Research opportunities in service process design

This paper presents an overview of the new issues and research opportunities related to four service operations design topics-the design of retail and e-tail service processes, design of service processes involving waiting lines and workforce staffing, service design for manufacturing, and re-engineering service processes. All four topics are motivated by new technologies (particularly web-based technologies) and require a multi-disciplinary approach to research. For each topic, the paper presents an overview of the topic, the relevant frameworks, and a discussion of the research opportunities. (C) 2002 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.