Oslo School of Architecture and Design

The Oslo School of Architecture and Design (AHO) is a specialized university and a leading international architecture and design school that provides education within architecture, landscape architecture, urbanism and design. AHOs fields of knowledge focus on design in all scales, objects, buildings, urban areas and landscaping. AHO is organized into four institutes, and has approx. 700 students and 145 employees.

The Institute of Design adopts a broad, holistic approach to design that emphasizes the relevance and importance of design within our contemporary society. It teaches and researches within the fields of industrial design, interaction design, service design, and systems oriented design, as well as themes that go across these disciplines, such as healthcare or maritime industry. Our perspective is that good design creates aesthetic and functional products, services, and experiences that delight and improve the lives of their users.

About the position

• Service design and interaction design are rapidly growing domains in design and are increasingly present in commercial and public sectors in Norway. A design research PhD position is now available to further develop the service design/interaction design research field within the area of healthcare. The position is centered in practice oriented design inquiry using designing as a means to research.

• The position is a part of Centre for Connected Care (C3) which is an 8 year initiative funded by the Norwegian Research Council, commercial organizations and by research partners. C3 aims to accelerate adoption and diffusion of patient-centric innovations that change patient pathways and delivery systems, empower patients and increase growth in the health care industry.

Reserarch framework

We invite applications, together with formal research doctoral project descriptions, for study within the following area:

• Service design, co-creation, patient experience and interactions with touch-point ecologies

The patient journey is becoming increasingly digital, and the number and type of digital touch-points are exploding. In some situations, interaction may be focused around one main integrative touch-point (for example an app), but increasingly we see an ecology of touch-points that have to seamlessly work together to form the desired patient experience. This ecology may include touch-points of generic character, such as an app, e-mail or a web page, but can also include specialized touch-points such as home monitoring technology, e-therapy, medical equipment etc. How should a service designer work with touch-point ecologies to co-create a seamless patient experience, and what are the roles of people in such a journey?

Sensors, smart-phones, cloud computing and communities of knowledge are coming together in the quantified self to collect data and transform this data into insights offering guidance and even diagnoses about an individual’s health situation. This primarily digital and patient-initiated monitoring can improve and radically challenge todays health service. In what ways could, and should, a health providers engage themselves in this area? What role can interaction design play in supporting the development, delivery and experience of such services? New delivery models for health and social care services are emerging, enabled by digital technology, patient and citizen empowerment and structural changes in the care delivery. Concepts of home hospital and remote care services are being developed and implemented for many patient groups. C3 is targeting innovation for co-production of services at home and customized to the lives people live and the communities they are part of that enables joint contribution to health.

Proposed research themes

1. Design of touch-point ecologies. Digital touch-points for future health will most likely be highly specialized, individual and based upon the health seekers personal data and context. We would like to explore models to improve patient health, patient-centric healthcare services and co-production of health. How can one design solutions that are perceived by the patient as individual, yet at the same time integrate them into large scale service platforms?

2. Development of a patient-centric Innovation Lab. AHO wishes to develop a shared resource, an Innovation Lab, that builds upon the Mindlab model from Denmark, the Aalto DesignFactory and Kent County Councils Social Innovation Lab (SILK). This could lead to the further development of existing living lab collaborations as a means of supporting innovation activities, or it could operate more as a strategic design lab for innovation between new constellations of public and private actors to address more radical and systemic transformations for service co-productions. The Lab will be developed and used in close collaboration with commercial partners, particularly new start-up partners brought into C3 through Oslo Medtech (a cluster of 150 medical companies).

We are interested in doctoral design researchers who are motivated to apply, design and critique the design of services for the public sector. We further invite proposals with a main focus on bridging relations between Service Design and Interaction Design. The doctoral researcher in this new position will work closely as part of a service design team within C3 together with partner researchers in healthcare, business and ICT. The Service Design research group at AHO is part of our Centre for Design Research (CDR) and draws on a strong tradition of research by design. The advertised position is part of the wider design and research strategy of the Institute for Design at AHO that encompasses the CDR (www.designresearch.no), the Centre for Service Innovation http://csi.nhh.no, and DOT (Design for public service - https://www.facebook.com/designforoffentligetjenester).

Academic requirements

Applicants must hold a

• Master’s Degree or equivalent in a design field of relevance (eg. Service Design, Systems Oriented Design, Interaction Design, Design Management, Visual Communication, Product Design).
• Practical experience in service design and/or interaction design is required for this position.

Applicants who do not have English or a Scandinavian language as their mother tongue must submit documentation of their proficiency in English (TOEFL-test or similar). Foreign applicants must attach an explanation of their university’s grading system. Please remember that all documents should be in English or a Scandinavian language.

Evaluation criteria

Applications will be evaluated based upon a combination of factors:

• Previous experience in the field of service design and/or interaction design
• Previous experience in designing for healthcare
• The quality of the submitted project proposal and supporting documentation
• The relevance of the submitted proposal to the goals and plans for the C3 centre
• The innovation potential offered by the submitted project proposal for the C3 partners.

Applicants fluent in Norwegian or another Scandinavian language may be preferred, although this is not a formal application requirement.

The application must include

We invite applications within one or more of the above research areas, and your application should include:

• A letter of application describing why the applicant is motivated to carry out a PhD and feels qualified for this position. In particular the applicant should describe the question from the above list that they are particularly interested in, and explain their motivation to work with it (maximum of two A4 pages).
• A written project proposal (up to five pages) detailing the theme, types of problem and the research method(s) you propose to use in your project.
• A portfolio of your work/design experience.
• A Curriculum Vitae (contact details, summary of education, positions and academic work, academic publications, design work, competencies in software etc.) especially highlighting aspects relevant to this proposal.
• Copies of educational certificates, transcript of records and letters of recommendation.
• Examples of academic publications and work written (where relevant) by the applicant. Three works maximum.
• Names and contact details of 3 references (name, relation to candidate, e-mail address and telephone number).

We offer:

• The PhD scholarship is fully funded and there is no tuition fee.
• The salary starts at NOK 449 900 for a full position; extensive relevant experience can give a higher start salary. From the salary, there will be a mandatory deduction of 2 % as a contribution to the State Pension fund (SPK). Standard employment conditions for state employees in Norway apply for the position.
• An annual sum of 20 000 NOK for literature and other necessary academic activities.
• Office space in a professionally stimulating working environment.
• Attractive welfare benefits and generous pension agreement, in addition to Oslo’s family-friendly environment with its rich opportunities for culture and outdoor activities.

Formal regulations

The educational component in the AHO PhD Programme is mandatory and requires fulltime attendance. Residency in Oslo for the employment period is mandatory. Research stay at a relevant international academic institution is encouraged. The PhD fellowship will start September 1st 2019.

The candidate will be placed in the context of the Institute of Design For more information about the position, please contact: Instituteleader Rachel Troye (rachel.troye@aho.no) Please apply through our website or directly at www.jobbnorge.no

The application deadline is February 10th 2019.

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