Welcome to the 5 hundredth episode of this
podcast. That's 500 weeks or nearly 10 years
of episodes for product managers and leaders.
I have a very special guest to discuss
how we have seen product innovation change over
the last several years. What has worked and
what has not what we're doing now. As
a product professional, you need perspective on where
things are headed and what is working,
which is aided by looking at the changes
that have occurred. So let's gain some perspective
together from the knowledge and experience of 1
of the most influential people in product innovation
that's Tony A.
Tony is the origin of jobs to be
done I first discovered Tony when I read
his book, what customers want using outcome driven
innovation to create breakthrough products and services and
a few need to see that. If you're
on Youtube watching, that's what that book look
like. After reading that, I promptly invited him
to speak at the Denver Pd Chapter. This
was back in 2006.
And he published that book while. I was
working on my Phd and innovation, and it
really resonated with me So strongly on on
my research about White pot fail. And I
thought Tony, what was ahead of me and
so many things. That still is what was
so glad to find that book. He's also
the author of the more recent book jobs
be done, theories practice,
which is this great book if you haven't
seen that. Both of these should be part
of your library, and I encourage you to
add them if you haven't done so already.
Tony also has 12 patents to his name.
He began his career as a mechanical engineer
product planner and a market researcher for Ibm
and founded his consulting firm strategy in 10
years later. Which has helped leading companies generate
billions of dollars in revenue growth.
Let's jump in and learn what has and
has not, worked in product innovation. Also, we
created an article format of this discussion, which
you'll find at product mastery now dot com
slash 500
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practitioner, and your guide.
Tony, thanks for joining us.
Chat some... Thanks so much, And congratulations on
the 5 hundredth
episode. It's amazing 10 years. Yeah. It keeps
on going. My... I love the opportunity to
give some information to the product management community.
But frankly, I am the boy in the
candy store, Right? That I love having these
conversations with amazing people. And you were very
kind you are... Were actually 1 of the
guests in that first year.
Long time ago to come share some information
as well. And here again. Right? Here yes.
How much has changed? Let's let's see. Let's
come this get that. That's gonna be fine.
I do wanna pull out a statement from
this book. What customers want, which I think
many people also call the O d book,
outcome driven innovation.
And in in that book, you describe the
need for outcome driven innovation. And frankly, the
introduction The whole book is great. The introduction
sets the stage so very well. Not a
lot of people read introductions. This is 1
that I have copied several times and handed
it out to a senior leaders because it
really does make the case for
why we need to think about innovation different.
And if I may, I like to read
just a short couple sentences and get your
your thoughts on this is at the stage.
You said in that introduction, it seemed to
me that if we knew well in advance
what criteria customers are we're going to use
to judge a product's value.
We could du design a product that met
those criteria,
and that the product would be a success.
So take us back a little bit about
some of the frustrations that you ran into
about what wasn't working
to developing products and what led to those
insights.
That's a great question. I I enjoyed that
quote too, and it really changed way I
think about, innovation. The backdrop on it is,
I was working at Ibm at the time.
And we were introducing a new product to
the world called the Pc Junior, we're supposed
to take over home computing.
And
what was interesting about it is the day
after it was introduced. The headlines in the
Wall Street Journal read, the Pc junior is
a flop.
And it was a flop.
But that led me thinking about what you
just quoted it. Right? I I wanted what
metrics were they using to judge the value
of our product.
Right? Because they were saying it's a flop,
Obviously, against some criteria. Right? And they thought,
When I had been nice to know that
criteria, like, a few weeks ago or 2
years ago. Right? And because if we knew
how they were gonna measure the value of
our product,
we could simply design the product around those
metrics and we'd have a success.
That was where that came from. Because
clearly, people using some criteria to say, I
like this product better than that product or
the Pc junior is so much better than
the apple. Right? And so they are using
some criteria.
We didn't know what they were. Right?
And that was the problem. It's like, wow.
And and the other part of that is
if that criteria, which stable over time, that
would be better yet.
Because if they said, here's the criteria we're
gonna use to judge your value of your
product in 2 years.
And by the way, it's gonna change every
year. That would be as valuable. Right? So
we have to know
well in advance what criteria they're gonna use
years from now
to judge you value the product.
That was the thinking. And
let me down a path of trying to
figure out
what metrics are those?
And do they exist, can we approach innovation
from that perspective?
And, of course, the answer turns out to
be? Yes.
And that has become your life's work since
that time. Right? Is think figuring out how
to do that and then helping people, helping
organizations do that as well.
As... So this revelation from the this flop
of the Pc junior that this was your
career for... I don't know how long that
project was a a year or 2.
It was following up the Ibm pc,
which was a big thing for Ibm. And
they were in the mainframe business and they
did Pc, and then highly anticipated Pc junior.
I would I remember those times and I
was looking forward to that as well. What
did you then take from that experience, then
to say, okay. How do we actually do
this? How did you begin to understand customers
how they would judge products and decide on
that criteria?
Yeah. So I I started working in product
planning. That was the first thing I did.
I moved from my engineering group, and it's
a design for manufacturing type of work on
the Pc junior.
