Vodafone Netherlands

Stimulating circular behaviour through service design

Challenge
The high speed at which mobile phones are left for obsolescent makes the electronic waste problem that they bring with them a target of high concern. Vodafone Netherlands' corporate responsibility team asked me to expand their circular economy strategy using user-centered design. The focus was to stimulate customer behaviour to be more circular and closed-loop in consumption, affecting both user's disposal and on-going use of mobile phones. 

My role
✺ Context research
✺ Analytical framework
✺ Formulate personas
✺ Validate personas with data
✺ Stakeholder interviews
✺ Co-creation workshops
✺ Quantitative user testing
✺ Service design blueprinting
✺ Strategic roadmap creation

Results
⇢ Quantitative user validation for concepts (n=±3000)
⇢ Three service design concepts, blueprinted
⇢ Roadmap for implementing 3 service designs
⇢ Concept 1 - Implemented redesign Vodafone NEXT
⇢ Concept 2 - Phone Boost, partially to be implemented Vodafone Netherlands’ WeCARE program in retail stores
⇢ Projected increase from 8% to 10% of retention old phones at time of implementation

Keywords: circular economy, service design, user testing, co-creation

Vodafone NEXT service - encouraging users to swap their smartphones at the end of its life cycle through different forms of compensation

Director of Corporate Social Responsibility at Vodafone Netherlands:
"It was an amazing experience to work with a free mind like Sindhuja. She really gave it all, she lived her assignment. She learned and so did I. Not only was our journey together one to remember, the destination was a perfect match between vision and business. Her deliverables are spot on and ready to implement. As Vodafone Netherlands did with the proposition NEXT. Following her advice, there is more in the upcoming years."

Process
During the course of 9 months, I owned and executed this project's collaborative and iterative process. Main touchpoints in the timeline included:

❂ Analysis ❂
- 10 key insights through qualitative contextual research 
- Formulate analytical framework for circular behaviour 

❂ Contextual synthesis ❂
- Create archetype personas
- Map current user journeys and pain points 
- Identify reformulated design challenges

❂ Design, test, redesign, test ❂
- Internal validation: stakeholder co-creation workshops
- Create first service design concepts
- External validation: quantitative testing, n=±3000 respondents of post-paid Vodafone customers
- Testing hypothesis through data analysis
- Iterate on concepts based on results

❂ Final design ❂
- Final service design blueprints
- Roadmap containing service concepts

Analysis
During analysis, the current problem context was critically analysed to see where growth opportunities lie for some key insights:
❅ Technological innovation in smartphones is stagnating
❅ Users are more open to lower-end devices
❅ Users desire flexibility in a rapidly changing industry
❅ Product-service-systems are key in circular economy propositions 
❅ Circular interventions  focus on facilitating repair & longer use
❅ Trends lean towards on-going service over ownership

All analysis led to a conceptual framework being built around circular intent and behaviour. This showed that circular intent is formed by internal, social and external factors but are halted by inhibiting factors. The external and inhibiting factors showed where growth opportunities lie for Vodafone in their circular services.

Contextual synthesis
The input from analysis was translated into meaningful design directions. By looking at the input from analysis through
the eyes of two polar opposite type of users, six design challenges were formulated. These were then converged into three directions for concepts using validation from an internal stakeholder co- creation session at Vodafone.

Subsequently, a first roadmap towards circular behaviour containing two short-term concepts and one long-term vision was created.

User testing
The two shorter term solutions were tested for user feedback through two surveys that were sent out to Vodafone post-paid consumers, receiving 2.954 responses in total. The results from these surveys were analyzed using SPSS, and the insights gained were used as input to redesign these two concepts into iterated versions.

Final design strategy
❅ Concept 1: Inruildeals 2.0, focuses on redesigning Vodafone’s retention service to help close the consumption loop.
❅ Concept 2: Phone Boost, and functions as a service check-up for users to make use of their devices longer and focuses on encouraging circling longer in the consumption loop. 
❅ Final vision: Always Connected, is a future vision wherein current linear user contracts are restructured into an all- encompassing circular customer journey.

The final outcome of the roadmap gives short- and long-term advice to Vodafone’s Strategy department in what high level actions need to be taken to implement these three concepts to stimulate users to engage in circular behaviour through Vodafone’s design strategy.