"Jobs-to-be-done" in practice....

Here is an example of the “Jobs-to-be-done” (J2BD) tool used to ‘reverse engineer’ an existing product, in this case Ultra Motor’s A2B Light Electric Vehicle (LEV) as profiled by Innosight in this blog post. We use “Jobs-to-be-done” (J2BD) in H2FL workshops and demonstrate its power to ‘reverse engineer’ Starbuck’s current product offering. One highlight here enhancement here is that Innosight identify Social, Emotional and Functional jobs to create a more rounded and complete picture of the customer needs they believe are satisfied by the product.

So What?

firstly, Innosight makes a common mistake of comparing this product with traditional gas-powered scooters when in fact its competition is much more likely to be a growing list of alternative electric scooters, the Segway, a bicycle, public transport etc.

What is important when applying the J2BD tool is to drive-out what hidden needs are uniquely being addressed by the product or service, especially if in a competitive and crowded market such as LEV’s. It takes creativity and a 360° perspective to do this and any simplistic analysis is likely to be less than useful.

The only sign of uniqueness in this anlaysis of the product is the innovative business model being applied in Stuttgart, Germany. Maybe this is the only unique feature but if it is, it addresses a more specific need not highlighted here – access to suitable transportation without capital investment and puts the product into a different competing category.

Like all tools J2BD needs careful application and any superficial rendering of it will likely lead to the wrong analysis and conclusions’, whether ‘reverse engineering ’ an existing product or trying to identify the needs for a new one.