Is "Jobs to be Done" missing a beat without a deep understanding of behavior?
I'm always thinking about innovation and how behavioral science plays a role - perhaps it's a consequence of doing my masters years ago in Economic Growth and Innovation.
So, I relooked at one of Clayton Christiansens papers on HBR to illustrate the point
“Job” is shorthand for what an individual really seeks to accomplish in a given circumstance" - the image shared by Jochem from TheyDo from his conversation with Jim Kalbach illustrates the fact that not only is there a job, but also a hierarchy.
Now if we call the main job to drill a hole, then this would be what we call a target behavior - the bigger overarching behavior we want to complete (though of course there is a behavior above that, which is to hang a picture and many related behaviors below)
Now back to Christiansen... "The circumstances are more important than customer characteristics, product attributes, new technologies, or trends". - This translates into making sure that you account for the context where people are making decisions - this is very important and something that is often overlooked, especially when tactics are copied blindly.
"Good innovations solve problems that formerly had only inadequate solutions..or no solution." - To me this could mean that a systematic approach to understanding the drivers of the behavior were completely ignored and not even addressed. This is why I try and make sure that when working on projects we use models, theories and frameworks to help guide us in the right direction.
"Jobs are never simply about function..they have powerful social and emotional dimensions".
- It may sound strange that to just drill a hole you may have so many things that make it easy or hard to do - you may have time, you may have the knowledge, and the skill and yet you may lack the motivation to do it - and that motivation may come in the sense of a belief about a consequence (will I get my deposit back if I drill that hole)
- so if you think that you only need to account for having cool tools or tips to help you drill the hole, it may still not get done - but how would you account for it, if you don't deeply understand what drives behavior? which means you will be creating an inadequate solution.
The article goes on to say “A deep understanding of a job allows you to innovate without guessing what trade-offs your customers are willing to make” - which means you should be adding a behavioral approach to your process - otherwise you will miss out on the deep understanding part.
Remember, most teams already have the ability, talent, and know-how to develop amazing experiences, but without a deep understanding of behavior and its influences you may end up, as Clayton Christiansen said - with inadequate solutions.
What are your thoughts on this?