And I got interested in and in just
market research and product innovation, move to the
product planning team and then began to
try to figure out
what kind of inputs will lead to success
in the patient. That's really it.
And so just before I did a lot
of qualitative work on my own, but we
hired,
researchers to come in and do work for
us and try to figure out what people
wanted.
Know And
in same traffic as everybody else. Right? All
solution space.
People want this feature. People want... The conversation
just never led to anything stable.
Alright? But then I came across 1 question,
a, way to ask customers
about their needs that became pretty insightful. And
that was simply...
What makes product day better than product b.
Now it the reason that works is because
people are trying to get the jobs done
better. Right? The buying products to get a
job done. And if you can tell me,
what it this about product a that got
the job done better than product b.
That would be useful piece of information.
And we try to keep it out of...
Solution space because they'd say, well, this product
allowed me to do this faster.
Okay. Well, this product make sure I don't
make this mistake or this product yields a
better result along this dimension.
And
after doing research, for a number of years
and listen to these kinds of statements.
I started to realize that we could categorize
these
statements into
groups, grouping
and say, you know, some of these need
sound like
product function.
Some of these need sound like
interfacing with the product.
Some of these needs sound like,
cost related buying a product,
and slowly, this was very slow.
It it finally evolved where I could categorize
needs into 3 categories case.
The functional aspects,
the consumption aspects and the financial aspects.
Unless was what it finally included that there's
3 key customers,
and there's 3 key areas of interest. Now
back then, I didn't call it and getting
the job done better. It was just this
product is better along some dimension. And
when I started going down that path, I'd
end up with... This is when I started
in research myself. I'd end up with 2
300 statements that describe
better.
And then I'd have to organize them into
categories.
And I spent weeks doing this to figure
out, well, how do they fit? What's sort
of pattern or anything here.
And over time, I realized that that there
there was a pattern,
and it usually began that there's some needs
associate with planning the activity and then getting
the right inputs and then organizing them and
then
executing the process as I said it, people
by product sticks you process, what's the process
execute monitor the execution. And so on, That
that became years later in 2008, the job
map that produced
for harvard review.
But I didn't call with that back then.
And and and this really evolved. There was
no job at upfront. There was just lots
of statements.
So a lot of this was really a
can
characterization exercise.
Right?
You gotta recognize sweet that there's 3 customer
types,
then you gotta recognize that customer type is
trying to
get, execute their process along certain dimensions
and so on. So the pieces started to
fit together.
And that's when the framework started evolving and
so on.
And it became,
a more predictable process.
And then it was... It was somewhere around
19 90
when,
read that quote by levi. People don't want
quarter inch drill. You want to quarter in
troll. And said, that's exactly it. This... These
functions are all about creating the quarter in
control.
So these statements are about the underlying process
that people are trying to get done.
And that became part of the theory, and
when I met Clay Back in about 19
99.
That's what I introduced to. The O process,
the concepts and so on.
And he said, the underlying process does not
sound
like, a very attractive way to say this.
But we when don't you talk about the
job to be done. That sounds better. People
are buying a product to get a job,
exactly. So so that's how oath had evolved
as well.
But a lot of
being
effective innovation. Really came down to
classifying things. What we're looking at. We need
the right inputs into innovation...
Then started working on these metrics for the
core job
for the consumption elements for the financial part.
And metrics that was stable over time, because
I realized that
the core job, like, creating the quarter in
control. That's stable over time.
So if we tire metrics to a stable
focal point, we could have
needs that would be
valid for 2 years 3 years while we're
going through the development process, so they won't
change when we come out.
So that was the thinking. And when that
occurred me, then I started working even hard
to
make my statements fiddle the deck criteria.
And so now we say good need statement
that we call them desired outcomes, they're stable
over time. They're actionable, they're measurable and controllable.
They predictive of success, and we have a
whole set of criteria that makes it easy
to think about them and how to capture
them.
But that's really the essence of all this
Chad is thinking.
What are the metrics people are gonna use
to judge your value for my product.
So if you talk to a customer's and
they say, well, I like Product day bit
product be for this reason.
Well, I can go to my needs set
and say, oh that's a functional outcome in
this job,
or that's a
interface related outcome in this
consumption change on or or so on. So
I knew that the piece fit, so we
could organize them and and then bring more
predictability to the approach.
And we just hacked that way through it.
This was
a learning experience as we went. I worked
on maybe
hundred projects from
19 91 until 2001,
by myself, basically,
just keep testing the hypothesis. Just keep trying
to make it work. And
fine tuning
until we eventually reached,
a point where we we published an article
link back in 2002,
which kinda kicked all this off it highlighted
a case from Quart corporation where we use
the process
very effectively to really move needle for them,
across many fronts
and it was stat success. Really sent the
validation to me that says,
you can come up with a matrix People
are gonna to judge your value of your
product. Years in advance and work towards
designing solutions that address those metrics that are
not well served by current products. Just
And,
that's the basics behind or
that's a foundational thinking behind our process.
So a start from that original frustrating
outcome of of the Ibm Pc junior project.
Right? How could all of our hard work
as a team be a flop,
announce the next day by the Lost Street
Journal. And just digging in deeply into how
could we do that better? Right? As you
started now, product planning Ibm,
And so I think it's it's very tangible
for people to get their hands around. If
we are ask people about 2 different products.
