All progress propositions – the offers to help progress seekers make progress – are located on a progress proposition continuum. Where they reside somewhere between enabling and relieving propositions. And moving a proposition along the continuum is a systematic approach to hunting innovation.

What differentiates where propositions reside on the continuum is who leads the majority of the activities that are an integral part of making progress:

enabling propositions: propositions that support the progress seeker leading the progress making activities

relieving propositions: propositions where the progress helper leads the progress making activities

Here’s an example – getting and eating food (which we can say is the functional part of progress sought). Making that progress has several activities: buying ingredients, preparing, cooking, serving, eating, etc. And it can be achieved in several ways. Such as, from a seeker’s perspective:

• cooking yourself – you perform all the progress activities using a number of enabling propositions, for example cookware.
• partaking in a gourmet restaurant’s tasting menu – a relieving proposition where your only activity is to eat plate after plate of wonderfully curated food
• going somewhere in-between the above two – an all you can eat buffet, a snack shop like Subway, a menu-based restaurant, and so on…with these you do increasingly less of the activities:

We evolve from the traditional goods-service continuum. Doing so because that sits in a logic that regards services as troublesome in comparison to goods. This narrows our view of growth and innovation. Instead, the proposition continuum reflects service-dominant logic, where that distinction between goods and services no longer exists.

What is useful about the progress proposition continuum is that we get three key insights:

• it is the non-functional and context progress sought that influences where a seeker is looking on the continuum to achieve the functional progress sought
• positioning a proposition on the continuum influences the service mix – enabling propositions have a goods-heavy service mix – and vice-versa
• misalignment on the continuum between where the seeker is looking and where a proposition resides is a progress hurdle (one of six) in the seeker’s engagement decision process

Innovation implications

Moving along the continuum, based on above insights, is a systematic approach to hunt potential innovation.

And new positions can be found. Not least by meeting currently unmet non-functional or context progress.

But we can also update the service mix to make a new positions viable. We should remember that propositions attempt to minimise a seekers’ lack of resource progress hurdle (another of the six).

A trivial example of the later is our “cooking yourself” proposition. There a seeker may lack cooking skills and knowledge (resources). We, as a progress helper, could add to the service mix: cookbooks, online videos, physical/on-line cook-along sessions, on-demand help, etc.

So let’s explore how we arrive at this progress proposition continuum.

(A quick note, terminology changes over the timeline we’re exploring. Customer, beneficiary and progress seeker, whilst not strictly interchangeable, can be seen as those who primarily benefit from a service/proposition).

Starting with the classics – the goods-service continuum

There is a goods-service (sometimes product-service) continuum in traditional marketing. And it serves its purpose well from a goods-dominant logic perspective. Helping us distinguish between goods and services.

In “Services Marketing: Principles and practice”, Palmer & Cole define the goods-service continuum ranging from tangible dominant to intangible dominant.

Our examples for getting food fit nicely onto this continuum. Cooking for ourselves is all about goods – the ingredients we use and the pots and pans we bought to cook with. Eating the tasting menu is to experience a major service with supporting products (the many plates of so delicious food).

This goods to service continuum reflects goods-dominant logic. That is, we define services in comparison to goods.

However, this logic sees goods as good and services as troublesome.

Services are intangible, inconsistent, inseparable, require involvement and you can’t create an inventory of them. These are the classic five Is of service. You may alternatively seen these presented as IHIP (see Zeithmal, Parasuraman and Berr) – intangibility, heterogeneity, inseparability and perishability.

And such an outlook can narrow our focus of growth and innovation to goods only. Why bother with these troublesome services? Well, maybe this is not the best logic.

Evolving to the service-service continuum

Lovelock & Gummerson show in “Whither Services Marketing” that not all services “suffer” from all the 5Is. And Lush & Vargo’s “The Four Service Marketing Myths” argues these negative attributes should be seen as benefits.

• intangibility powers scalability
• inconsistency should be seen as customisation
• lack of inventory reduces costs and enables the transfer of value creation from point of exchange to the point(s) of use
• inseparability/involvement leads to the benefit of co-creation of value

Vargo & Lush “The Four Service Marketing Myths“

To cut a long story short, out of Lovelock, Gummerson, Lush, Vargo and others work, we find the development of service-forward thinking about marketing. Leading to, amongst other, the foundation layer of the progress economy: service-dominant logic.

Evolving from a goods-service continuum to a service-service one arises from two areas. Firstly removing this goods vs service debate. Secondly, examining the role of the customer.

Removing goods vs services debate

One key evolution of service-foward logics is defining service along the lines of:

service is…the application of…skills and knowledge…for the benefit of another entity or the entity itself

Vargo & Lusch (2006) “Service-Dominant Logic: What it is, What it is not, What it might be.”

That is hopefully clear for what we call service in the goods-dominant logic. But this is also true for goods. We now see them as “freezing” the application of some specific skills and knowledge.

