Co-creating inclusive public services with customers experiencing vulnerability
Year: 2025
Type: article
Abstract: Purpose Service inclusion empowers customers to self-determine their life and future. Using the motivation-opportunity-ability framework and a strengths-based approach to vulnerability, this study aims to examine the lived experience of secondary school students experiencing vulnerability to better understand how they are motivated, provided the opportunity and able to co-create an inclusive mass public education service. Design/methodology/approach Twenty secondary school students who attend high school in a low socioeconomic area undertook semi-structured interviews and co-design activities to investigate how customers experiencing vulnerability co-create value in public secondary education services. This grounded theory approach used inductive-deductive thematic analysis to analyse interviews transcript and data artefacts from the co-design activities. Findings The results show that customers experiencing vulnerability in public secondary education services are intrinsically motivated to co-create inclusive services. Customers provided with opportunities to co-create will use their agency to drive co-creation, perceiving that they are competent to co-create when drawing on past practices and being facilitated by structured freedom. Co-creation is supported by a sense of belonging but impeded by a range of micro-, meso- and macro-level barriers. Customers that co-create inclusive services are subsequently more likely to exhibit engagement. Originality/value This research provides empirical evidence to support transformative service research theorising that enabling opportunities and offering choice leads to more inclusive service experiences for customers experiencing vulnerability. Perceptions of service captivity can also be improved by co-creation.
Source: Journal of Services Marketing
Authors: Nicholas Grech, Dominique A. Greer, Rebekah Russell-Bennett
Institutions: Queensland University of Technology, University of Canberra
Language: English
Subfield: Marketing
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: hybrid
OpenAlex ID: W4409407642