What do you like better about 1 or
the other? That I can see where that...
A lot of things started from that sort
of idea. And now it's really around these
need statements.
Can you give us an example too of
about a a need statement that, how how
you figure this out? Sure. Yeah. So,
let's go to the simple thing like cooking,
preparing a meal. Out and we've all prepared
males. And there's measurable outcomes that you're trying
to achieve as you go about executing that
job.
For example, you wanna minimize the time it
takes to complete the prep of the food.
You want to minimize the time it takes
to portion the food and to the right
amounts you wanna minimize likelihood overcook cooking the
food. Minimize selective under cooking.
Minimize likelihood that's foods cooked them evenly,
and that I could go on. Right? There's...
There's dozens of these statements that talk about
how to get the job done faster, more
predictably in with a a great result. So
this no defects, if you will.
And and these types of statements exist for
any job, and they're plentiful. It's not as
if there's
5 outcomes around getting a job done. There's
often a hundred or more outcomes and involved
in getting a jonathan done. Even some simple
jumps, We did a project for Unilever on
washing your hands in a public restroom.
There were a hundred outcomes associated with washing
hands in the public crescent. Sounds like a
very simple un complicated job, but
turns out that there's a lot of moving
parts. Right.
And it's really at that level of granularity
that you need to dig in order to
get to the inputs that will help you
create value.
Right? Because evelyn, there was just trying to
make products more convenient to use reliable,
dependable.
Ease, you know, easy use, But...
What does that mean? Right? You can't measure
that.
I remember 1 of the first projects we've
worked on in the Motorola, radio products division
here in Florida.
The... Customers are saying, well, we'd need to
make our product easy to use. Of course,
to do. We captured 25 different
statements that related to ease of use.
Right? So we could define that minimum minimize
of likelihood that, I don't hit the wrong
button in a emergency
situation or the very specific things.
It turned out that only 3 of those
25 were underserved outcomes, but they were highly
underserved and and fixing those 3.
Help to differentiate their next generation of radio
products.
But so the the point there is getting
to this level of granularity is really
what's important.
So that's what we do with in every
assignment that we're on figure out. Well, what
is the job The customer's trying to get
done?
And then break it down into its component
parts fair how they measure success when getting
the drop on. K. 2 things I I'd
like like to go back to it from
what you just shared So the... So and
what customers want? O Book. I think the
language there was at that time, these statements
were those things that we would minimize and
those things that we would want to maximize
to create value.
And I think that
from what you just said, you... All your
statements were minimized. I think that's been in
1 of the evolutions of your learning that
you you have... Thought about how to just
simplify phrasing need statements.
It's definitely true. Yeah, We used to be
much more
inviting to variations and realize that they're really
are causing the process to be inefficient.
And 1 of those as we picked up
on is how do you start the statement?
And you're right, we say minimize this or
increase that. As what we were for do.
Mh. But what we learned is that,
people are trying to get the drop down
fast more predictably higher output throughput.
They're trying to reduce time.
They're trying to,
reduce the likelihood that things go bad. They
wanna reduce defects.
Alright? They're trying to take
imperfections away from the process.
Alright?
And all that led to the focus on
minimize. Let's minimize time it takes the ux.
So it's minimize the likelihood this bad thing
happening.
A minimize selector of of this defect occurring
in the output.
And it became a lot easier, for customers
to understand and to talk about and for
us to collect the information
because because we just took away 1 of
the variables in the equation what do he
start need sticking with.
And so we've done that for good. Oh,
gosh. I had have 15 18 year or
something like that where it's just and
minimize the likelihood of that,
bad things happen and minimize the time.
And I I'd like that approach and I
don't know if Scott Be, but he wrote
a book called statue in the Stone this
here,
which is interesting. And he talks about this.
He worked with strat for a number of
years,
and he talks about,
how, my client... Michel
remove the imperfections from the rock. To create
the perfection.
And I love that analogy. And it's like,
people are trying to get a job done
better. Let's just remove all the
and we'll... It'll be done better. Right? So
the same it's the same kind of thinking.
And it... Like I said, it simplifies
the captured
it also simplifies it when it's being prioritized
too
because we put these statements in surveys and
have people rate them for importance and satisfaction
And if we stick at the same nomenclature,
people don't have to rethink the starting point
it just becomes... Or it's very consistent.
Yeah. Exactly. So that works quite well. Yeah.
Yeah. Just that that simple...
Simplifying anyone that's done the... The l or
type survey where we say, right on a
scale of 1 to 7, how served were
you right underserved kinda of neutral served and
when we start changing the the direction those
questions go, it just causes confusion for us
as the people doing the analysis, and also
for the people taking it. So... Yeah. So
I like this change. You you mentioned in
there, which what, I was gonna ask you
about too. It sounds like the ranking process
trying to figure out. Like, in your motorola
example of the 25 jobs that were related
or 25 criteria related to statements that for
something to be easier to use.
There were 3 that were underserved. What are
you doing today to you get to identifying
what is under just underserved and maybe which
of those are most important?