As an example, knowledge and skill of warming food over a heat source, in a tidy, safe and efficient manner is frozen into a cooking pan . That pan can now be transported to another place and used when needed. In a sense, the frozen skills and knowledge are unfrozen when the goods is used (a beneficiary integrates their resources with it).

And this is what foundational premis #3 of Vargo & Lush’s service-dominant logic tells us:

Goods are distribution mechanisms for service provision

Foundational premis #3 of service-dominant logic

So, in service-forward logics, we see only service provision. But it still feels useful to distinguish between different forms of service propositions. And Vargo & Lush’s “Why service?” proposes that service provision can be direct or indirect (ie frozen in a goods). Or somewhere in-between.

The usefulness of a direct-indirect service continuum relates to understanding the role of the customer/beneficiary.

The role of the customer/beneficiary

Bitner et al looked to understand the contributions and roles of the customer in service delivery. And from their paper we find:

in many services customers themselves have vital roles to play in creating service outcomes and ultimately enhancing or detracting from their own satisfaction and the value received

Bitner et al (1996) “Customer Contributions and Roles in Service Delivery”

They further identify that customers’ participation in a service can be some combination of them being a:

1. productive resource;
2. contributor to quality, satisfaction and value; and
3. competitor to the service organization

Bitner et al (1996) “Customer Contributions and Roles in Service Delivery”

The first point leads to interpretations of the customer being a “partial employee of the service provider”. Which implies a view that the service provider is always driving the service delivery…but they may need to “use”employ” the customer to achieve the provision.

And the second point reflects that involving the customer increases the likelihood that the customer gets what they were after. This will eventually emerge in the literature as value co-creation.

Finally, point three tells us that a customer may just do things themselves. Therefore they become a competitor to the service provider.

To bridge between these customer roles and the continuum we can turn to Normann. He wrote in “Reframing Business: When the Map Changes the Landscape” about enabling and relieving processes. Two words that Vargo & Lush subsequently link to who controls the operant resources used in a service (see their paper “Why service?”). Where operant resources are those that need acting upon in order to contribute to value (co-) creation.

With Bettencourt, they further develop this to be:

While the customer always participates in value creation, the customer can have a more or less active role in the service provision itself….

…thus, in matching its resources and capabilities, a company must decide where on a continuum of “enabling” to “relieving” service it will be because this impacts the service role of the customer.”

Bettencourt, Lusch, and Vargo. (2014) “A Service Lens on Value Creation”

Let’s then look at these two types of service – enabling and relieving.

Enabling service

We can summarise an enabling service as one that is indirect. That is to say prosecuted through goods. And it is the beneficiary who generally applies their operand resources – typically skills and knowledge – on the operant resources provided by, typically, a firm.

Bettencourt, Vargo & Lush later say an enabling service is where:

the customer is a job (co-)executor who acts in conjunction with the firm to provide service to get a job done

Bettencourt, Vargo & Lush (2014) “A Service lense on Value Creation”

Relieving service

In contrast, we can summarise the literature on relieving service as a service that is direct. Where the service provider operand resources control the offered operant resources.

Bettencourt, Vargo & Lush later say a relieving service is one where:

the customer is a beneficiary who mostly “uses” service(s) provided by the firm to get more holistic jobs done

Bettencourt, Vargo & Lush (2014) “A Service lense on Value Creation”

Now we arrive at the service-service continuum. A step on the way to our proposition continuum.

The service-service continuum

Whilst not defined in the literature, at least not that I have seen, as a service-service continuum, I feel it is an appropriate name for the continuum between enabling and relieving service.

Below you can slide between the goods-service and service-service continuums for comparison.

The service-service continuum ranges from enabling to relieving service. Where that control of operant resources also ranges from the beneficiary, at the enabling end, to the firm offering the service at the relieving end. While the customer role ranges from job co-executor to beneficiary.

Looping back to our getting food examples, let’s see how they fit this new continuum. Cooking yourself requires indirect service provision – the pots, pans and ingredients. And these are operant resources that you as a beneficiary control.

In contrast, the gourmet restaurant is a direct service provision with supporting indirect service (the plates of food). You are relieved of all the cooking, serving etc. With the restaurant (the firm) controlling most operant resources – except the plates of food.

But there are still some challenges with this continuum, as we’ll see. And I think we can take one more evolutionary step, arriving at the progress proposition continuum.

Evolving to the proposition continuum

The service-service continuum represents a natural evolution from the goods-service continuum. We’ve moved away from a goods vs. service mindset and toward one that is entirely service-based. And we can see a viewpoint on the customer’s role emerging. Furthermore, who controls the operant resources is becoming linked to a proposition’s position on the continuum.

But in the progress economy, this view is still not general enough.

A progress helper, for instance, offers a service mix to be integrated with. This mix of resources includes both operant (goods and physical resources) and operand (employees and systems). And either or both of those types can be controlled by the seeker or the helper. Similarly, an employee or system in the service mix may exert influence over the seeker (who are themselves an operand rather than operant resource).

