think it was the right time for me to start working and focus into innovation and service design.
Through that amazing journey, we were able to build innovation labs, innovation capabilities, and help many entities redesign their services and offerings. And we have amazing stories, so I started by providing design as a service, as a design agency.
And now I'm at this stage where I think design is more about creating Quality of life and more about creating economical value. So how can we use design as an engine to start and build new companies? Especially in Saudi, we're focusing on tourism. We're opening up to the world and we need everybody who visits Saudi to have an amazing memory, amazing interactions, and we have an amazing heritage to share.
We're also investing a lot in the cultural fields, in movies, music, art. And again we can use service design and innovation management and design thinking and product design to export our culture to the world. Because from my humble experience, I've seen that there are so many commonalities.
And people still don't know the amazing stuff that is happening here in Saudi. So it's been a bumpy ride and I think now we're ready to show the world our amazing experiences and services. Yeah,
Daniele Catalanotto: I feel, we live this quite similar thing where often for me seeing service design in Switzerland, I'm like.
But we have so much to offer to the world, because we have this culture of hospitality. I've heard also same stories from Saudi, people coming back and telling me, Oh, these guys, they have the same level of care. Even more than us. It's wow, this is so interesting.
And and I think there, there are really interesting things that, that sometimes we have, we can have a, an an obligation to be part of the people showing to the world. Yes, we have a culture, we have an heritage. And we know a lot about that. Not just because we're service designers, but because we're citizens of our country in some way.
Turki Fageera: Exactly. And I think it's very important as well. sInce you got this decision to open up to the world. and invite people to your home country, to your hometown. You need as well to match your level of experience design and service delivery and definitely throughout that journey and throughout those touch points, you have these unique interactions where people can know you more in depth and understand the things behind those drivers, the things behind those interactions.
When we say hello salamu alaykum marhaba, the tone of voice, even if we're speaking in Arabic, you can really sense the hospitality, you can really sense the depth of the welcoming even though it's in a different language. So there is this universal language of design. That I I'm seeing it happening, growing and getting much more mature in everywhere I'm I visit here and it's the right time to, to start rethinking, redesigning and improving.
And I think there's no better time and place than Riyadh and Saudi.
Daniele Catalanotto: So interesting. And you said a word that I'm very curious about, which is maturity. You said it's a mature time now. So how would you rate or evaluate the maturity of service design in Saudi at the moment? Would you say it's a, it's like you're, uh, it's growing, it's at a peak.
It's just before it's starting. Where do you see
Turki Fageera: it? dEfinitely it is growing. It is getting much more mature.
The Role of Government in Service Design
Turki Fageera: The beauty about it is that each government entity today and it's been led by the government. The word beneficiary experience, the word citizen experience, the word digital maturity designing for humans is being circulated every time a government official or a new public service is being deployed.
The same in the government and in the private companies as well who are competing. So we have been noticing and seeing these words circulating around a lot Saudi One of the most sophisticated digital infrastructure, which allowed us to jump years in advance and getting the latest cutting edge technologies and put a layer on that.
And I always refer back to the COVID situation. When it happened government didn't stop and services didn't stop. And everybody was able to get... The best experience as possible hospitality culture, tourism, and even the medical field. We have definitely seen a significant enhancements and improvements that really affected the quality of life.
Again, we are opening up to the world, we want people to come, we want investors, entrepreneurs and premium residents to come and live. I think that was an important part. There is recently a Digital Service Maturity Index that was launched and each government entity has to be measured within that metric through the digital government agency.
And it shows that there is this deliberate actions toward improving service citizen experience. It's super
Daniele Catalanotto: interesting this notion that the government is a big force. In pushing it, and seeing how powerful it is. This is something that I've seen also, for example, in the UK, where, the government is putting a lot of standards that then the private world says, Oh, this is something that we're going to borrow, because it's super interesting.
And and I see here This idea of how can the government, be a force also that, that pushes it.
The Importance of Resilience in Service Design
Daniele Catalanotto: And another thing that I find extremely interesting in what you said is this idea that good services are resilient. When the service is really well made, you put a COVID on it. Sure, it's going to, it's going to go through some stress, obviously, but it's not going to shut down completely, and it's not going to just fall.
And this is a quite interesting idea, saying are our services, resilient enough? Also for crisis
Turki Fageera: types. Exactly. I think, yeah so COVID was a good stress test for governments. Governments has the mandate to orchestrate, to legislate to design in multiple levels from public policies to daily interactions.