Yeah. So we still do the quantitative research.
Mh. You know, the way our process works
is we do qualitative work first to understand.
From the customer, what is the job to
be done?
How do you break it down and what
are all the metrics? So while it's un
qualitatively,
through,
in and if interview process with con... With
the customers the job computers.
Once we have that information, we put it
in the survey that goes out to hundreds
if not thousands of people,
and they fill out the survey, tell us
the importance of each outcome
and the current level of satisfaction, given the
solution they use today. And they tell us
for solution they're using too. So we can
get competitive data, satisfaction levels.
For product a versus satisfaction
for product b and so on. So we
can look product by product to see where
opportunities lie, and we can look across the
market to see are their needs that are
unmet by everybody. Right?
But it's the same
calculation that we introduced back in the 2002
Hvac article. Mh.
It's very simple.
If a need... The concept is... If a
need is very important across a large portion
of the population.
But only a small percentage of the population
satisfied,
then we're gonna call that unmet need.
And and the greater, the importance and the
less satisfaction,
the higher the opportunity score.
Very simple.
We've worked on
several variations of that formula since that time
and to see if we could make it
better
and
do our own analysis. We think the optional
algorithms is about 93 and half percent effective
There's some noise in the middle of the
equation when it's not that important and not
that satisfied. So there's a little bit noise
in the middle, but it works well in
the fringes is
But we looked at other approaches that would
be more predictive, but they were so hard
to explain.
That we decided just to stick with what
we currently have. You know, I I don't
wanna I don't want it to be you
have to have a Phd in order to
understand how to prioritize needs. Because say it's
important and not satisfied
makes perfect sense. So let's just put them
math there and you and go with it.
So that part of the equation really hasn't
evolved much over the past 20 years or
so, been very stable, and it continues to
scrape results. Yeah. And simple for us to
to grasp important and not satisfied as is
the things that get our attention. As part
of my... Phd research, I had to have
my people participating in in that data, qualitative
and quantitative analysis to do some ranking. And
I chose to do pair wise
comparison, which is Yeah. You pull out. So,
like, if you had your 25 statements of
easy to use, you pick 2 at a
time and you ask the person which one's
more important. And you go all the way
through. And this becomes un
for more than just a few, which statements.
And so we we have to find ways
to make this work to give us useful
information that isn't so labor that no 1
is ever going to do fill out a
survey for us.
Exactly. And chad, 1 more interesting thing about
that is pair comparison, the force choice, those
methodologies
are really...
Quantitative research methods
designed in
in solution space.
Because because you're asking people to make trade
offs between
outcomes,
which outcome is more... Which outcome would you
prefer
But see, and before that was used for
outcomes, it was really used for features. Would
you want this or more than this feature,
which one's more
interesting to you. And then, that 1, which
feature we could choose this 1 over over
this 1. So it was really when when
you're asking people to make trade offs, you
do it its solution space.
And we're trying to avoid all that because
you could have 20 needs. They could all
be really important and not well satisfied.
And when we're not trying to make trade
offs in problem space. We only make trade
in solution space.
Right? So we never use paired comparison and
force choice
to prioritize
outcomes.
Because we're not making treatment, we're not asking
customers to make trade offs
that early in the process.
Right? If they have 10 on unmet needs
We wanna try to satisfy us by all
10. Mh.
We we don't want them deciding in solution
space, which one's gonna be addressed better because
they don't know. Eric. It'll build the best
solutions.
K. I'm going to try to capture that
to make sure I'm not confused about that
because I think this is a very important
point. When when we look at innovation processes,
there's the upfront work to understand what... Who
the customer is and what problem that they
actually have. What job. They're trying to accomplish
and jobs if you've done language, what they
wanna move towards. And then with a clear
understanding of that, we can start considering solutions.
And validating a far solution creates satisfaction for
the customer. And in too many other the...
Too much of the time, I see, teams,
product teams, and organizations jump into the solution.
I I think it's just hardwired into humans.
And particularly engineers like both of our backgrounds
we hear anything that sounds like a problem.
We we we are on to driving towards
the solution. Right? And we get things wrong
them because we don't clearly understand the problem
and what is important. And And that's what
you're talking about that the focus is clearly
understanding what that problem is. What the customer's
unmet needs are. What they're trying to accomplish
and what what is underserved for them and
accomplishing that job.
That. That's exactly right. Okay. Yep And we
don't wanna make any trade offs too soon.
Right? Trade offs come in solution space. We
don't make trade offs some problem space.
We wanna know in priority to order. What
are your unmet needs and to what degree.
Right?
Yep. Yeah.
Absolutely. Okay. Very good. So... Yeah. You went
through a great history there. Lots of details
that will be rounded out, for people if
they they do read those 2 books we
talked about before. I... I'm curious
as you look back on this time in
in developing the this kind of body of
knowledge for job to be done, that experience
from your Ibm days.
And putting the other outcome innovation and job
to be done. What surprises you most about
the state of innovation
as you look over the your career where
things are now
maybe in comparison to where you thought they
might be?
Yeah. That's a great question Chad because, you
know, I I thought
years ago that.
When when we came up with the approach
that everyone would use it, everyone would read
the our customers want book and they'd go
do it, and I'd be out of businesses
or in another business.
