Applying Jobs-to-be-done
to UX Strategy
Jim Kalbach
Sept 2014
@JimKalbach
Principal UX Designer Citrix
LIS Degree Rutgers University
#jtbd
The job, not the customer,
is the fundamental unit of
analysis for a marketer who
hopes to develop products
that customers will buy.
CLAYTON CHRISTENSEN et al.“Marketing Malpracitce,“ HBR 2005
JTBD
1. Understand users
2. Map JTBD
3. Identify opportunities
4. Align efforts
1. Understand Users
39 interviews/observations
68 hours of audio
1,488 pages of text
793,281 words
1,716 descrete tasks
Indi Young, Mental Models. Rosenfeld Media, 2008.
A mental model helps you
visualize how your business
strategy looks compared to the
existing user experience. Thus,
it is a diagram that can support
your experience strategy.
2. Map JTBD
Find photos
on computer
Upload
photos to edit
online
Find photos
uploaded
from phone
Search photo
library on
mobile phone
Get photos
from social or
cloud service
Find photos
on the go
Look in
organized file
structure
Dig through
unorganized
photos
File Transfer Search
Mobile App
Find PhotosGoal Space
Tower
Tasks
Support
Tasks, towers, goals
=
JTBD
Support
Features
Products
Services
2. Map JTBD
Map Future Concepts
3. Identify Opportunites
TONY ULWICK
Satisfaction
Importance
Minimize my effort to find photos on my computer
Desired Outcomes Statements
MinimizeReduce
MaximizeIncrease
TimeAccessAbilityEffort
Direction Unit Qualifier or action
Minimize my effort to find photos on my computer
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
Very low Very high
A. How important is this to you?
B. How well is this currently being satisfied?
Desired Outcomes Survey
Calculate Opportunity Scores
9
Importance
3
Satisfaction
Satisfaction Gap6
Importance + Satisfaction Gap = Opportunity score
9 + 6 = 15
Do 1st
Do 2nd
4. Align Efforts
Do last
“It’s great to have this data to help make
informed decisions. I’m looking forward
to incorporating it more and more.”
PRODUCT LEAD
a. Concepts
b. Messaging
c. Differentiators
Outcomes
a. Concepts
Desired Outcomes as heuristics: does the concept help or hurt?
b. Messaging
Shift language to reflect JTBD
BEFORE
Our automated photo indexing is the best in the industry
AFTER
Find photos on your computer with less effort thanks to our smart indexing
c. Differentiators
Pe
rfo
rma
nc
e
JTBD
Us Them 1 Them 2
“The greatest competitor [in
tax software] … was not in the
industry. It was the pencil. The
pencil is a tough and resilient
substitute. Yet the entire
industry had overlooked it.”
Quoted in: The Myths of Innovation, SCOTT BERKUN, 2007
SCOTT COOK
Founder of Intuit
[On Arenas]: The driver of
categorization will in all
likelihood be the outcomes
that particular customers
seek (“jobs to be done”) and
the alternative ways those
outcomes might be met.
The End of Competitive Advantage, 2013
RITA GUNTHER MCGRATH
JTBD
1. Understand users
2. Map JTBD
3. Identify opportunities
4. Align efforts
5. Redefine markets
Danke schön
@JimKalbach