Yet I think two key words that happened in Saudi throughout the past few years was digital transformation. Bringing the best infrastructure and tailoring and enabling the entire ecosystem to design amazing services on top of that infrastructure. So we have, I can't recall anything that we do today is not fully automated.
Let's take, for example, the the simple renewal of any government papers. Your ID card, your passports. We have an amazing platform called Abshir and 30 million people use it every day. And you can actually renew and receive any public papers official papers, certifications or whatever.
and get it delivered at your doorsteps in less than 24 hours. All payments are being digitized, and all interactions are being digitized. Yet I think that notion, it's only digital, might lead us to forgetting about the importance of design, deliberately, and making conscious decisions that design and digital...
Goes hand to hand. Yeah, I'm very proud of what we have accomplished in the region so far. So for people... Maybe this is a good good push for you to pay us a visit soon.
Daniele Catalanotto: Absolutely. Absolutely. I'm super interested. And I've already received a few invitations. Obviously with family, it was a bit hard these days, but but the next one I might say, Oh I can pass it for work this time.
Maybe.
Turki Fageera: Definitely.
Daniele Catalanotto: I think it's super interesting because here for me, what I see is that. In some countries we have this conversation, oh, this is not possible, it's not possible to have that level of good digital services in government, because it's government, and then having examples like Saudi, and people being able to go and see and hear the stories and say, oh, it's possible, and then it changes the conversation from it's not possible to.
Why can't we do it now, and then seeing, okay, there are things that we need to change there because it's possible. And I think this kind of unlocks a door. And I'm so grateful, for all the countries who are able to do that, as examples. Estonia is, I think, also a very good example in that, where each time you go there, you're like, Oh, we have so much to learn, we still, we think we're in advance, every country always believes that they are the best in something.
And then when you go outside, you say, Oh, maybe we still have a few things to learn, which is a very good thing.
Turki Fageera: There is always room to improve, definitely. And we always, have that cross pollination. So I think Estonia in particular was a great benchmark. When Saudi started its digital transformation but now if you didn't have the will to push the very complicated system, governments, is not as easy as it sounds, right?
So it's a very interconnected, very complicated ecosystem. Yet what I think the beauty is that Saudi, by the way, is like 75%. Under the age of 30 and 35, so it's a young country and people came who are well educated and we have a a young leadership that supports that, and I, and many meetings that I've been with government officials, there was always this language that what if and we can do it and there's no excuses so that pressure enabled people to move faster than before.
Yes, I know that it's not easy to transform, but 20, 10 years ago, we didn't have such leadership, so I think it's like waves, and now we are living a very amazing way, but we should learn from each other, we should share more stories we should talk and explain and And invite each other to share those stories publicly because once we share it, there is no, the sky is the limit, I think, for those ideas to pick up with someone else, another government, another country, and people can do much better.
And this is how we grow as human beings.
Daniele Catalanotto: Stories are powerful. Stories are definitely powerful.
Discussion on the Upcoming Book
Daniele Catalanotto: And that gives me a very good transition to the next bit that I'd like to speak with you about, which is so you read the book the next book coming on, which is Services and Principles 301 to 400. So it's the fourth book in that series.
And so you've read it. Was there something particular that you said, Oh, this is
Turki Fageera: interesting.
So before I give you my feedback, I think I want to have a deal with you first that we're going to translate these books into Arabic. Let's do that. So let's sign that deal and let's have that agreement.
But this is a proof that I really enjoyed your books and I would love more people from different languages, from a different spectrum of the world to read that.
Everyday Service Design
Turki Fageera: So the beauty about these series is that and being as honest as possible, is that it really speaks none to the technical people, because most of the books in service design is about the tools, the techniques maybe on how to actually deploy it. There is a very important part is building the mindset and finding a sweet spot where anybody can relate to the power of service design.
Services are a huge part of our daily lives. It is universal. It is what makes or breaks our day. So I really love that it is very simple. The language is using you're sharing your personal stories. The illustrations are giving more context but what I really liked about your books is that you end up each chapter or each principle with an action question.
it's a food for thought. It's something that you can ensure that your ideas and books are being transferred to somebody's own mind. So they're not just reading and consuming. You're actually pushing us to have an action, to question things and to relate those principles to our personal careers or our personal lives.