Right?
And and that didn't happen. Right? And So
even as we have introduced
all the specifics, and we...
We've laid out everything in terms of what
you have to do from a qualitative research
standpoint, quantitative
data and analytics,
segmentation techniques, the innovation strategy,
development
we've laid all that out. What what... And
and we have been proposing it and using
it in large companies for 32 years
I guess what surprises me is that there's
still
there's still... I'd say,
95
percent of the cases.
Innovation is still ideas first.
Right it's not about understanding the needs. It's
about someone had an idea.
Or our company has
50 ideas or thousand ideas in the idea
of database and now we have to manage
the ideas. Right?
It's like... It's almost 2 camps. Right? Where
1 camp is
innovation management is about managing the ideas that.
Generate and figure out which ideas you should
go pursue
versus what we do is we save you're
in a market. Let's understand all the unmet
needs in the market,
figure out which I'm unmet, and then come
up with solutions that just addresses those unmet
needs. You don't need that database of all
those needs.
All those solutions, or, the ideas.
Right? Just and instead of just creating ideas
because for for every idea. Think of it
like this. For every idea, someone's gonna have
to sit there and go. Is that a
good idea,
and then I have to know what market
is that idea.
In. Right? What market is it
focus on?
Does the idea address on unmet needs in
the market?
And does it
address that unmet needs.
Now you have to do that a thousands
of ideas. That is a tremendous amount of
work.
And the bad news there is, the answer
could be that none of those ideas address
the top unmet needs in the market.
Right? Right? So you're really gambling if you
go down that ideas management
path, where...
That's not really innovation. Right? That's just...
Try to
mine ideas.
That's high risk.
Going the other way, Of course, we're trying
to mitigate risk And like I said, what
what really amaze me to this day is
that most companies still go down the Idea
management path.
And think about innovation through that lens. And
Chad, I think you're right. Keep... I think
people just hardwired to think about solutions.
Mh.
Because I've I've asked myself this question for
32 years. Why don't people just
do it the way we're prescribing here works?
It's great.
Requires a little discipline upfront, but but it
produces the right result.
And I think it just gets in the
way of natural instinct.
Right. I think that's part of the answer.
Yeah. And this would be a much larger,
longer discussion depending what direction will yell in
here. But there's the the common sense that
we have heard about at for a long
time, like, you need lots of ideas to
come up with a few good ones. Right?
And so there's lots of innovation math that
looks like that. So I think 1 of
the problems is just the human nature of
kinda not trusting ourselves to use the process
right,
especially when something is new. And I I've
seen this in a several arenas, like, where
someone will write a how to book. Right?
Follow the steps, and you can do this.
And then the author ends up still offering
all these courses that are filled all the
time because people aren't sure if they're applying
it properly.
And we we we have talked in the
past. I don't know if done some interview
before. It it turns out that we both
helped the same company.
And I was there after the work that
you did.
And I was fascinated about how how this
started because the people involved
read this book. And applied it and came
up with a really good strategy for what
they needed to do. They they did a
good job of uncovering
important
underserved needs. Right? And then your organization, did
the detailed market research for them and created
a detailed plan to support that. And they
felt... Okay. We got it right.
Right? Because we we thought we were on
the right track. We just applied the book.
Right? The the knowledge for that. And then
based on the market research and in your
organization's work, like, yes. The experts, strategy and
is telling us we got it right, and
it's what we're gonna go do.
And then I was asked to just help
the product team and the product managers,
basically gain confidence
about how do you innovate? Right? Not... III
don't teach your stuff per s. I'm I
respect it wholeheartedly,
but I I probably should've have tried to
ask you for a job what I bet
you back in 2006 because I would loved
to. I think I've missed out here. But
But I I think there's this confidence issue
that that's come to into play too as
we look at why aren't companies better at
innovating given the tools they have.
Available. And in this example, this organization, they
applied your work. They did it themselves. They
did a great job. They hired your organization
they had a great detailed plan that they
they were ready to execute on. And it
was still the people involved in the execution.
They just needed more confidence to know that
they could innovate.
And and so there's some aspect they're about...
III don't know what that looks like in
human age. Right, that that that we're not
really sure about moving forward. And even today,
they're still the Ceo that hopefully, some are
listening to this that their position is to
Well, we'll find out if anyone wants this
when we we put it in the marketplace.
That's when we'll find out if it's a
successor or not. That's painful. Yeah.
Yeah. That's Pc Junior. You don't wanna do
that. Right. And, Chad, you bring up something
that we've worked on a lot for the
last 10 years.
Especially last 5. We did it an O
project on this too.
We apply an O 2 markets that we
wanna...
As well when it's innovation capability building.
And so we study that. And what we
find is that, and It's exactly what you
just said. People are not confident in using
the data correctly.
It's interesting these outcome statements are very straightforward,
but when the team is presented with an
outcome statement and said, here's the biggest unmet
need. They don't know what to do with
that.
In many cases. Right? So
so there's there's an education component that comes
along with it.
And what we've done for the past 5
year... So when we do projects with their
our clients,
we go do the work like we always
did, but we had a, what we call
it project cohort.
