The Master's in Service Systems Design balances theoretical knowledge and practical experience. Over the course of the programme, you will translate your knowledge of Service Design theories and methods into practical solutions. The programme focuses on problem-based project work (PBL), and through collaboration in groups, you will gain a solid understanding, actionable knowledge and practical experience in the use of design methods and knowledge of service systems. The Master's is designed to give you the tools to analyse multifaceted challenges and design services that provide optimal service experiences.

The Master's in Service Systems Design gives you a strong foundation for working across disciplines and combining technical competences with creative skills. You will be able to plan and design services that can help cities overcome future challenges, such as major social and cultural changes. You can manage and design digitally connected and complex services that incorporate circular economy, sustainable lifestyles and data management.

With a Master's in Service Systems Design, you can make a difference working for companies, public sector authorities and NGOs, in positions such as service designer, design researcher, UX designer, system designer or consultant. From health and education to transportation and urban design, service designers play a crucial role in creating meaningful and effective experiences for users. Service design consultants find work in the travel, healthcare, banking, finance and retail sectors, as well as in information services in the widest sense. Your cross-disciplinary competencies, which include design, management, foresight and IT skills, will also allow you to fill strategic roles in service organisations.

All bachelors enrolled in the programme who have not obtained their bachelor's degree from Aalborg University must take part in a course on problem based learning as part of the 1st semester project. In case non-AAU bachelors get credit transfer for the 1st semester, they will be asked to take part in a course ensuring that they are trained in working according to the problem based learning model. 

Read more about problem based learning.

In your 1st semester project, you and your fellow students will conduct an analysis of a product or service, focusing on the interaction aspects between users and the service, human and technology as well as machine to machine. The project work will introduce you to time and interaction related issues in service cases, and you will learn how to apply appropriate methods and tools to organise sequences of events and interactions in service solutions that take into consideration people’s cultural and behavioural backgrounds.

User experience design for service interaction

This course trains you to research, analyse, prototype and conceptualise design considering all system aspects including the social and cultural contexts of use. You will gain comprehensive knowledge about user involvement in the design process, going beyond traditional methods such as usability lab testing. The course introduces you to the application of multi-modal methods and interaction design within contemporary fields such as surface computing, pervasive computing, social and mobile computing, and/or mundane computing.

Designing product service systems

You will be introduced to service design and gain knowledge and methodological tools to analyse existing services and to develop new services. The course will provide you with an overview of analytical methods to understand and integrate users’ needs, design methods to control and organise time and interaction-based elements of a services and representation techniques that can be used to communicate with the various actors involved in a service system.

Visualizing and Prototyping for Service Design

This module introduces you to visualization and prototyping, which are two important skills that enable you to better understand, describe, and communicate service systems. Through workshops, you will get to try out various techniques, where we explore their benefits in different phases of the design process and in different contexts, including both analog/live and digital/online.

On the 2nd semester, we take your learning a step further by adding hands-on experience on the design of a complex service on basis of a modular platform in which actors and competences are clearly identified, organisational and interaction aspects are planned and user participation is planned and supported. Through this project module, you will learn about the nature and structure of a distributed system, and you will become familiar with techniques that support the participation of actors with different backgrounds, skills and culture while integrating technical and human components on a service platform.

Perspectives in Service Design

You will be introduced to the many exciting perspectives on service design, encompassing both current aspects and future trends. The module takes you on a journey where we will explore the various applications of service design. We will also examine how these different perspectives can influence the way we design services and how distributed systems play a role in this process.

User participation and social innovation

This course provides you with advanced knowledge and methods to interact with users and involve them in a process of co-design and participation. You will learn to use methods and techniques from different disciplinary contexts and adapt them in order to stimulate and support users’ participation and the interpretation of their needs, behaviour and attitudes in relation to their social and cultural context.

Design futures

We venture into the intersection of design and futures studies to engage with foresight and futures thinking. The module provides you with an overview of both theoretical perspectives, practical methods, and exemplary cases within future design. The course will also allow you to tinker with methods connected to
speculative design, design fiction, and experiential futures.

As indicated by the semester title, you may choose to carry out a project in collaboration with a company as part of your ECTS credits on the 3rd semester. You can go abroad or stay in Denmark – it is entirely up to you, and we will assist you in finding a company or an institution with whom to collaborate. You can also choose to carry out a project where you do a theoretical elaboration of a topic or a case.

If you choose company-project collaboration or the theoretical project, you must also attend the course "Stragegies and Business in Services".

Strategies and business in services

This course will give you advanced knowledge on theories and methodological tools to analyse and suggest appropriate and innovative business models for service companies. Focus is on theories of entrepreneurship with emphasis on innovative business models for product-service systems. In the course, theories and methodological tools will be applied to specific cases.

You also have the opportunity to choose a course from another programme which may add to the profile you wish to obtain. At en.cpu.aau.dk, you can take a browse through the programmes offered. If you choose this option of having an elective course from another programme, it must be approved by the Study Board of Media Technology.

There are no courses offered on the 4th semester; this is entirely devoted to working on your master’s thesis. The work is carried out alone or in small groups.

Once you have finished your master’s thesis, you are Master of Science (MSc) in Service Systems Design.

See curriculum for Service Systems Design.

AAU Career helps you on your way from student life to job life in Denmark by giving you the tools to examine your options and find out what to do.

While studying at AAU, you can participate in career and job-related events, find help on our website, and book a personal career counselling session to talk about e.g.:

• Finding your way in your career
• Danish working culture
• Application and CV the Danish way
• What you can offer an employer
• How to go about job search in Denmark – both student job, internship and full-time job

Read more about AAU Career here

Are you a student at AAU? In AAU Study and Wellbeing Guidance, we can help you with, among other things, choices during your study programme, study doubts, study techniques, motivation, wellbeing, leave and study resignation or perhaps just a conversation about your thoughts regarding your study programme and wellbeing. We are happy to talk to you about anything big or small.

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