Designing services that deliver memorable personal experiences is a science and an art that is poorly understood. Borrowing from the masters of managing performances, the theatre industry, the authors examine the process for staging plays. Based on their study, the authors draw inferences that can help service experience managers create more memorable face-to-face service encounters. Illustrates seven steps managers should follow to ensure service experience success.

The received wisdom--which many practitioners rigidly follow--assumes that competitiveness in a global economy requires companies to focus on core competencies, reduce their number of suppliers, and develop strong partner relationships built on shared information and trust with the remaining suppliers. But interviews with leading practitioners indicate that blind adherence to this three-step approach trivializes the issue and may be bad medicine. We provide a simple guideline for choosing the appropriate relationship for each supplier. An important consideration is whether the supplier relationship aims at cost reduction or value-added benefits for the customer, or both. The appropriate relationship could be one of competitive tension, cooperative partnership, or strategic alliance. In this study, the firms with successful outsourcing strategies began with well-developed and rigorous technological forecasts. Otherwise, strategic outsourcing will be filled with many blind avenues and deeply regretted decisions.