So this is in general, I love the structure I'm gonna steal some of those ideas myself. And I love that it is, it's digestible. You said this is a toilet reading book in the beginning. I think it is our responsibility today as practitioners to make such information and such knowledge relatable, uh, digestible, and easy for people to consume, even if they're not practitioners in service design.
Because everybody has a role in making services and experiences better.
Daniele Catalanotto: It's this thing where as service design becomes more mature, we're going from very academic, to then more tools based, and then suddenly we're doing kind of this transition to. Every day, service design, where we say, Hey, if you're throwing a party, it's service design.
You're thinking about how how do I select the time, so that in my culture, people come at the right time. So for example, for Swiss people, it's saying come at this time, zero, zero. And that people will be there 15 minutes before, and it's okay. But if I'm doing that in Italy, I say, okay, guys, let's come at eight.
And I know everybody will be there on time and it's fully okay. But you have to think about all of these things. You're thinking, what are the types of chips that I put so that people feel comfortable speaking to each other? It's a lot of decision. You're making a service. And here there is this. I think it's not an unmet need, I think there are many people trying to, working on that and we're just adding a little part on it, which is saying, what if we can, and we come back to the what if question, what if anybody just used these principles?
Which are good for parenting, they help you to try things and try things out with your kid and see what sticks. They are good for solving mental health problems that you might have, being able to visualize what you have in your head. And it's not so much about the tools, it's about ways of thinking.
It's possible, there are other ways to do it. And I'm so happy that you saw that in the book. This difference which is not, it's not a, it's not a tools book, it's not an academic book. It's a toilet down to earth book for everyone. And so that's a, that's the gift of the day. Thank you so much
Turki Fageera: for seeing that.
Thank you so much. As you just mentioned, I think we are all service and experience designers whether we realize it or not. As long that we are delivering interactions or designing interactions with each other every day. If we have, that paradigm shift that we have control of the emotions of those interactions, of the quality of those moments then I am a service designer.
A term that I've been using here with everybody who joins our workshops or training programs in South East. Everybody so basically you're saying that everybody has the right to become a universal designer. So imagine if a doctor a pediatrician, somebody who interacts with kids every day, realizes that mindset that I am designing this interaction with those kids or those patients.
If me or you with your kids every day when you go back home, you can control the emotions. Of your kids, even if you had the worst day ever, you can wear that mask and have a big smile and design that interaction. I think this is the deepest level of being a service designer is that we really want to create impactful moments by design to the people we interact with.
And it's agnostic to any I think it's agnostic to any specialty. To any background, to any age any gender it is about... Authentic experiences, simply.
The three levels of Service Design practice
Daniele Catalanotto: What you're saying reminds me of of another book that I read about mental health. It's the Headspace Guide. Maybe you know the Headspace app?
Yes. And there is, so the founder wrote a book about the method and he explains, that basically for meditation. But you could replace the word renovation by service design and it fits perfectly. Basically, there are three levels. It says there is the mindset level, which is you have to understand how it works.
You have to change a bit your way of thinking about things. That's the first level. Then there is the practice level, which is made in a specific context. For meditation, it's you sit, you do 10 minutes, you've done your meditation, you go on with work and life. And then there is the everyday life level, where what you're doing in meditation that suddenly becomes a part of all your life, where for meditation it means when you're eating more mindfully.
When you're with your kids, you're enjoying that moment where you're playing ball and you're not thinking about your calendar, and so for me it's really thinking about these three elements, I think we're really good at principles, that we are really good at that, we're really good at using service design in the work context, but then in the everyday life, it's there it starts to be a bit more challenging.
The importance of mindsets to create a common language
Turki Fageera: I think so. And yeah, we're very good with principles. And yet, in real life scenarios, as service providers in the corporate world, in the business definitely there are those silos and those this is mine and this is yours and roles and responsibilities and blah, blah, blah. Yet, I think once we invest as much as we can into the mindset, um, into, Acknowledging and seeing with a different lens that there is another world and interesting intangible experiences and services.
At least you will do is supporting those designers once they're working. At least you can observe the beauty, what I love about your book is that somehow you reprogrammed your mind into seeing those small interactions that is not related. Whenever you interact with something, and this is a powerful tool, is that you have been noticing now, because you, and relating that to your book and actually this is how we learn.
