Oceanic Catering New Digital Ecosystem
Service System Design for maritime cruise ships
Brief and Goals
Support Oceanic Catering, a leader in the catering management services sector for commercial fleets active in maritime transport, in the redefinition of the digital ecosystem and, in particular, in the redesign of the application dedicated to onboard catering management.
Catering Management Application
The redesign of a complex ecosystem such as that of OCL was approached with a view to Service and User Experience Design, putting the user at the center, identifying and analyzing the expressed and unexpressed needs of the main stakeholders thanks to a field research phase carried out at the Cyprus HQ and in the training locations of Manila (Philippines) and Mumbai (India).
Human Centered Design
The project was focused on Chief Cooks and on-board Chefs
Service Design
The main stakeholders, service actors and end users (Chief Cooks, on-board chefs and captains) were interviewed.
Design Thinking Workshops
Two co-design workshops in Manila (Philippines) and Mumbai (India) were held to collect insights and needs from the target end-users
Activities carried out
The collaboration with Oceanic Catering has seen Softec involved in various design phases, from pure analysis to discovery, up to the release of functional and interface specifications for new applications.
Content and Functional Inventory
The objective of the Functional Inventory was to understand the current state of the systems and services in place at Oceanic Catering, highlight weak points that could be improved and start imagining a new business sales proposal capable of bringing out the company. itself and differentiate itself from international competitors to open up new business opportunities.
Stakeholders Interview and Workshops
The main stakeholders of the company - top management, sales, operations, IT department - and the end users of the platform dedicated to onboard catering management, ie chefs and captains, were interviewed. The interviews made it possible to "diagnose" in detail the objectives, expectations of each category of stakeholder and the issues related to the use of the as is platform, allowing to trace the route to follow during the design process.
Design Thinking workshops in Manila and Goa with Chief Cooks and On-board chefs
In Manila and Goa, the workshops, which involved training managers, cooks and commanders, made it possible to collect ideas and useful ideas for the design phase. A fundamental step in the Service Design process.
The focus on the "cook" user, desired by OCL, was guided by a very specific strategy: the satisfaction of the main users of the most important tool of the ecosystem (and, consequently, its continuous and correct use) is the key that allows to realize the value of the digital offering proposed by OCL to its customers and therefore to increase its perceived value and vendibility.
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User Flows
The analysis of the daily / weekly and monthly activities of the chefs is the result of the activities carried out during the Preliminary Diagnosis and Service Discovery phases and allowed to focus attention on their actions and highlighted the weaknesses of the as-is process, in view of a subsequent redesign of the service, supported by new technological touchpoints.
Service Personas
The data and information collected thanks to the interviews and workshops revealed three different "personas" (eg types of users): the identification and creation of these profiles, based on real users who really interact with the Company's touchpoints , help to understand their needs and goals and become key elements of the design process
Envisioning a new ecosystem
The design process based on the principles of Human Centered Design has made it possible to define an ecosystem that places the user at the center, whether it is the internal business stakeholders of the Company or whether it is external stakeholders: customers, network of suppliers, crews of fleets operated by OCL.
The individual touchpoints respond to the Company's business needs and, at the same time, to the different needs of the different types of users. The new digital ecosystem is thus configured as a real product, part of the overall offering of OCL, which manages to differentiate itself and distinguish itself from its competitors.
Task blueprint
The Task Blueprint is useful to give visibility to the daily activities of the target audience and served as the basis for the design of the desktop and mobile module. The process of completing the task flow took into account the objectives of the individual interviewees, as well as the specific workflow of Oceanic Catering and highlighted the role of each single technological touchpoint within the service during the design phase.
Catering Crew Desktop App
The desktop application developed plays the role of on-board assistant: it simplifies the planning of activities, ranging from the quick and easy preparation of request and reporting cycles to the faster creation of menus and recipes with a focus on nutritional values. The decision-making process is assisted by the display of easy-to-understand emoticons, graphs and KPIs.
Catering Crew Mobile App
You can write here as much as you want, this text will always The mobile app allows the catering team to work more effectively and efficiently: time-consuming activities can now be performed at the right time and in the right place. Menu planning and daily usage reporting can be done on the go, ensuring a more efficient monthly cycle report. Catering Crew can create their own cookbook and access it even after disembarking.
Ecosystem visual identity
The logo, composed of the symbol and the signature, celebrates the harmonious and perfect union of the key elements of the OCL ecosystem. The sinuous shape of the wave, as in an embrace, welcomes the circular shape, the essence of the OCL identity, as if to seal the inseparable relationship between the "sea" context and the services offered to customers. The logo is used as the name of both the offline desktop management module and the mobile apps.
"Neris" naming
This name is inspired by the mythological Nereids, the Greek sea nymphs: female spirits of the sea who accompanied Poseidon and helped the sailors. This feminine name gives the app a warm human touch - it can be seen as the Chief Cooks' personal helper, their personal assistant on board.
Ecosystem visual identity
Starting with the design of the Neris logo for the mobile app and the desktop module, we have developed a grammar for each of the products of the new Oceanic Catering Digital Ecosystem.
