Decision-making in integrated product-service development

Paper in proceeding, 2017

This paper is investigating decision-making in integrated product-service development through a focus on the decision-makers’ attention. By conducting a case study of an on-going development project, it is concluded that attention to product-related aspects will suppress service-related aspects to be acknowledged. As structures and channels benefit product-orientation, service-related issues will be undermined when proceeded through the same channels as product-related issues. Consequently, the existence of a service-oriented separate function does not necessarily help focusing the attention towards service-related issues in an integrated product-service development project. However, while there has been an argued tension between service- and product-orientation, this paper also proposes that attention towards both aspects in the decision-making could be enabled through a focus on the overall, integrated offering rather than on individual components which compete in attention. In order to facilitate decision-making that concerns both product- and service-related issues, the organisation needs to acknowledge and integrate service aspects in the early phases of the development project, before a product-orientation has been established.