The mind is an amazing comparison tool. so Once we have that common language, at least at the, as service designers and service providers, we need everybody to know the principles, to know the mindsets, to enable us to have a common language, to have a common ground. Not necessary to practice the tools and this is maybe another level or another step in the way.
But investing in that common languages and the paradigm shift is very important.
Daniele Catalanotto: So what you're saying is, if I'm getting you right, is saying that people don't, not everybody needs to have all the three levels. There are people who just need to understand like the key principles. So that they can have a shared language, which then makes work easier for those who have to do the work.
And then there are the crazy ones who say, Oh, how can I use that in my family and stuff? And but recognizing that. We have still to start with the principles and sharing them to a very wide audience, also inside the organization so that we have that shared language where we say, Hey, it is possible, changing their language from I, I'm stealing the thing that your government says from we cannot to what if, these kinds of little changes that are very strong And that are a bit of the basic of our work.
Important mindset shifts for service design
Daniele Catalanotto: Might I ask, what would be for you, maybe two or three of these big mindset shifts? We have this, we cannot to what if? Do you see other things like that, that you find very important? For example, when you're doing your workshops, when you're doing venture scaling and this kind of stuff. What are the elements that you say, these are important shifts?
That you need to consider.
Turki Fageera: I always use this. I'm trying, part of my life mission is something called creating innovators. I'm on this mission to build 1 million innovators in our region. And innovators are problem solvers, are designers after all. I always start with having that.
We all face the same pain every day. We have the same issues, whether in the street, in the school, at work. So you need to find, in the beginning, a common ground where everybody can relate and say, aha, yes, I have been there. And now I'm telling them, you need to start thinking with your hands and start building things and prototyping.
And they need to go through the process of. Seeing what you are seeing. Otherwise, you're going to be just giving them theories and something that they can't relate to. I always go to this question, what's in it for me? Why should I give you my time, my energy, my focus to believe in service design? To believe in innovation, to believe in all of those terminologies and design thinking.
And especially that we... As service designers, we are always working on mostly intangible experiences that people cannot really materialize, right? So it is about those emotions, those moments, those tips. If people doesn't, don't see what's in it for them and see that they can... Use these tools to make their lives better, to make their community better.
From my humble experience, nobody would give me their time and attention. So they need to see a flavor of it. They need to see uh, to hear stories as we mentioned in the beginning. To correlate and connect the dots. Because it's about giving them a new eyeglasses, a new perspective to see daily issues as opportunities.
To switch from being a victim, from being reactive, from being proactive, even if that was a 1 percent improvement. Maybe it could be an idea, maybe it could be a word, maybe it could be an initiative, or maybe it could be a public policy from a governmental level. It's the notion and the mindset that we need to invest a lot and that's what I'm mainly about today.
The power of teaching Service Design principles early
Turki Fageera: Especially when it comes to the education part and the capability building part. So imagine if kids actually started learning those principles at school, if they actually started redesigning their room class their classroom and their daily schedule and embedding those that you are a superhero, that you are the you're not the victim here.
You have the capability, you have the superpower to make our life better through
Daniele Catalanotto: design. Yeah, and, there was always for me this thing where... Learning philosophy in in school was for me very important because, it taught me how to think, but then learning design, learned me how to create kind of power and freedom for myself, where, it's this very interesting, this element that you're saying, going from, it's like it is I can't change stuff from, let's try, let's, and then comes also one thing, which is very interesting, especially in education, which is you tried, it didn't work, it's even worse than you thought, and then having a sense of responsibility and saying, okay, it's not so easy after all.
So now you can be also a bit more, because when you're doing service design work, I think every time I go in a cafe, now. I'm so grateful for the guy who thought about all the details, because I know all the work that has been done, but where
Turki Fageera: you appreciated more because now you
Daniele Catalanotto: can see it, you can indeed.
And I think this is so interesting, because it's not just giving power to people, but it's also giving back a sense of respect for the work of others, because you realize, oh, in most of what's happening today. There is someone who made decisions who tried to do something nice. And obviously, sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't work, but still, I can recognize that there was effort being made and I can, I still can be grateful for that.
I think
Turki Fageera: such principles as well is, can give people the courage to try, to fail. We live in a very, it's a difficult time today for climate change, war, with discriminations happening, with political issues and so on. Yet, if we... I think as practitioners, as designers, we should be hopeful we, because we have this confidence that, I always said that to my team I don't know what are we going to do next or how are we going to solve this problem, but I have this confidence that we're going to figure it out together.