We're for every step we go through, market
definition, outcome gathering,
prioritization,
segmentation,
innovation strategy.
We take the team through 5 90 minute
live sessions on...
What we're doing, why we did it, what
with the information is and how they're gonna
use it downstream.
So by the time we're done with the
project,
they know
why we have this data and how to
use it,
then we go use it. So then we
go into idea radiation, We're go into product
value prop mission,
creation, whatever an activity we need to work
on downstream.
And that increases chances of success dramatically.
We did work. We did a study back
in 2010,
and we found that 86 percent of our
clients that
release a product using O
have a success.
But we also found that 40 percent of
the clients would work with
never used the data. They never produced the
product. Mh. It was... It's for the reason
you you described.
Alright. They didn't have the confidence of they
needed to really move forward.
And so the this training component, if you
will. It's designed to get people,
in the right mindset.
Right?
So so they can get out of that
ideas first phase into the problem
solving phase
and learn how to use data
in their current workflows to get their jobs
done better.
And that has proved to be very effective
approach so the uptake is far greater than
it was
before, thankfully, because, yeah, none of us wanted
do work and have the data sitting on
the shelf for great strategy sitting there with
nobody pursuing it. So I think you're having
the team come on board with this education
component
and it's it's come it's part of change
management, which is starting people in in the
new mindset.
So they're ready to take that data and
use it effectively.
Yeah. The the old business adage about analysis
paralysis.
The there is something kind of
fun for some of us maybe they like
data. And reassuring that you do the analysis,
you uncover what people need, what would actually
create value for them and make them choose
your product over other options and you feel
good about figuring that all out, but there
is the step then that
is kinda of moving into into unknown territory,
Like, well, how do we actually...
Create the solution and the solution elements that
respond to that. And the it sounds like
the the this project cohort cohort that you've
put together, is helping to bridge that a
little bit, give people confidence to move into
that and take action on what they've learned
from the analysis
Yeah. That's exactly right. And we and we
do 1 more thing too that we didn't
used to. And that is once we know
the top opportunities, let's say there's 10 of
them. We go back out to customers, and
we ask them, I whole variety of questions
about that particular outcome. Like, why is it
a problem? What's the root cause? What's your
workaround around? Things like that. So we really
have a lot of good background information on
each on unmet need. So when we go
into idea aviation, working with the company and
the team to come up with solutions, they
have a really good knowledge about the problem,
why it's an issue. Mh. What the root
causes is and potentially how to fix it.
But really makes idea radiation
easy.
I have to say. Once you have all
that information coming up with the right solution,
really isn't that hard. These people
Working the companies are very smart. They're not
lacking ideas or intelligence or creativity.
They're just lacking a good understanding of the
problem.
Yep. Fantastic. Okay. So some good good changes
there to recognize how can people not just
put this in the use, but take that
next step. And I I like the stats
that you guys collected at 8 86.
I think you said 86 percent,
people finding success put this in place, But
40 percent at the time, were not taking
action on what they learn on the analysis
And so now, add it to the project
cohort to to get there. So very good.
Lot of good insights. We do have 1
more question coming up for you. Which was
sent to me for by listener of this
podcast as well as an innovation quote I
want to discuss. But first, I am able
to... Fund this podcast that's been going on
now for almost 10 years by the training
courses that I provide product managers and leaders.
And the course that I wanna tell you
about today is focused on fun product management
leadership skills, which also allows you to earn
a professional certification from Pd mae. It is
the training that prepares you for product mastery,
and really is focused on those 7 research
back knowledge areas that this podcast is built
around that you need to understand Most people
who take this training already have several years
of experience. They know a lot and the
rapid product master experience, the Rp rpm experience.
Is a of course that we'll integrate that
knowledge and really add to it. If you're
serious about creating more value for customers, improving
your team and growing your own career the
Rpm experience is something you should check out,
go to product mastery now dot com and
learn more about the training and get started.
I hope That's again, a product mastery now
dot com.
On to a question from a listener. This
was sent me by diane s. Who asks
jobs to be done requires digging deeper into
what the customer means and not just doing
what they have said.
As we are in a more distributed remote
environment these days, how do you recommend observing
customers when they may be in different places
or different location than you.
Yeah. That's really great question because it brings
up a couple of issues.
1 is the concept of observing customers.
And I've always fought back against this little
bit.
When you're observing customers, you're watching what they're
doing.
That solution space.
Right? What you wanna understand is, what are
they trying to accomplish?
By doing what they're doing.
That's problem space.
And what I'm saying is that,
it's much easier to train practitioners when you
just keep them focused in problem space.
If they have to watch something in their
in solution space and constantly try to
take that and translate it back into problem
space. That's an extra burden.
We don't generally observe customers.
In fact, what we'd like to do is
take them out of their environment
and put them in room with us and
begin asking questions about
the creating the job map. Let's assume we
have the job app done. Right?
The first step in the job? What's the
first thing you're trying to accomplish when you're
trying to find access... To the portal,
Right? Or whatever the step might be.
And you just try to collect a set
of outcomes. What you're trying to do is
to get
the
interview
in a mindset where they're thinking through what
they are trying to do.
