Business Beyond Design Read online

  More usual customers and posts on Instagram and Facebook

  3. How do we maintain the integrity of our message?

  Replying to messages on Social M

  Review the videos with other managers for future improvement

  Have a YouTube channel

  4. Who can we trust to maintain the integrity of our message?

  Our staff

  II. COMPETENT: Do we have the necessary ability, knowledge, or skills to do what we promise?

  5. Can we clearly restate our core promise

  * A unique coffee experience in Sham Shui Po

  6. What skills, abilities and knowledge do we own to deliver on our promise?

  By consistently improving on our skills and hospitality

  Connect with customers, more than just a transaction

  Offering more experience of coffee

  7. Can we provide tangible evidence of our operations?

  YouTube channels, coffee & workshops

  8. Which skills, abilities or knowledge can we constantly improve?

  * Customer service, cafè creations, unique menu offerings, event hosting, event planning & marketing

  III. HONEST: Are we acting truthfully and with sincerity; do we do what we promise we’ll do?

  9. What are the core promises we won’t break?

  Always treating customers first

  More variety of coffee will be served

  More workshops to connect with customers

  10. Which mistakes might we make? How are we going to fix them?

  Not answering questions clearly

  Not planning enough for marketing

  Not aligning the purpose of the event with staff

  11. What are we willing to give up to maintain our promise? (time, profit, quality, image,…)

  * Personal time, Limited offering to increase quality

  * Investment in staff training

  * Accept and implement feedback

  12. What is our most feared criticism? (List min. 3)

  Slanders / Haters

  People who would challenge just for the sake of it

  Copyright issues potentially

  IV. RELIABLE: Are we consistently delivering both quality and performance while being open, connected and vulnerable?

  13. What are the minimum standards we will deliver, within which range?

  Open seven days a week

  Always serve coffee we are proud of

  Never serve expired or spoiled products

  * Always have an open communication channel

  14. What does it take to maintain and elevate our standards?

  Having enough traffic to stay sustainable

  Sharing more knowledge and workshops

  Staying active and relevant

  15. What are the tangible measures of our standards?

  How much interaction we are having with the customers

  * Positive / negative comments on Social Media

  * Staff turnover and engagement rate

  16. Which industry players are setting the standards? How?

  Starbucks

  Environment & Standards

  Sant’Eustachio

  Chocolate and espressos secret recipe

  Common Room

  Art Events & Coffee

  V. FAMILIAR: Have we provided appropriate and crafted occasions to be often encountered or experienced?

  17. With whom shall we connect to spread our message?

  Target audience, baristas around the world

  18. In this moment how would our target know about our business?

  * Strolling in Sham Shui Po, Word of Mouth, Open Rice,

  * Instagram, Facebook, Local food blogs

  By attending more community and coffee events (weekly)

  19. If we could buy exclusive keywords what would they be? (3-5 words)

  * Coffee, Sham Shui Po, Live music,

  * Jazz, Live events, Community

  * San Francisco, breakfast

  20. To what extent can we open our doors to the public without compromising our intellectual property?

  Sharing recipes, coffee blend and food with one secret ingredient, getting to know the staff and people, SM profiles

  NOTES ON TRUST

  The goal of this section is to demonstrate to our target that we are worthy of their trust and affection. According to our scorecard, this is the highest scoring principle.

  AUTHENTIC:

  In this section, we can’t understand what authentic offering and experience our coffee shop is providing. If for example in section 1 our statement is: a true bay area café in Hong Kong, we could state that we provide a unique “Carnitas burrito”, “SF ice coffee”, Imported goods from SF or whatever is hype in SF now. If it is an authentic crossover cafe, we could promote “bacon and egg sandwich”, or any old time HK favourite, “soy milk flat white” perhaps? The goal is presenting something that is specific and relatable.

  COMPETENT:

  Michael is confident that he and his team have the necessary ability, knowledge, and skills to deliver a superior coffee experience and connect people through coffee. Even here we must be more specific on how we can communicate that to our customers. Some ideas could be “all our baristas have a certificate” or “each of them goes through 3-month apprenticeship” or “before becoming a Miwok (Sausalito indigenous people) they have to demonstrate…”

  HONEST:

  This section, like the previous one, needs to be more specific on what the brand needs to achieve. “Serve the customers within 5 minutes” or “have three signature events a month” or “Have a new blend weekly.” Also be a bit more open to criticism and question more the present qualities and performances.

  RELIABLE:

  Even this section needs to be a bit more specific. What Michael listed is true for more or less every good coffee shop on the planet. We should aim for statements such as “listed best HK brew for two years in a row” or “increase SM presence with ## Weekly posts” or “reply to comments and criticism within 48h” or “implement a customer recipe every month”.