I have this confidence that we have the mindset, the tools that we can reach out to each other and try and figure it out. And we are always responsible of giving our best. We're not responsible of seeing the results. And that lowers up the the burden as well. We need more problem solvers. We need more people who have the courage to try.
And I really believe that sharing and preaching about those principles. allows people to contribute regardless of the depth of their contribution or the weight of it is some sort of contribution. And this is how we make our societies better. I might sound a bit philosophical, but it is.
The key essence of design leadership and design education is working first in the mindsets.
Profound optimism and Service Design
Turki Fageera: I will
Daniele Catalanotto: do the same joke that my wife did with me, but to you, which is, my wife said it like that. She said, in the world, most people see the glass, uh, half empty. Then she says, she sees the world as being the glass.
And then she says, so I'm going to replace it with your name, Turki, that there is a glass and that you can do a lot with a glass, you can put it like that and oh, now you hear the Austrian, you can put it in front and now you see another world, and if there is water or not, it's not so important, I can do a lot with just a glass.
Different. And so I see you have this deep optimism where it's not just about the water, it's about all of the rest. Where you see, hey, there is a world of possibilities and we can be very excited about it. Exactly.
Turki Fageera: It's about how do we see things. We can either be pessimistic and stop and leave everything go to hell.
Or you can actually say, no we should teach. We should change. We should try our best. And if services touches we interact with services all day long, it's, it's contributes to 70 percent or more in the global GDP. And every startup today, every business, every government is a service provider, whether we like it or not, we all live in a service industry and we all have a part and responsibility to make those services better.
So how can we teach those principles to as many people as possible?
Daniele Catalanotto: And I'm seeing you're on a mission to do that and I'm so excited that that there are people like you doing it.
The bad stuff
Daniele Catalanotto: I'm going to switch gears a little bit. So now we've been, in this very optimistic and and and philosophical bit.
Let me see what's a part of the book where you say, Daniele, I see you've done your best, but let me help you. There are things where I can help you improve it even more. What are things where you see in the book where you say, this, I don't agree with it. And here's another take that will be interesting for the readers.
Change is harder than you think
Turki Fageera: mAybe I would go to some of the mainly I would say change, the change part. I think I'm really interested into that because reality is a bit difficult yes, speaking about innovation, design, creativity, and we need to be. As positive as we can, yet we are constrained with time, budget, organizational cultures, resistance The word that I really hate is quick wins and low hanging fruits while design requires patience Requires collaboration, it's a team effort, it's a team sport and maybe our schooling and education taught us to be as individuals as possible, right?
In the part where you spoke about habits it's very important to not overwhelm people that these are very complicated principles. oR that it is not related to every culture. I really believe that there is the basic human drivers like fear, ego, and personal agendas are always going to be there.
How can we add to the principles some provoking scenarios or some provoking real life cases? WHere people can actually, where people actually face resistance and face the big no word and how they can deal with it, actually, because we face lots of negativities and lots of no's every day.
And I know so many service designers who are fragile or they are creatives, they are they can't actually accept critique, they can't actually accept the word no. So how can we have, in that particular section, Some of those extra stories or extra how might we questions or the call to action questions that they can actually use it and convert it by themselves into tactics that they can use this second day, the next day when they go back to work.
Daniele Catalanotto: From what I'm hearing, you're saying change isn't, a honeymoon. It's the phase after the honeymoon, where when you come back. So the question here which which giving is this idea that change isn't always easy. Sometimes it happens that it is, sometimes it happens that it is not. And how can we create the patience when people are faced with no no, and no, again, do you have examples?
How to stay motivated when change is hard
Daniele Catalanotto: Do you have personal stories where. These helps you when you were faced in these situations where people didn't want to change. People weren't happy to go there. And what did you do? How did you, for yourself, create the patience and the courage to continue?
Turki Fageera: That's a very tough one. Being a design advocate, especially here in Saudi.
When we started, nobody was speaking this language. We had a transformation, we had mandates to deliver. iF you're gonna speak about design as something fancy and something nice to have, nobody will actually. People, from my experience, was, I need to give them a reason to believe. Let's start small, let's prove that this works.
I'm going to connect with your mandates. I'm going to connect with your KPIs. I'm going to help you be and achieve your personal agendas and personal goals. Even though and this is maybe something else is that when it comes to the tools, um, I think, especially here in the region, we have actually curated our own frameworks, our own hacks into the design sprints, for example, into the design thinking methodologies that it doesn't really click.
