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The purpose of this paper is to highlight how systems thinking contributes to decision making in uncertain contexts that are characteristic of service systems. Based on the assumption that service systems face complex conditions, the paper posits that systems thinking may support the understanding of key issues in service management.

This paper proposes an interpretation of complexity in the context of service systems, which highlights the perspective change that occurs when a systems approach is adopted. The offered conceptual perspective is then brought to an operational level, in spite of the complexity of the decisions driving a viable system, by modelling a service system as a network of agents, resources, processes and decisions through the use of fuzzy logic. The paper reviews service management research streams, and takes a deeper look at the concepts of service systems and complex service systems. The paper then proceeds to discuss how systems thinking contributes to service management by proposing a systems interpretation of complexity.

Service management theories and models may be enhanced by integrating prevailing approaches, based on a quantitative and mechanistic view of service systems dynamics, with systems thinking‐based meta‐models that can be used in better understanding service exchanges. The findings of the paper also show how the integration of an engineering approach can be insightful to the understanding of service systems; adopting a Viable Systems Approach (VSA) as a meta‐model can be useful in fully comprehending market behaviour in uncertain conditions.

The originality of this paper lies in exploring the contribution of systems thinking, in particular of the Viable Systems Approach (VSA), to service management and decision making.

Service networks are inherently complex as they comprise of many interrelated actors, often driven by divergent interests. This can result in imbalance, which refers to a situation where the interests of at least one actor in a network are not secured. Drawing on the “balanced centricity” perspective, the purpose of this paper is to explore the causes of imbalance in complex service networks.

Adopting a qualitative case-based approach, this paper examines a public health service network that experienced imbalance that was detrimental to the lives of its users: the Mid-Staffordshire National Health Service (NHS) Trust, UK. Drawing on service-dominant logic and stakeholder theory, case evidence provides insight into the origin and drivers of imbalance in complex public service networks.

The origin of imbalance stems from competing institutional logics of various actors (patients/public, employees, managers, regulatory bodies, etc.), but the degree to which these competing institutional logics lead to imbalance is moderated by accountability, communication, engagement, and responsiveness within the service network.

By uncovering causes of imbalance in complex public service networks, this paper pinpoints important research avenues for developing the balanced centricity perspective.

The inherent existence of multiple parallel institutional arrangements makes networks imbalanced, but value creation can be achieved when the appropriate mechanisms are fostered to manage balance between divergent logics.

By examining imbalance as the underlying cause of network dysfunction, this research contributes to understanding of the dynamics in, and performance of, complex public service networks.

The purpose of this paper is to introduce ecotones to the service literature as a conceptual extension of the service ecosystem (SE) framework.

To synthesise the contribution, an illustrative empirical case study with research of nine organisations and their service systems is developed.

Boundaries connect systems with their environment. Ecotone, a concept from natural ecosystems, provides a useful concept representing the boundary zones between adjacent systems, supporting emergent phenomena. The authors find that a service ecotone emerges through the interactions occurring at the intersections of relational, technological and institutional boundaries of two unique SEs. The case demonstrates ecotone edge effects – the unique landscape and diversity of actors and their roles – which play a role in the co-evolution of the separate SEs.

The ecotone concept provides an understanding of SE boundaries, helping practitioners understand the complex environments they operate. Developing strategy in complex ecosystems requires a clear understanding of where the boundaries of dependence and interdependence lie. The ecotone concept helps practitioners to develop responsiveness and resilience to their environment and take advantage of resources that may be currently unrecognised.

The authors introduce the ecotone concept and integrate it with service theory. This paper develops service ecotones for understanding the relationship between different systems that influence their functioning and development. Thus, ecotones suggest new avenues for understanding the diversity and roles of actors, and how new structural properties, resources and practices come to be through the tensions and interactions created in these complex boundaries of SEs.

Strategic trends towards service operations have been widely reported in the recent literature, but organisational capabilities to support such service-centred strategies are less well understood. The purpose of this paper is to identify key organisational issues in managing complex engineering service operations throughout the lifecycle.

Using instruments developed from the product lifecycle management technologies and the network configuration concept, key organisational issues for engineering service operations were identified through case studies focusing on complex engineering products and services systems across a variety of industrial sectors.

The case studies demonstrated different organisational features and strategic priorities of engineering service operations along the whole lifecycle. A generic trend has been observed for engineering systems to move from being design, development and manufacturing focused to embracing support and end-of-life recycling matters.

This paper provides an overall framework for integrating key organisational issues in engineering service operations. It contributes to the service literature by highlighting the need of developing appropriate organisational capabilities to support service-centred strategies with engineering cases. It also provides guidance for companies to manage their engineering network operations throughout the whole lifecycle of complex products and services systems.

While theories of complex service systems have advanced important insights about integrated care, less attention has been paid to social dynamics in systems with finite resources. This paper aims to uncover a paradoxical social dynamic undermining the objective of integrated care within an HIV care service system.

Grounded in a hermeneutic analysis of depth interviews with 26 people living with HIV/AIDS (PLWHA) and drawing on Bourdieu’s (1984) theory of capital consumption to unpack dynamics of power, struggle and contestation, the authors introduce the concept of the service labyrinth.

To competently navigate the service labyrinth of HIV care, consumers adopt capital consumption practices. Paradoxically, these practices enhance empowerment at the individual level but contribute to the fragmentation of the HIV care labyrinth at the system level, ultimately undermining integrated care.