  FAMILIAR:

  What exactly we have to do to be experienced. Bring our product on the streets? Post with regularity on Social Media? How often? Be more part of local events? Which ones can we identify?

  CONSISTENCY WORK SHEET

  Finally, we have reached the concluding stage of our development process. Now it is time to connect the dots and pull together the threads that will consolidate our Business Design.

  I. STATUS: Have we crafted the overall experience surrounding our product or service? Does it grant status?

  1. What are the intrinsic values of our product/service?

  Quality hospitality & service

  Each product is served with high satisfaction

  Never ending experiment of coffee with customers

  2. What are the symbolic values of our product/service?

  Latte art

  Public demonstration of pour over

  Shop front Live Jazz

  3. Which standards and behaviours do we promote and encourage?

  Volunteer for the homeless

  Avoid food wastage

  DIY handmade and trying to make something

  4. Which standards and behaviours do we ban and discourage?

  Criticism

  Can’t do attitudes

  Dishonest and ignorance

  II. IMAGE VS IDENTITY: Can we clearly distinguish our image from our identity?

  5. What are the traits that define our identity?

  Customer service

  Good coffee

  Live music

  6. What are the traits that define our Image?

  Coffee

  S logo

  I don’t know yet

  7. What products/services can be confused or associated with ours?

  Nearby coffee shops with a bigger space

  Coffee shops offering more events and better service

  Other coffee
shops with a sophisticated name

  8. Which customs, arts, institutions do we embrace and support?

  Art Schools and Institutions in the area

  DIY Crafts

  Impact HK and other local non-profit organisations

  III. HUMAN CENTRED: Are our solutions truly human centred?

  9. What basic human needs does our business cater to?

  Interaction, Food,

  Relaxation, live music,

  Shelter, refreshment

  10. Where and how is our product or service consumed?

  Instore

  Open rice

  11. How can our qualities be seen, touched, smelled, tasted and heard?

  Instore

  Online

  WOM

  12. What does our target know about us already?

  Western Coffee shop in Sham Shui Po

  IV. COLLABORATIVE: Is our development approach collaborative by being essential, concrete and credible?

  13. What are we going to learn in this process? From who/how?

  The right people to hire

  * Assessment of all HR and External Consultants

  The target audience we want to focus on

  * Current customers CRM system in place

  The core values and weaknesses of our company

  * Experimenting with different strategies and approach

  14. What unexpected skills are we going to learn/develop? From who?

  How to better stand out to customers

  Developing people and soft skills in staffs

  How to attract a potentially larger customer base

  Communication experts

  How to build a following

  Improve storytelling skills through enlightened customer exp.

  15. What are the essential resources we have to rely on to succeed in our business?

  Motivated staff

  Delicious quality coffee

  More community oriented events

  16. What particular method/process will become an integral part of our final outcome? How?

  Authenticity and trying to improve our latte art skills,

  * Create more workshops

  Enlighten hospitality and inspiration connection

  Improved etiquette and constant interactions

  By creating role models

  * Knowledgeable, competent staff by sending staff to competitions

  V. EXPERIMENTAL: Are our processes genuinely experimental by embracing failure and identifying the next step?

  17. Can we clearly identify 3 Key Performance Indicators (KPIs)

  Weekly foot traffic/coffee transactions

  Month-to-month growth in social media followers

  Number of people we could connect with

  18. What are the three areas where we absolutely won’t allow any failure?

  Lack of interaction with customers

  Customer service

  Serving bad coffee or food

  19. Which mistakes might we make? How are we going to fix them?

  Feeling like another similar style coffee shop they have been to

  Neglecting the current trends in the market. Network with other shops and paying attention to coffee shops/ culture abroad

  Not training staff properly. Implement more guidelines and making sure staff believe in our values

  Sticking to our core values and competencies

  20. Do we have a clear, simple and agreed-upon score to follow?

  Double foot traffic every month for the next 5 years

  All 4 venues combined

  Be recognised as a “hidden gem in Sham Shui Po”

  A tracking system in place? What does that look like?

  The quantity of our events

  If our foot traffic would increase over time as events increase

  Staff engagement and satisfaction from improved skills through stronger revenue

  NOTES ON CONSISTENCY

  These simple work sheets do not pretend to be an ultimate guide to all things innovation, but rather a thinking trigger to put you on the right path of generating ideas and analysing problems from a different perspective. The goal of this section is to connect the dots and pull together the threads that will consolidate our Business Design.

  STATUS:

  In redesigning Sausalito’s business, we must tap into the culture that surrounds the brand crafting the entire experience. We have to envision John (young musician) hopping into the café and start jamming with Yan playing the saxophone and enjoying coffee. How Margaret gently sips on her pour over trying to identify all of the aromas. How Tracy and Rachel are chatting at the table sharing a carrot cheese cake with a cappuccino. The goal is to craft the overall experience surrounding our product or service, considering variability, appropriateness, discipline and granting status.