With the culture here. People here are not very patient. We need to see results. We're very hungry to to feel and touch and and see things. So having small victories and small outcomes and small results was very important. So most of the, I would go and refer back to the principles that Yes, it is about the daily interactions, teach me something while I wait repeat the key information and so on.
It didn't click with me that, how can I interact with my boss who is refusing my creative ideas? How can I interact with a decision maker who is resisting the importance of fixing that poor interaction or procedures in the service? How can we switch more into the reality of day to day work and making those quick reason to believe and make it more practical maybe, or convertible into actions?
Serve first as people want you to serve them
Daniele Catalanotto: I really relate to. This idea of when you're faced with people who are in the know, the best thing to do often is say, okay, it's no. Let's agree on that. So now I have a bit of free time.
How can I help really? Where would it be really helpful? And then this gives you the opportunity to be helpful in something that they feel is helpful, but at the same time, you do it with the mindset shifts that you bring. And you're, and basically it's a troyan horse where people say, we want this. We don't want that one.
And you just punt the one in the horse. And it comes with it.
Turki Fageera: Yeah, let's be realistic, people need results and they have their own agendas. They don't care about the help. It's our it's our responsibility as a designer to maybe put it in a Trojan horse, as you mentioned to give it whatever labels we need to shift it and tweak it.
But we need to answer to some metrics now and be a bit pragmatic and mean balancing between being super, uh, optimistic and super nice and super creative into being realistic and we can deliver tangible results. Outcomes, and we need to make our bosses look good as well. We are, all of us are actually wearing two hats.
We are a consumer, a customer, but we are also service designers. Going back to the, so I'm referring as well as much as I can to the book to give it as was in context, is that sometimes some of the advices is about me as consumer. More than than me as a designer as well. And I see why, I see the differences, I see the balance between that.
It is, it's actually speaking to both. So you're giving the story as a beneficiary or as a customer, but you're telling me to give to give, for example, I think one that stuck with my head was the teach me something While I'm waiting, I think which is, makes sense, yes. How can we reduce waiting time and all of the pain that happens inside it?
You made me feel the pain and you told me how to maybe think and bring something to fill that gap. The final part, which is the call to action, is very important to, to have an action tomorrow. I'm bringing that part from this region where people are really not patient. They need to see something tomorrow.
And they live in that every day, when I convince somebody we need to revamp the whole app, and we need to go and do ethnographic and design research, and field surveys, and mystery shoppers. Most of the people tell me, okay, but they have a mandate tomorrow so we have to somehow hijack the system and do it the wrong way so we can deliver something and earn some trust, uh, so we can have the freedom to do it our way.
It's not a critique, by the way it's really recognizing
Daniele Catalanotto: the different dimensions and
Turki Fageera: depth in the book. And they love that about it,
Daniele Catalanotto: yes.
The missing lens in the book
Daniele Catalanotto: I like how you're seeing that there is something missing in the book. Fortunately, there is always a new book coming, which is very good. And one thing that you wish for is saying, What if there was a bit more of the lens of how, as a service design professional or someone using service design at work, how can I also use it with my boss, how can I use it with interactions that I have?
to, how can I make it easier when people are saying no to what I'm trying to bring? How can I make that?
Help your boss look good
Daniele Catalanotto: You touched on on, on a few principles that I'd like to highlight here, which I find very interesting. One which is which is a bit weird. It sounds a bit weird when I say it like that, but help me look good.
As a boss, I'm the boss, even as a boss, I still have a boss. And I still have a wife at home who asks me, what did you do today? And I have to answer that question every fucking day. And so help me answer that question by giving me, the highlights, not the whole, the thing, but the little thing where you say, Oh, this is super exciting.
This is great. And so that this person who is the boss can take that and give it further. This is a thing that I did back in the days when I was in an agency, each time my boss came he came in and at the moment he came in, I was, I said something like, Oh, this is so cool. This is so cool.
And. And he came in and then came back and said, what is so cool? Oh, sorry. I'm just working on a thing. I don't have time right now, but it's so cool. I have to show it to you after. And then what happens is that it goes back and it comes back and says, can you show it to me now? Yeah, for sure. So this is the thing.
