[Kim Heeyoon's Bookshelf] In Meeting Rooms Overflowing with AI, Reflecting on People Once Again

A few planning documents are scattered across the meeting room table. There is one word that is now indispensable in planning documents: AI. Recommendation algorithms, data analysis, automation. With just a few slides, it can seem as though the future has already arrived. Yet, when you take a closer look at these documents, a subtle question lingers: Ultimately, who is this service for?

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Technology evolves rapidly. A few years ago, data analysis was the hot topic, and before that, mobile technology was believed to be the force that would reshape the world. Now, it is all about AI. While technology always appears to be at the center, the reasons services actually fail often tell a different story. It is because there is a lack of sufficient understanding of people.

Digital Service Planning and Business Models by Hyekyung Park and Yoon Han begins from that very point. Judging by the title, it seems like a typical digital planning textbook. However, as you turn the pages, you discover that what the authors prioritize before technology is 'customer experience.' Rather than asking whether a technology has been adopted, they question how that technology changes the human experience.

The phrase digital service planning is often reduced to issues like feature design or interface layout. Questions such as where to place the menu or what color to make the buttons are typical. Of course, these are part of planning. However, the authors argue that the starting point of planning lies elsewhere entirely. One must first observe what inconveniences customers experience, what they expect, and in what situations they seek out a service.

The book explains this process as a single flow: starting from basic concepts of e-business, moving through desk research and data analysis, identifying customer problems, designing personas and user experiences, and finally connecting it all to a business model. It carefully demonstrates how planning is not just about generating ideas, but about completing a process through multiple stages of judgment and decision-making.

Many books these days discuss AI. However, most dedicate more space to the structure or potential of the technology itself. What sets this book apart is that it treats AI not as a grand technological discourse, but as a tool for planners. The 'AI exercises' in each chapter demonstrate how generative AI can be used in real-world planning processes: as a tool to assist with data analysis, as an auxiliary device to generate ideas, or as a means for making service design more sophisticated.

Although we live in an era overflowing with AI, the starting point of service remains the experience of people. Behind the algorithm lies a question: "Ultimately, who is this service for?" AI-generated image

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The authors' backgrounds are also noteworthy. One is a practitioner who has long worked on CX and UX strategies in the corporate field, while the other is a scholar researching how AI influences consumer behavior. The practical sense built on the ground and the academic analysis naturally intersect, which is why the book is neither overly theoretical nor a simple practical manual.

The term digital service is often explained solely in the language of technology. Words like algorithm, data, and platform take precedence. However, for those actually using a service, the technology itself is invisible. What is visible is the experience: how convenient the app is, how quickly it solves problems, and how natural the user journey feels.

That is why the competitiveness of a service often depends more on how well it understands people, rather than the level of technology. Even with the same technology, some services endure while others are quickly forgotten. The difference ultimately lies in how accurately one reads people.

This book serves as a reminder of that timeless truth. No matter how advanced AI becomes, the starting point of planning does not change: understanding human experience and connecting that experience to new value. Every task carried out under the name of digital service planning ultimately begins with that question.

Technology keeps changing. New tools emerge, and new platforms are created. However, for those creating services, the most important question remains the same: Why do people seek out this service? And how can that experience be redesigned?

Although this is a book about planning in the digital age, what it ultimately discusses is not the story of technology, but the story of people.

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