  IMAGE VS IDENTITY:

  I believe one of the main reasons Michael chose to embark on a Business Design project is because he can’t clearly distinguish his image from his identity. Looking back at page 101 we can recall that “The essential duality in every brand, business or design exists between its IMAGE, a representation of its external form, and its IDENTITY, the sum of characteristics determining who or what that brand or design is”. If we read between the lines of what Michael wants Sausalito to stand for, we can discern a pattern. He sincerely cares about people, service, creativity and a hint of bohemian spirit. Here his deep fascination with Jazz. Now the present image doesn’t reflect at all the interesting desired identity. We can see in section 14. 15. how limited his answers are.

  HUMAN CENTRED:

  Although he puts a lot of effort in dedicating his attention to staff and clients, he never truly describes the real life experience that a customer can expect by having a coffee or dining at Sausalito. Even less so on how and why a true coffee, music, DIY lover can know about and reach Sausalito.

  What matters is what he/she will say about us.“Oh, man, I went to this place, and they had the most amazing cheese sandwich ever!!!”, or “Went to this place, so chill and fantastic music… ”. We are the orchestrator of such conversations.

  COLLABORATIVE:

  Being truly collaborative means being open by being essential, concrete and credible. This doesn’t translate necessarily in giving too many options, or trying to overcomplicate the offering, or simply asking customers what they want. Choice is learned not inherited.

  The value of choice depends on our ability to perceive differences between the options. Too many choices to compare and contrast will overwhelm us. It is our duty as service providers to create a choice architecture. For instance, we could offer the 3-4 best selling coffees and then just add a “make your own option”. Instead of overflowing a menu with dozens of options, it should show our best offerings and eventually, add to the menu the requested customizations. For example, if soy latte is one of the off the menu best sellers, we could add that in the new season, making it a core item. This will show true collaboration between Customer and Service.

  EXPERIMENTAL:

  There is one fascinating aspect of this case study. How our client never truly questions his business capabilities. To embrace our business design mentality and attitude we have to embrace failure. A good designer always questions himself. I understand that this is an uncomfortable process, but we MUST question everything every time. Is our coffee really that good? Is our food good enough? Is our staff truly as friendly as we want them to be? Are they truly willing to go the extra mile? In all this assessment we never address this uncomfortable topic.

  One of the things that I aways tell my students and clients is that as Business Designers, we should not pretend to have all the answers, but we like to think that we know how to ask the RIGHT questions.

  THREE BUSINESS DESIGN STRATEGIES

  This interesting case study demonstrated the foundations of my Business Design process. As we can see from our discussion, building a successful and innovative design driven business is much more that just se
lling (in this case) roasted beans.

  We analysed and evaluated which principles our business needs to focus on to thrive in an extremely competitive market. We saw how critical it is to evaluate each principle in depth and how a simple, straightforward question can be answered in very different ways.

  In this specific case of Cafè Sausalito, looking at how the difference between Image and Identity can steer the decision-making process on focussing on activities that might be very appropriate, such as a more contemporary logotype, but not necessarily essential at the present stage.

  With the wealth of information gained from the work sheets, we were able to conceive three distinct strategies.

  Strategy I - Organisation

  Strategy II - Sophistication

  Strategy III - Abstraction

  These Business Design strategies should firstly lead us to bring more balance in the model by increasing the single values of Character, Desire and Empathy. Secondly, aim at a constant improvement by raising the overall value of each principle to an ideal score of 4 points.

  STRATEGY I - ORGANISATION

  The first strategy focuses on consolidation of the present position.

  GOAL: Build a community of true coffee lovers that choose Sausalito as their gathering spot. Focus on recurring customer base that should account for 25-30% of revenue. Ideally, daily communication through SM with this key target, not less than weekly.

  ENVIRONMENT: The original competitive advantage of being the first-mover in the western F&B segment is being jeopardised by new F&B establishments competing on the same sector. Newcomers have the advantage of being very specific in their offering and also enjoy the novelty factor, more modern decor and environment attracting many curious customers. To contrast this trend we shall rejuvenate the offering and image but still maintain the authenticity of the brand leveraging trust. This should lead to a tailored service for loyal customers providing solutions such as loyalty programs, personalised offerings, special payments that would make it hard for them to switch.

  RESOURCES: We should rationalise our resources focussing on the few activities that really bear the most impact. Finance: invest on quality rather than quantity, focus the financial resources on only the most relevant items, reduce waste better to sell-out than throw-out. This should also reinforce the concept of homemade. Capitalise on HR: Be selective on staff — they truly are the ambassadors of the brand. Have dedicated staff for communication.