And it's Robert who did it, and then basically you're giving the, you're helping the team sell a bit of their work, but with excitement. And by, with this excitement, you're giving a bit like the gift of excitement and say, this is something really cool that you now can share further. And now you can look good with your client, with your other boss, with your wife, with your
Turki Fageera: friends.
It's a universal principle, people need to fulfill their egos and hierarchies and so on.
The potential for Service Design in the workplace
Turki Fageera: I think there is this study that we spend like 80, 000 hours working from graduation to retirement, or I think our generation is actually doing much more. So work and dealing with colleagues and dealing with bosses and our bosses is a huge part of our lives and we spend like those nine to fives or whatever or even more so I would love to see more of that, to see more of those tactics and questions that provokes and making our work life much better and help us.
Produce and design better.
Daniele Catalanotto: Indeed. And I think the workplace is definitely a part which where we all can be service designers, with designing our own workplace.
Go beyond the emotional titles
Daniele Catalanotto: And and even if we say stuff like. Make me look good, which is a bit of a provocative way. We can then frame it also in the very interesting way, which is to say, when you give stuff to people to look good, basically what you're doing is you're highlighting what are the most important parts.
Because usually the part that makes me look good is usually also the part which is the impact part. Which is not the process part, but which is the part where you say, we did this. And now we had this so much sales or we did this and the customer wrote us a beautiful letter, and obviously there is a process to it.
There is all of that, but it helps us to translate, to think about how can I show the impact instead of. The messy process, which is maybe a bit less
Turki Fageera: interesting. I love the provocative questions and the language that you're using. I use that sometimes as well. It really resonates and you can remember it much, much better than a very straightforward question.
Yet how can people, especially people who skim books... And might read it, maybe sometimes they misinterpret it or use it unethically or whatever. So I think what you just mentioned can actually help that. The why and the rationale of why choosing that provocative question.
Daniele Catalanotto: Yeah, indeed. It's always a danger with this kind of stuff.
If someone takes one of my books and just reads the titles, It's gonna be a fucked up world after. But fortunately, people have patience with me and they usually read a bit more on that.
Recommended resources
Daniele Catalanotto: And I'd love to ask what are... Resources things that you say, this would be very interesting for people who are interested in service design, maybe you read that book you say, these are other takes, things which are very a bit different, but would complement well reading that book, can be a video, can be an article,
Turki Fageera: anything.
Recommended books
Turki Fageera: From books I always start with the basics. whEre I think it's very important to build our creative confidence, so there's this book that's called Creative Confidence Austin Kleon books Steal Like an Artist Show Your Work, and so on. It was very inspiring books for somebody who wants...
tO have more confidence in their creativity. A nice book that I like is Superhuman by Design where it's actually, I use that a lot, that designers are superheroes. Tony Fadel has an amazing TED talk and I remember that scene where he was speaking about the small labels in the apples. and how when he grew up. So I think also designers should be able to think about the small details, but have the ability to elevate as a helicopter a 10, 000 view and going up and down.
So that the talk was very inspiring for me. Definitely the gold books of this is service design thinking and the service design doing is a very good entry. I'll leave a book for anyone who wants to understand more about the tools of service design. And again, you need to practice, you need to try, you need to figure out your own path.
Because there is no right or wrong in design.
The need to adapt tools and frameworks to your culture
Daniele Catalanotto: And I'm very curious because you said that in your culture, you had to change a bit things like the design sprints to be more giving fruits more quickly.
Turki Fageera: Do you have any names of... The five day thing doesn't work here.
Daniele Catalanotto: And so do you have maybe names of people that you say, these are very interesting people who either wrote about it or share how to bring these kind of classical methodologies in a more cultural working way and fast, more for a fast pace.
Turki Fageera: Yeah so this is a contradiction actually. So we need things fast, but we we can't actually do the methodology that enables agility. And I just don't want to generalize it, but for example, we tried the Jknap design sprints, for example, the five day thing.
We stopped with the decision making the hierarchy in some organizations and so on.
So we actually tailored. For example, three levels of design strengths. So we did the small, medium, and large. And enabled having that flexibility based on the based on the challenge, based on the priorities of the CEO, for example, that we're working with. So a one size fits all, which is very nice when it comes to frameworks.
In reality, it doesn't really work, or when you go to the five steps in design thinking I think there is, yeah, if we leave time and creative constraints and budgets, we need to think about frameworks as enablers, and just don't go and follow it as is, and have the courage to tweak it a bit. So for example, we actually took some of the design sprints and design thinking.
