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GOVERNMENTS, businesses and universities should increase
support and funding for service information to ensure
future economic prosperity and global competitiveness.
This is the challenge seen in a recently released joint
report by the University of Cambridge and computer giant
IBM.
The
report said service innovations continually feed
improvements to the numerous service systems that people
use or encounter daily in technology, people,
organizations and information work.
The
report, based on a recent international symposium
sponsored by IBM and BAE Systems and held at Cambridge
in London, calls for a doubling of the funding for
service education and research to ensure future economic
growth and competitiveness in the age of globalization.
More
than 100 international academics and business leaders
contributed to the report, titled “Succeeding through
Service Innovation.”
Highlights include how vital service systems for
transport, communications and health care now form the
major part of the modern economy but still suffer from a
lack of support when compared with traditional systems
for manufacturing and technology research. This
imbalance needs to be rectified, the report said.
According to the UN’s International Labor Organization (ILO),
service jobs outnumbered agricultural and manufacturing
jobs worldwide for the first time in 2007. In Britain,
75 percent of the labor force works in the services
sector; in the United States, the sector accounts for
more than 80 percent of that country’s gross domestic
product (GDP).
A recent
report from RTI International states that in developed
economies, research and development (R&D) investment in
services typically accounts for less than one-third of
total R&D spending, while the service sector accounts
for over two-thirds of GDP and jobs.
The past
few years have also seen many manufacturers of
engineering products, such as BAE Systems (the
third-largest global defense company) and Rolls Royce,
adopt service-oriented business models.
“Business models are changing and there are enormous
opportunities for companies and economies that are able
to integrate science, technology, production and
service,” said Prof. Mike Gregory, the chief of
Cambridge Engineering Department’s Institute for
Manufacturing. He is also coauthor of the report.
“The
report captures the latest international thinking in the
field and provides a rich resource for policymakers,
industrialists and academics to derive their policies on
service innovation.”
In
today’s economy, consumers expect service interactions
to work seamlessly, but more often than not, these
systems break down, resulting in problems like lost
patient records, canceled flights or mislaid luggage.
Service interactions are thus critical between business
organizations, the report noted.
“The
growth of services economies, coupled with the evolution
of businesses from multinational businesses to globally
integrated enterprises, calls for a new,
multidisciplinary approach in order for individuals,
industries and countries—including the Philippines—to
remain innovative and competitive,” said governmental
programs executive Alejandro Melchor III. “Governments
and businesses must play their part by developing and
implementing service-innovation road maps.”
“Service-orientation is critical for our future business
model which we have been transforming over recent years.
Our work with the University of Cambridge is
contributing to this journey and the report is welcomed
as an important signpost,” said Paul Tasker, BAE Systems
program director for support solutions.
The
report noted that technological and demographic changes,
together with the development of the global economy,
have increased the scale and complexity of service
systems and left gaps in the understanding of how to
manage networks of people, technology, and institutions
on which thriving and successful services rely.
The
report recommends that universities offer courses in the
emerging fields of Service Science, Management, and
Engineering (SSME) to teach graduates to become
“adaptive innovators” who are capable of working
entrepreneurially across traditional boundaries.
It also
recommends that researchers embrace an interdisciplinary
approach to addressing the “grand challenges” facing
both business and society; and that governments fund
SSME education and research and collaborate with
industry and the academe to develop service innovation
roadmaps.
Finally,
it recommends that businesses establish employment
policies and career paths that encourage “adaptive
innovators” and provide funding and support for service
research and education. |