Furthermore, we see the seeker as both a beneficiary and a co-executor, not an either/or.

The key to understanding our next evolution is the activities that make up progress attempts.

Who drives the progress activities?

Remember when we defined a progress proposition? We defined them as follows:

And within this definition we say there are a series of that normally take place:

as attempts to integrate seeker’s resources and resources of the progress helper

However, we did not specify who drives of the activities (integrations). Is it a seeker who actively incorporates their resource into the service mix? Is it the operand resource initiating and integrating with the seeker’s resource? Could it be a mix, given that we’re describing a continuum?

It turns out that who drives these activities is the real distinguisher between enabling and relieving propositions.

We can now define these proposition types as:

enabling proposition: the progress seeker drives the majority of the activities involved in the process of making progress

relieving proposition: the progress helper drives the majority of the activities involved in the process of making progress

And this finally leads us to the progress proposition continuum.

The progress proposition continuum

So now I present the progress proposition continuum.

Where all progress propositions reside on a range between enabling and relieving propositions. The distinguishing factor being how many activities involved in the process of making progress are lead by the seeker or helper.

Let’s return to our running example of getting food. We can now say that cooking for ourselves is where we, as the seeker, perform the majority – in fact all – of the activities required to progress. It’s also a special case where the seeker We probably need some enabling propositions to help us. And they come in the form of helper’s goods-heavy service mixes – pots and pans.

In contrast, when we enjoy the gourmet restaurant’s tasting menu, our activities become limited to eating the food. The helper’s activities, on the other hand, are deciding on the menu, obtaining the ingredients, cooking, serving, cleaning, and so on. It’s towards the relieving proposition end of the continuum.

Probably the only proposition further towards the relieving end of the continuum is the unfortunate case of IV drip feeding in hospital. There we are even relieved of the eating activity.

Usefully, the progress proposition continuum gives us three key innovation insights:

• it is the non-functional and context progress sought that influences where a seeker is looking on the continuum to achieve the functional progress sought
• positioning a proposition on the continuum influences the service mix – enabling propositions have a goods-heavy service mix – and vice-versa
• misalignment on the continuum between where the seeker is looking and where a proposition resides is a progress hurdle (one of six) in the seeker’s engagement decision process

Let’s explore these a little more.

Non-functional progress sought influences seeker’s position on continuum

One question stands out. Why does a seeker choose one proposition over another? After all, in our running food example, all the propositions help achieve the same functional progress.

Now, that question is not impossible to answer with the goods-service or service-service continuums. It’s just not obvious, or built in.

Whereas our progress economy focusses on progress. And progress in the progress economy comprises of more than just functional progress.

There is also non-functional and context progress sought. Both of these are also taken into account by the seeker in the engagement decision process. We can identify where the group of seekers we are targeting are likely to sit on the continuum. That is, Non-functional and context elements of progress sought influence where the seeker is on the continuum.

Though a challenge is the range of non-functional progress and context is potentially large. Luckily, we have previously noted that Almquist, Senior & Bloch’s (2016) ”The Elements of Value” usefully identifies a hierarchy of 30 common non-functional progress elements. Which are a good starting point.

And we can expect, for example, that a seeker looking for self-actualisation – the sense of achievement in doing something themselves – will tend towards enabling propositions. Whereas a seeker that is risk adverse, or time-short, would tend away from enabling propositions.

Relationship between Progress proposition position on continuum and the service mix

Hopefully you’ve noticed there is a link between the continuum and the service mix – the resources offered by the progress helper.

Identifying where seekers are looking on the continuum helps us craft an appropriate service mix. And vice versa. Any given service mix we put together indicates where the progress proposition sits on the continuum.

For example, seekers looking for enabling propositions are often looking for goods heavy mixes. Though this might also be system-heavy in our digital world. Think, for example, of word processors that enable writers of all skills to publish documents, skipping the need for typesetters and printing presses.

Misalignment is a progress hurdle

So we see that both seekers and propositions can be viewed by their positions on the continuum. Now we can ask what happens when those positions are misaligned? Say a seeker prefers an enabling proposition and you are offering a relieving one.

The simple answer is that the seeker will see this as a hurdle to progress.

It doesn’t mean they will not engage. There may be no alternative proposition, or alternatives may have higher other hurdles (in the progress economy we see six of these hurdles). Or the alternatives offer less progress potential.

But it does mean you encourage seekers to look elsewhere.

There is a potential solution: does it make sense to move your proposition?

Innovation moves

A main aim of the progress economy is to help systematically hunt innovation and growth. The progress proposition continuum is a useful tool for that. And there are two approaches.

First you could introduce a new proposition. Or move an existing . Second, you could move an existing

Moving along the progress proposition continuum is a systematic approach to hunting innovation and growth

Wrapping up