Service Designer

What we’re looking for;

In keeping with our current business needs, we are looking for a person who meets the criteria indicated below

Reporting to the Service Design Chapter Financial Services Lead, the role purpose is as highlighted below;

Service Design at Safaricom is the practice of designing and orchestrating the whole service end to end, across every channel and the frontstage experience and backstage operations that deliver it, so the customer's journey works as one. The Service Designer designs friction-free, end-to-end services that drive customer uptake and lift experience, working to the human-centred design standard the business builds within, and connecting the specialist crafts around the customer rather than the organisation's own structure.
In Financial Services, this means designing services that work as one seamless, consistent experience across every channel, the M-PESA apps and portals, USSD, call centres, agents, retail and partner systems, so a customer can move between channels without friction or losing context, and owning the seams between them where experiences most often break. The role changes and improves how a service works, which can involve changes across processes, channels, operations and technology, not only the interface a customer sees. The Service Designer works across the full design lifecycle, Discover, Design, Validate, Measure and Improve, embedding design early in the product development process rather than being called in to repair services after they launch.

Key accountabilities and decision ownership:
Working across the delivery lifecycle and within multidisciplinary teams, the Service Designer will:

• Design end-to-end services. Design current-state and future-state customer journeys across digital and offline channels, and create and maintain service blueprints that map customer actions, the frontstage experience, and the backstage operations, processes and partners that support it.
• Ground design in evidence. Use user research, service audits and both qualitative and quantitative data to understand real customer needs, identify pain points and constraints, and iterate on design decisions.
• Validate before scaling. Prototype and test service concepts with real users to surface what breaks early, iterating designs before they are built and scaled.
• Measure and improve. Set up journey-level experience measurement (such as jNPS and CES), interpret the results, and translate them into improvement actions that are owned and tracked, closing the loop between insight and action.
• Collaborate and influence. Work closely with Product & UI/UX designers, customer journey specialists, researchers, product managers, engineers, operations, call centre and partner teams, aligning service and technical design, and influencing stakeholders through clear storytelling and evidence.
• Work to the standard. Deliver work to the Service Design standard and playbook, contribute to a consistent and high-quality practice, and document each engagement as a service design case study.
• Champion the customer. Advocate for human-centred, inclusive design so that services work for all customers, including the underserved.

Must have technical / professional qualifications:

• A degree in design, human-centred design, business, technology, social sciences or a related field, or equivalent practical experience.
• Experience in service design, or in a closely related discipline such as UX or UI design, customer journey, design research, systems or business design, product or operations, from which the person is growing into end-to-end service design.
• A portfolio demonstrating design thinking and problem solving, ideally including end-to-end service design work such as journey maps and service blueprints, and evidence of customer or business impact.
• Experience producing user experience deliverables such as journey maps, service blueprints, flows, wireframes or prototypes.
• Experience working across multiple channels and collaborating within cross-functional or multidisciplinary teams.
• A working understanding of human-centred design, design thinking and inclusive, accessible design.

Safaricom is the leading technology company in East Africa. Our purpose is to transform lives by connecting people to people, people to opportunities and people to information. We keep over 60 million customers connected across Kenya and Ethiopia, and play a critical role in the society, supporting over 1.13 million jobs both directly and indirectly while our total economic value was estimated at KES 1.1 trillion ($ 8.5 billion) for the 12 months through March 2025.

Listed on the Nairobi Securities Exchange and with annual revenues of close to KES 388 billion as at March 2025, Safaricom provides connectivity through wide range of technology. Our 2G, 3G, 4G and 5G network in aggregate covers over 99% of Kenya’s population.

We run the world’s largest mobile payment system and Africa’s largest Fintech, M-PESA, the world’s first mobile money transfer system. By empowering millions of customers to transact, save or borrow money through their mobile phone, M-PESA has driven financial inclusion in Kenya to 84.8% of the adult population in 2024, from a low of 26.7% in 2006, and generated over KES 161 billion in revenue as at FY25.

Our subsidiary, Safaricom Telecommunications Ethiopia, has deployed world class network and services to contribute to Ethiopia’s digital transformation.

Safaricom is an equal opportunity employer, actively recruiting staff from different backgrounds reflecting the communities that we serve. We are committed to equal gender representation at all levels.

As part of our ongoing commitment to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), we continue to work towards improving energy and resource efficiency in our network and facilities to reduce carbon emissions and our fuel consumption. We remain committed to becoming a Net Zero carbon-emitting company by 2050.