This study enhances understanding of integrated care in three ways. First, the metaphor of the service labyrinth can be used to better understand complex care-related service systems. Second, as consumers of care enact capital consumption practices, the authors demonstrate how they do not merely experience but actively shape the care system. Third, fragmentation is expectedly part of the human dynamics in complex service systems. Thus, the authors discuss its implications. Further research should investigate whether a similar paradox undermines integrated care in better resourced systems, acute care systems and systems embedded in other cultural contexts.

Contrasted to provider-centric views of service systems, this study explicates a customer-centric view from the perspective of heterosexual PLWHA.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the concept of value co-creation in complex value networks with many actors. Electronic health records (EHRs) are innovations that warrant deep study to properly introduce such a complex system.

The paper describes a qualitative study based on Grounded Theory to understand value co-creation from multiple actors’ perspectives in a National EHR Service Project: the Portuguese Health Data Platform.

Study results enabled further development of the value co-creation concept in complex environments with multiple actors. More specifically they allowed: operationalizing the value co-creation concept by identifying its factors and outcomes, understanding how value co-creation factors and outcomes are interconnected, and understanding of how value co-creation for each actor depends on his/her own actions and the actions of other actors, in a complex set of interactions and interdependencies.

The findings have implications for service managers seeking to understand how actors participating in the network integrate resources and interact to co-create value. The study highlights the need for designing and managing services to co-create value, not only by enabling dyadic interactions between the customer and the service provider, but also by supporting and enabling value co-creation interactions among different actors in the network.

This study responds to the need for empirical research on value co-creation in many-to-many contexts and for operationalizing the value co-creation concept.

This paper aims to develop impact value (IV), both theoretically and practically, to better account for the processes of value creation within complex service ecosystems.

This conceptual paper connects the complex systems nature of service ecosystems and the complexity of issues of sustainability and well-being to the need for a conceptual and analytical extension of value within service ecosystems.

This paper defines IV as enhancement or diminishment of the potential of stakeholders (beyond the service beneficiary), to transfer or transform resources in the future, based on direct and indirect involvement in the processes of value-in-exchange and value-in-use creation.

This paper provides an initial exploration of the theoretical and practical extension of value through the IV concept.

Sustainable service ecosystems require actors to understand their role in the service process and account for the impact pathways of their value creation activities. This paper proposes a framework for developing sustainable strategies to account for IV.

This research expands service research’s core concept of value by integrating the complex systems nature of service ecosystems, sustainability and well-being. IV provides a means to address the systemic impact pathways of service and value creation processes and bridge idiosyncratic value-in-use and broader system viability concepts.

The purpose of this paper is to analyze the history and future of service operations, with the goal to identify key theoretical and technological advances, as well as fundamental themes that can help to imagine the future of service operations in 2050.

A review of the service operations literature was undertaken to inform a discussion regarding the role that technology will play in the future of service operations.

The future of service operations is framed in terms of three key themes – complexity, orchestration, and elasticity. The paper makes three contributions to the service science literature by: reviewing key themes underpinning extant service operations research to frame future trajectories of service operations research; elaborating a vision of service operations in 2050 based on history and technology; and outlining a research agenda for future service operations.

The case of service automation is used to provide an illustration of how the three themes converge to define future service operations, and in particular, to show how technology is recasting the role of the firm.

Service operations in the next 30 years will be very different from what it was in the past 30 years. This paper differs from other review papers by identifying three key themes that will characterize and instill new insights into the future of service operations research.

The purpose of this paper is to better understand and study the architecture and system characteristics of the underlying support platform for crowd system, by recognizing the characteristics of service internet is similar to the coordination characteristics between the massive units in the underlying platform of crowd system and studying the form, nature and guidelines of the service internet.

This paper points out the connection between the underlying support platform of crowd system and service internet, describes the framework and ideas for researching service internet and then proposes key technologies and solutions for service internet architecture and system characteristics.

The research unit in the underlying support platform of crowd system can be regarded as a service unit. Therefore, the platform can also be regarded as service internet to some extent. The ideas and technical approaches for the study of service internet’s form, criteria and characteristics are also provided.

According to this paper, relevant staff can be guided to better build the underlying support platform of crowd system. And it can provide a highly robust and sustainable platform for research studies of crowd science and engineering in the future.

The purpose of this paper is to create awareness on the need for lifting up the level of analysis in service research by focusing on systems, networks, and ecosystems to contribute to the research expansion of the traditionally narrow view of service.

This conceptual paper is built upon three blocks. First, the viable systems approach is revised to highlight the survival, viability, and complexity of service systems. Second, the dynamics of service networks is discussed using an ecological view of service with a nested, networked configuration. Third, these two previous perspectives are integrated using the fundamentals of ecosystems thinking.

This paper outlines a novel, tri-level approach reorienting and reframing our thinking around systems, networks, and ecosystems. Some research challenges and directions that could expand the body of knowledge in service research are also discussed.

The tri-level approach proposed in this conceptual paper could be enriched with other theoretical perspectives and empirical explorations.

Lifting the level of analysis by focussing on service systems, service networks, and service ecosystems would allow practitioners to expand their business perspective to better face the challenges of complex business settings, enabling them to co-create value for all their stakeholders.

The paper contributes to set the foundation for the next stage of service research by going beyond dyadic interactions to address dynamic systems, networks, and ecosystems across different interaction patterns in complex business configurations.