Not what they're doing. We're trying to take
them out of solution space as well. So
they're not describing the products you're using or
how they're...
Interfacing with it. Again, all solution space.
The trick is to get them into problem
space and keep them in problem space,
So we actually find it easier
taking them out of their environment and putting
them in our environment.
The other thing we do that makes this
easier,
and that's been a big difference.
Made a big difference for us is
we train them to become
good interview ease.
So we we tell them what we're doing.
Right? We tell them bell,
the job. Here's the job. We have them
validate the job for us. This is what
you trying to accomplish. Yes.
We have them help us build out the
job map.
And we validate with more people. And it
was just the steps that you're going through.
Yes.
And then we we get into the outcomes
as well.
And something we've done different in the past
5 years or so. Is what I call
immersion sessions.
Whenever I do interviews, my preference is to
get the same 3 to 5 people,
book them
for 2 hour sessions, 4 or 5 of
them over 2 to 3 week period.
And work with the same 2 to 3,
4 or 5 people
to create... To validate the job step, to
come up with the job app and to
create most of the outcomes.
Now you have
most of the this built. Most of the
framework is discovered.
Then you go out to individuals and my...
A more diverse set of customers
to really fill in the gaps. Have them
review what you've already collected
have them add to any outcomes that might
not exist already that they have that that
weren't considered
And it's more of a collaborative effort with
the interview weeks.
Right? And this is interesting.
A typical
the old fashioned way. In a typical old
fashioned interview,
neither the interview e or the interview were
know what input they're looking for.
Think about that. Right? They they don't know
what they're trying to collect. They're just collecting
stuff. We're exploring. Yep. We're exploring.
They're Well, we're flipping that around. We know
what in information we're trying to collect. We're
trying to collect
outcome statements in into very specific format.
And we show them that, and we teach
them that. So within a half hour, so
they're talking our language.
Right? Now both parties know what information would.
Looking for, and we can collaboratively work together
to get the information.
And that's why I like taking that same
group of people
for a few sessions
because they're learning. That they're learning to speak
outcome language, and they can really help us
build out the model and the framework.
And that goes a long way. Instead of
doing... 31 on 1 interviews for an hour
and try to piece it together.
Working with the same group people for short
period of time, and then Ballard didn't even
more people later.
It's proven to me but be a much
more effective approach. I suspect so if you're
doing these emerging sessions, you've said 4 to
5 people,
involved in that deeper dives
that some people say, 4 or 5 people.
That's all. I suspect that you don't very
often find anything that meaningful when you go
past that group. That that's just my guess.
That when you do get others involved, review
the findings,
I guess the your 4 to 5 actually
gives you the majority if not all of
the information.
Yeah. We find it... It's in the 80
percent range. Yeah. Yeah.
And that's right. And then what we do
from there is we'll even interview people in
different countries because people... We we're we're we
work with lot of global companies. And if
they want us to be able to hand
them, a set of outcomes that have been
validated
worldwide.
So we'll collect most of the inputs in
the Us in English and then translate them
into language. Is and go out to those
other geographies and validate that there's nothing missing
and that they're correct. And that they understand
what they mean. And things like that.
And
that makes it a heck of lot easier.
Okay. So So today, you're focused on these
deep dive interviews. You are collaborating with them
really over the process. That this is what
a job is to us. This was what
we think you're trying to accomplish. Let's, you
know, refine that. This is what outcomes look
like to us. This is our our job
map of steps.
So and substance kinda c creating
the
understanding of the problem with the customer.
The this
just in contrast to some other things that
that were done in the past. My my
real introduction that I... At least what I
call, and my real introduction to innovation was
stumbling in to eth pornography.
And didn't know what that term was or
anything. And I have found in my past
high value and user observations And 1 of
the case studies that I I very much
like for mere work because it's tangible it
is the skill saw and how construction workers
tend to use skill solves and and then
homeowners as well. And that did use eth.
Right? That was observing
trades, trades people on sites,
interacting with the skilled saw. Yeah. And so
clearly, there was value in that, but this
is like, 1 of these examples of, like,
here's something that we did that worked and
now we think this is working better. Is
that what we're saying? Yeah. That's right. And
and here's look the nuance.
When we did those
observational,
research,
interviews put on the circular side,
we know what we're looking for.
Right? So we know we're looking for outcomes.
So we're not I'm just watching them. Right?
We're asking them why are they doing each
thing? You know, what are they trying to
achieve next and so on. So we know
how to interview them despite the fact that
we're watching them in solution space. So we're
we're almost ignoring the solution space space aspect
and trying to under stand everything happening in
problem space in documenting that.
But what we find is for most practitioners,
interviewers,
that's hard.
It's, it's it's actually much easier just to
take the people put them in your space
and just haven't them slowly go through.
The the job they're trying to get done.
And when I say slowly, and in in
my instructions I say,
this is in super,
slow
motion.
If we're gonna go through from the start
of this job to the very end it's
gonna take us 3 hours.
It's very slow. I may write down 1
statement there 5 minutes. Just it's a slow
process.
And that's what we work through. Right. Right.
But in 3 hours, we have,
bunch of outcomes statements and,
off we go.