Principles. And we created a framework called the Ather Impact which is, can be done in a five day or a day, or can be scaled over a year, for example, if we are building startups in, in different sectors. So I love to think about frameworks as this stretchy, elastic that enables us to squeeze and stretch as much as we can.
But I've seen many practitioners who love to follow as been written in the book or as this is it. I think that's a bit constraining for us and having the courage to speak. Definitely there is something good. Sometimes we emphasize more into maybe validation or the synthesis part or the evidence based.
Why you need to go on lunch tomorrow. So we sometimes sketch those, we launch, and then we learn from those mistakes. But yeah, so simply is having the courage to stretch and manipulate with those frameworks and creating your own.
Daniele Catalanotto: I love that part because I'm also on that side, let's say, of the spectrum of people saying they are recipes, sometimes the recipe is perfect.
Sometimes you say it's my mom coming and she's gluten free. So I need to tweak a few things. Another time, I'm just want to add some spice because it's my dad's coming, and sometimes I say no cookies. Because we're going to do burgers and I completely changed it. I think I love your idea of, squeezing that's a method can be done in one day up to one year, and say it's a starting point, like a recipe, it gives me starting points and it's really useful, but then I need always to think.
Do I keep it like it, or maybe I squeeze it a bit, or I expand it like crazy? I
Turki Fageera: love it. And having that courage and setting expectations, right? That design as a tool is not a magic wand. It won't really solve things like Harry Potter. My kids really love the J. K. Rowling series. Setting expectations is having the courage to reframe, to choose.
People who created frameworks, they did their best, and they did an amazing job to guide, but they had the courage to build that framework in the first place. Designers in real life should have the courage to tweak and add and remove, depending on the context.
Daniele Catalanotto: That's a very powerful call to action I love it.
Come visit Saudi
Daniele Catalanotto: Is there anything else that you'd like to share about on this conversation or elements that you thought about during the conversation that you thought, Oh, I need to speak about that. Did we miss something important that you said that you want?
us to, to just explore a little
Turki Fageera: bit more.
Closing Remarks and Future Plans
Turki Fageera: But my real call to action as somebody who's in this part of the region, who's been witnessing an amazing transformation and have worked and traveled and worked globally in so many cities.
is I really invite you and I invite every designer to come and visit us here in Saudi. We have an amazing culture, we have an amazing level of services and I would love to exchange and see ideas and see how we can really design for humanity and bridge those gaps together. We have amazing places.
I invite you to visit Riyadh, Al Ula, Jeddah. And soon we're going to have Neom as a new innovative city. So I think it's the right place for designers from all over the globe to come and to be part of this amazing change.
Daniele Catalanotto: So we definitely have to organize a tour in your country with you as the guide, definitely. To two or three days and you taking us to places and say, this is what's happening here. Let's go and see. That will be the gift I give for so many people.
Turki Fageera: It will be an absolute pleasure and it will be more than happy to to have you here in Saudi. I've been to Geneva a couple of times, and we stole some ideas especially, in hospitality I know for a fact that there are so many things we can do together. Wonderful.
Get in touch with Turki
Daniele Catalanotto: And so first, a big thank you. It's been a big pleasure. Is there anything that you'd like to shed a light on for people either to follow you or? Do you have something in particular that you'd like to share with people or is there a special way for people to get in touch with you if they're coming to Saudi?
Turki Fageera: Definitely. I'm as reachable as possible. I'm always on Instagram. My account is Turkey Fagira or T Fagira. T F A G E R A I hope that I'm responsive in LinkedIn and Instagram. I have my personal website as well. Anybody who's eager to contribute, to collaborate we recently started the new company called Sigma Innovation Engine.
With a mission to create and design impact driven startups and use design as a scalerator for high growth companies in tourism, in culture, in education. And I'm always open for collaborations, always open for, to exchange ideas.
Closing words
Turki Fageera: And I was extremely honored and happy to finally meet you and be part of this discussion.
So thank you so much, Daniele, you took the first step and, I would love that we build this relationship and continue creating impact.
Daniele Catalanotto: Thanks so much to you, Turkey, and you heard it. Have a chat with Turkey and maybe go visit him because I know he will be in my list of people to visit in Saudi.
Thank you so much for your time and wish you a lovely evening.
Turki Fageera: Stay creative and I hope to see you soon. Bye bye.
Daniele Catalanotto: Bye bye.