Building a community through service design and responsiveness to emotions

This chapter focuses on decolonising practices in service design in a quality certification project carried out for a Master of Design programme in Chile. The process resulted in a change of perspective, from that of a strict and formal quality certification process of a postgraduate programme, which is a requirement in the Chilean education system, to one that involved the co-definition and co-creation of a community. Measures of improvement of the programme were explored by integrating sensitive and fundamental emotions identified by the students, graduates and teachers of the programme. The research methods for data collection included workshops, surveys and collecting testimonials. Significant findings illuminated the role of the service designer–facilitator as the promoter of dialogue and creator of an optimal atmosphere for co-creation, and how decolonising approaches in service design through a continuous process of reflection on achievements and emotional and behavioural processes strengthened a sense of belonging and collaboration throughout the process.