So it's that... It's... That's kinda of new
ones.
Yeah. Important to stun the distinction.
Bunch with that, that... To me to kinda
suggest that let me get your opinion on
this. It seems like it could be helpful
to have people doing the interviews, whether it's
that focus on solution space
observations interviews of the circular law example, or
today, your deeper dive merchant sessions. That have
less experience with the domain.
Because I have found that people that really
understand the domain well
that know all about circular cells, For example,
tend to make assumptions about what people need.
Right? Yeah. Yeah. That's definitely true. Yeah. If
you're not familiar with the space, then going
out there watching,
What we do a lot of times too
and, in half few years is, you, we're
gonna watch videos. Go to Youtube, we'll go
see what next
does.
You know, for example, and and there's so
much information and now with,
Ai and Chad And so on. There's so
much information out there. And
and, we've been experimenting with that for over
a year,
with the Ai. I mean, and,
what we find is that it's a useful
tool for a savvy practitioner.
It Kim prompts help generate a job app
and help generate a set of outcomes
Are they real? Who the heck knows. Is
is our client going to be confident that
they're gonna get a great result if we
don't talk to any actual customers.
No nobody has said that yet. Nobody said,
it's okay not to talk to because that...
So, you know,
it's a good
it's good way to get some background on
a topic
and to make sure you're covering everything.
I'd I'd say that's it's it's huge. But
and maybe there may it's sometime soon where
we could be so confident that it produces
better results than a practitioner. But what we
find is a train practitioner armed with Ai
is a really good tool set.
For you. I think we'll see more and
more of of that going on where we
have our Ai partner on. Yeah, as practitioners.
You, okay? Thank you for responding that, Diana,
Thank you for the question. Listeners if you
want to submit a question to
future guests, just follow me on Linkedin, and
you'll see who's coming up.
Innovation quotes we also love? What's the quote
that you have for and what does it
mean to you? It's funny because I've had
this quote in my mind for years. I
lived by it, but I looked up like
the exact
version of the quote.
At by Einstein, and there's 3 versions of
it because now with chat Gp,
it's all the variations that have happened over
time. But the quote is If I11I would
to saved the world, I would spend 55
minutes to defining the problem in only 5
minutes finding the solution.
Which is pretty much what we've talked about
for all this time here today. Mh. Right?
Is is how do you make that happen
in of innovation.
How do you define the problem?
Right? Hit this very granular level?
And then, of course, once we have the
problem well defined and you know what you're
idea round coming up with the solution truly
is easy. I've seen it happen. You mentioned
the Boss example.
When they were presented with their 14... You're
unmet needs. They solved all of them 3
hours.
That's it.
And if they said, we had a lot
of these ideas before. The problem is
we've had thousands of ideas before. We didn't
know that these were 14 that really meant
anything to the customer.
But get there they were all prioritized. So
I I lived by that quote, and I'd
love that thinking.
That... That's excellent. Yeah. If there's so many
things that we could do, it's hard to
know what to actually take cash sean. Yeah.
Very good. Thanks for the quote. It is
1 of my favorites as well to clearly
understand what the problem is before we try
to move into solution.
It's probably pretty easy for people to find
your books? I just suspect we can get
go to Amazon and make that happen. But,
how can people find out more about the
work that you're doing? And the work is.
Strategy doing, resources you have. Well, it's a
couple things. Oh, I have a free book,
not the 1 there, but the other book,
the jobs be done 32 practice.
If you go to jobs be done book
dot com, all hyphen jobs, hyphen to be
done brooke dot com,
you can download. A ebook version of that
or an audiobook version of that for free.
So that's a great starting point. Other than
that, there's plenty of material on our website
at strat dot com. There's a resource center
there that has access to tons of white
papers,
there's videos out there. 1 it's my favorite
if you go to Youtube,
it's what is jobs be done that's an
8 minute video.
It just summarizes,
In a nice way, I think how a
Jo done helps you think differently about innovation
and brings predictability to the process.
And, of course, if you just wanna contact
me, I'm at all at
dot com. That makes that easy. People can
reach out directly.
Okay. Tony really appreciate the information. So glad
you could spend the 5 hundredth episode with
us. I was around the house the other
day that this is the longest running podcast
for product managers. My son did the... And,
of course, with the Chat Ep and typed
it in. What is the longest running product...
Podcast for product managers. Low and behold, Chat
believes it is also that this podcast. So
that was great.
I got it right. And that's perfect. I
got it right. Again, congratulations on that. I
know that is quite a feat. And perseverance
is and their key to success. So
good to see you hanging in there. Oh,
thank you. And likewise, appreciate that you have
not to given up on helping organizations to
get better at innovation and that you are
continuously learning how to do that better and
your team.
And really excited to see
organizations that have embraced that to, see such
benefit from it. And, no. Do the... The...
These are the things that we need to
be doing just great satisfaction for our customer
and and generate new value for them. So
great body of work. Thanks, Chad. Appreciate it.
And listeners you've can find the written version
of everything we discussed as an article at
product mastery now dot com slash 500.
As always, keep innovating.
Thank you for listening to product mastery now.
We're product leaders and managers gain product mastery
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