Over the years I've learned to accept and embrace the fact that if I want to go beyond the workshops, I need to take into account:

• The lobbying work: how to prepare key decision-makers before we present the work and how to make them allies

• The communication work: how to spread the ideas and get people used to them

• The political work: how to understand who really has the power to block the work, understand their interests and work better with them

I'm not great at it. And it's something I want to learn more about in the future. But here are already a few things I've learned so far:

Provocate decision-makers to understand what they truly want

In certain cultures, decision-makers will tell you that you are free. When that the case it's good to verify what are the limitations of this freedom by saying something like: "So if at the end of the project, the solution is [something provocative for that context], would you agree to it, if that's what the group has found to be the most valuable?"

Share and engage before the meetings

It's important to lobby key decision-makers outside and before the official meetings. If you can't access them, find the people who can access them and ask them to share how things are going.

Ask: who can block this

When I ask "Who is the decision maker?" I often get a very different answer than when I ask, "Who can block this?". The person or entity who can block the work is often the real decision-maker you must onboard.

Share drafts, WIP, backstage elements and parts through different channels

The worst thing that can happen in a Service Design project is that when the implementation should start, people say: "How this is surprising! Give us some time to reflect on this!" Instead, we want people to say: "Finally! We can get started!".

To do this, it's smart to share parts of the work you're doing as you're working on it. Share, for example:

• Early drafts

• Photos and videos of the people working on it

• Parts of the work

This stuff obviously takes a shit load of time, so plan that you need time for that communication part.

What the experts say

Ricardo Martins, a design researcher and professor at Federal University of Parana, Brazil, has written a great little guide called "Political Principles Applied To Service Design: Power And Negotiation Are Crucial To Projects Implementation"

In this guide, Ricardo highlights and develops four things that can help Service Designers become better at the political side of their work:

1. Learning how to manage stakeholders properly

2. Learning how to manage stakeholders properly

3. Seeing politics as something healthy and legitimate

4. Taking the implementation into account since the beginning of the project