Pen-and-paper Rituals in Service Interaction: Combining High-touch and High-tech in Financial Advisory Encounters

TL;DR

This paper introduces a system that blends traditional pen-and-paper rituals with digital tools to enhance high-touch advisory services, maintaining personal connection while leveraging technology.

Contribution

It proposes a novel ritual-oriented system design that integrates high-tech tools into high-touch advisory practices, demonstrated through realistic mortgage advisory evaluations.

Findings

Mixed reality enhances advisory interactions

System maintains personal touch with digital integration

Potential for consistent quality in advisory services

Abstract

Advisory services are ritualized encounters between an expert and an advisee. Empathetic, high-touch relationship between those two parties was identified as the key aspect of a successful advisory encounter. To facilitate the high-touch interaction, advisors established rituals which stress the unique, individual character of each client and each single encounter. Simultaneously, organizations like banks or insurances rolled out tools and technologies for use in advisory services to offer a uniform experience and consistent quality across branches and advisors. As a consequence, advisors were caught between the high-touch and high-tech aspects of an advisory service. This manuscript presents a system that accommodates for high-touch rituals and practices and combines them with high-tech collaboration. The proposed solution augments pen-and-paper practices with digital content and affords new material performances coherent with the existing rituals. The evaluation in realistic mortgage advisory services unveils the potential of mixed reality approaches for application in professional, institutional settings. The blow-by-blow analysis of the conversations reveals how an advisory service can become equally high-tech and high-touch thanks to a careful ritual-oriented system design. As a consequence, this paper presents a solution to the tension between the high-touch and high-tech tendencies in advisory services.