[Event report] The 8th International Conference of Serviceology

Between September 14 and 16, 2021 the 8th International Conference of Serviceology (ICServ2023) was held at Tokyo Institute of Technology in Japan, and the Center for Tourism Research (CTR) supported this conference as one of the sponsor organizations.

This conference focused on the area of “Science of Service,” or as how the organizers coined the term, “Serviceology”. A unique aspect of the conference was its interdisciplinary approach to the topic of service design. The conference brought together academics from various research backgrounds, such as from engineering, service marketing, tourism management, sports and business, to name a few. Furthermore, the conference was attended not only by international academics but also by industry leaders and other stakeholders who were keen on sharing research findings and future trends in serviceology.

ICServe 2023 started off with a Doctoral Consortium which aimed to support early career researchers who were delving in their research on serviceology. Here, early career researchers gained invaluable insights and networks as they were mentored by renowned academics in the field. Over the three-day conference, insightful research presentations covering the themes of digitalization, sustainability, and service design were discussed. All of such topics are highly relevant to the tourism management and marketing context. As tourism is considered a service sector, the use of a service design perspective is particularly important in ensuring the sustainable development of tourism destinations and the satisfactory experiences of tourists. Overall, the ICServe 2023 gave new insights into how tourism management and marketing could be developed more sustainably and ethically within the technologically advancing tourism landscape, through the lens of service design.

From the CTR, Dr. Husna Zainal Abidin attended this conference and connected, learned from, and exchanged ideas with other leading academics and industry stakeholders within the field.

¡ôICServ 2023 official website¡¡https://icserv2023.serviceology.org/

¡ôSociety for Serviceology  http://ja.serviceology.org/index.html