Jobs to be done

The Jobs-to-Be-Done framework is a representations of user needs born out of qualitative user research, such as field studies, interviews, and discount usability testing. It involves identifying for which goals customers “hire” your product (and, ideally, also finding out if there are competitor products that these users are ready to “fire”). Armed with this understanding, a product team can think about the nature of the users’ core problems and needs from a fresh perspective, and devise product features that solve that main need as best as possible.

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For example, if a traditional task analysis unearthed that delivery drivers frequently needed to print out directions that showed how to navigate between each stop on their daily route, it’s likely that the design team would focus on making it as easy as possible for the drivers to format and print the directions; however, a JTBD-focused approach would focus on the delivery driver’s “job” (that is, getting navigation guidance while driving), and would look for solutions to that problem (such as a GPS system providing voice guidance).

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Oftentimes, we hear JTBD advocates referring to the famous Theodore Levitt quote, “People don’t want to buy a quarter-inch drill, they want a quarter-inch hole.” Rather than focusing on a list of features for a product, the JTBD framework forces designers to think about outcomes: would users be able to (happily and easily) complete the job they “hired” the product for? Does this solution provide a better outcome than existing ones?

From: Personas vs. Jobs-to-Be-Done by Page Laubheimer

 

 

 

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Persona attributes

Most well-crafted personas include a multitude of information such as:Demographic details, such as age, marital status, or income:

• Personal details, such as a short biography, photograph, and name
• Attitudinal and/or cognitive details, such as information about the persona’s mental model, pain points, and feelings about the tasks that need to be accomplished
• Goals and motivations for using the product
• Behavioral details about how the persona tends to act when using the product

Personas vs JTBD by Page Laubheimer

Most well-crafted personas include a multitude of information such as:

• Demographic details, such as age, marital status, or income
• Personal details, such as a short biography, photograph, and name
• Attitudinal and/or cognitive details, such as information about the persona’s mental model, pain points, and feelings about the tasks that need to be accomplished
• Goals and motivations for using the product
• Behavioral details about how the persona tends to act when using the product

Personas vs JTBD by Page Laubheimer

Replacing The User Story With The Job Story

Summed up, the problem with user stories is that it’s too many assumptions and doesn’t acknowledge causality. When a task is put in the format of a user story ( As a [type of user], I want [some action], so that [outcome] ) there’s no room to ask ‘why’ — you’re essentially locked into a particular sequence with no context.

[Suggested job sytory]

We frame every design problem in a Job, focusing on the triggering event or situation, the motivation and goal, and the intended outcome:
When _____ , I want to _____ , so I can _____ .
For example: When an important new customer signs up, I want to be notified, so I can start a conversation with them.

Alan Klement: Replacing the User Story with the Job Story

Snice OR OSEMN – taxonomy of data

What a scientist does in roughly chronological order: Obtain, Scrub, Explore, Model, and iNterpret

1. Obtain: pointing and clicking does not scale.
2. Scrub: the world is a messy place
3. Explore: You can see a lot by looking
4. Models: always bad, sometimes ugly
5. iNterpret: “The purpose of computing is insight, not numbers.”

Hilary Mason: A taxonomy of data

 

User research methods overview

From: https://www.nngroup.com/articles/which-ux-research-methods/

There are important things we can’t easily or accurately measure.

If we could read user’s minds, then we could in theory design the perfect experience for them. Unfortunately, we’re not all Jean Greys, so we make due with what we can measure to try and take educated guesses as to what people care about. In this day and age, what we can measure has its limits, and it’s important to always remember that. Simply looking at what people are doing in your product can’t tell you:

• the degree to which people love, hate, or are indifferent to your product or any of its specific features
• whether a change increases or decreases people’s trust in your product over time
• how simple and easy to use your product is perceived to be
• how people see your product versus other similar products in the market
• what things people most want changed, added, or fixed
• how people will want to use your product as time passes

Julie Zhuo: Metrics Versus Experience

Jobs-to-be-done (JTBD) Technique

A JTBD is not a product, service, or a specific solution; it’s the higher purpose for which customers buy products, services, and solutions. (…) It helps the innovator understand that customers don’t buy products and services; they hire various solutions at various times to get a wide array of jobs done.

There are two different types of JTBDs:

1. Main jobs to be done, which describe the task that customers want to achieve.
2. Related jobs to be done, which customers want to accomplish in conjunction with the main jobs to be done.

Then, within each of these two types of JTBDs, there are:

1. Functional job aspects—the practical and objective customer requirements.
2. Emotional job aspects—the subjective customer requirements related to feelings and perception.

Finally, emotional job aspects are further broken down into:

1. Personal dimension—how the customer feels about the solution
2. Social dimension—how the customer believes he or she is perceived by others while using the solution.

(…) The better a solution can fulfill all of these job levels and layers, the better chance it has in the marketplace. Also, the better the solution either achieves or nicely dovetails with related JTBDs, the better chance of success it has. In short, the JTBD concept is a guide for thinking beyond to make your current solutions, and your competitors’ solutions, obsolete.

From The Innovator’s Toolkit

 

The Progress Making Forces Diagram

This diagram can be used (e.g. in interviews) to explore physical, functional, social, and emotional aspects of the forces that pull people towards either tried and tested and innovative solutions.

 

From jobstobedone.org

 

The Customer-Jobs-To-Be-Done Canvas by Helge Tennø

‘How Might We’ (brainstorming) questions

Example: Redesign airport design from the POV of stressed mother.

• Amp up the good: HMW use the kids’ energy to entertain fellow passenger?
• Remove the bad: HMW separate the kids from fellow passengers?
• Explore the opposite: HMW make the wait the most exciting part of the trip?
• Question an assumption: HMW entirely remove the wait time at the airport?
• Go after adjectives: HMW we make the rush refreshing instead of harrying?
• ID unexpected resources: HMW leverage free time of fellow passengers to share the load?
• Create an analogy from need or context: HMW make the airport like a spa? Like a playground?
• Play POV against the challenge: HMW make the airport a place that kids want to go?
• Change a status quo: HMW make playful, loud kids less annoying?
• Break POV into pieces: HMW entertain kids? HMW slow a mom down? HMW mollify delayed passengers?

http://dschool.stanford.edu/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/HMW-METHODCARD.pdf

Collect efficient feedback with Edward de Bono’s thinking hats

Workshop participants put on a metaphorical coloured hat that symbolises a certain type of thinking. This allows to collect efficiently different types of feedback and avoid having an idea shot down for purely political reasons:

1. Pitch Design team presents their idea and value proposition and/or  Business Model Canvas
2. White hat (Information and data; neutral, objective;) Participants ask clarifying questions to fully understand the idea
3. Black hat (Difficulties, weaknesses, dangers; spotting the risk): Participants write down why it’s a bad idea; collect one feedback after the other while participants read it out loud
4. Yellow hat (Plus points, positives, opportunities) write down – collect
5. Green hat Ideas, alternative possibilities; solutions to black hat problems. Open discussion, facilitator to write down feedback
6. Evolve Design team evolves idea

Osterwalder 2014, p. 136 – 7