What to Include in Innovation Processes

We surveyed 1,244 product teams over the last 6 months and uncovered a reality that blew our minds: While all product teams are trying to create products that better satisfy customer needs, over 80% of product teams do not agree on what a customer "need" even is! Teams define "needs" as exciters and delight-ers, pains and gains, specifications and requirements, features, value drivers, wants and benefits, wishes, aspirations... ...and the list goes on, as if any of these inputs will correctly inform the innovation process. Here's the problem: THEY DON'T! Just like any process, only precise inputs lead to a great result. So what is the right input? We know that people buy products and services to get a "job" done. So, let's start by defining customer "needs" as the metrics customers use to measure success when getting a job done. If we know how customers measure success, we can create solutions that help them get their jobs done better--and win in the marketplace. These metrics, which we call the customer's desired outcomes, are tied to the customer's job-to-be-done and are unique in many ways. They are: - measurable and controllable, - actionable, - unambiguous, - solution independent and, - stable over time. When listening to music, for example, a music enthusiast may want to: “minimize the time it takes to get the songs in the desired order for listening.” This is one of many outcomes associated with the job of listening to music. Using these customer inputs as customer need statements, you're able to: 1. Understand how your customer measures success. 2. Measure how well your solutions get the job done. 3. Give your team clear instructions on how to improve your solutions. Watch your team transform when they're aligned with the metrics your customers use to measure success. #CustomerNeeds #InnovationProcess

How to Lead Through Innovation – And Actually Make It Work Innovation is no longer optional; it’s essential. But how do you lead through innovation and ensure it becomes a sustainable part of your leadership strategy? Here’s how: → Define Innovation Clearly – Make sure everyone understands what innovation means for your organization and align it with your goals. → Set Specific Goals – Break down big innovation objectives into actionable steps for your teams to tackle effectively. → Assemble Diverse Teams – Bring together different perspectives to foster creativity and broaden the scope of ideas. → Foster Collaboration – Encourage an environment where team members feel safe sharing their ideas and collaborating. → Implement Structured Processes – Use a step-by-step approach to generate, refine, and implement ideas, ensuring consistent progress. → Encourage Experimentation – Create room for testing and refining new ideas in a controlled space, building confidence in your team. → Leverage External Insights – Stay updated on industry trends and insights that can inform your innovation strategies. → Measure Success and Iterate – Continuously assess the impact of innovations and refine your strategy based on results. Innovation is a journey, not a destination. By focusing on these steps, you can make it a sustainable, impactful part of your leadership strategy. What steps do you take to lead innovation in your organization? Let’s discuss! 👇

Here’s a new, highly-timely way to classify innovations: FLEXIBLE vs. INFLEXIBLE. When chaos abounds, prioritize the FLEXIBLE. Yet companies usually spend most money and time on what’s INFLEXIBLE. Six ways to change the balance are: 1️⃣ Map your innovation portfolio How have you spread your bets along axes such as time horizon, type of risk taken, and ability to change course? Know where your portfolio is currently at, and what profile you wish to move toward. 2️⃣ Create options What are inexpensive bets you can place on ways your world might shift? Consider, for instance, low-cost products that might be embraced by customers feeling acute economic pressures. Perhaps these bets have a relatively large probability of not paying off – that’s OK if they’re taken inexpensively, keeping your financial risk small. 3️⃣ Think platforms, not products Platforms create flexibility to change what you offer customers, while retaining a sticky customer relationship. They often have a software component, even in the world of physical goods. 4️⃣ Stay focused on your customers’ constants We can be certain that today’s chaotic environment won’t settle down soon. But your customers’ Jobs to be Done stay fairly constant. Know those very well and concentrate on them. 5️⃣ Prioritize business model and service innovations Product innovation often takes time and multi-year planning. Business model and service innovations are much more flexible (and cheaper), yet oftentimes companies lack clear mechanisms to pursue these. Fix that. 6️⃣ Pursue Costovation You can concentrate some of the less flexible portions of your portfolio on cost innovation (Costovation), because your costs are often more controllable than your revenues. Use the tools of innovation to radically re-think your costs. The innovation literature has many classifications: disruptive vs. sustaining, existing vs. new market, etc. But it’s been rare to classify flexible vs. inflexible. Now’s the time to change that. When everything seems to be swirling, focus on what’s FLEXIBLE.

Is the process of innovation in need of innovation? Most innovation processes are linear. First, you do A. Then, you do B. Each stage-gated step earns you permission to move to the next step. If you’re lucky, you make it to the MVP step, where your prototype arrives in the hands of users. The steps from start through MVP are usually product-focused: What’s the idea? Who needs it? What are their pain points? Which features address the pain points? Answering those questions is a terrific way to build a product. But it’s a terrible way to assess the most important questions: Is somebody going to buy this thing? How many somebodys? It’s not that innovation teams ignore the question of demand. Pre-MVP surveys often assess new product interest. Surveys, however, don’t tell you if people want to buy your product; they just tell you whether people *think* they want to buy your product. Even worse, in many cases survey respondents are paid for their opinions. Are you really going to get a good read on how they will behave when they encounter your product for sale in the real world? 💡 Here’s an idea: Don’t put marketing at the end of the process. Put it at the beginning. Answer the hardest question—does anyone want this product?—as soon as you can. You may be thinking: how do I know which product to market? It’s early days. Good news: you can test-market multiple product concepts or multiple ways to position a product. Use ads. Be honest (“in development” should be prominent). See who clicks. See how many click. If it doesn’t meet your hurdle, try again or pull the plug. Learning early is better than learning late. Lean Startup and its MVP approach were arguably the last big innovation in innovation. But that was over 15 years ago. Isn’t it time for a new look at the process of innovation? #innovation #marketing #demandvalidation #concepttesting #heattesting

Innovation—and making change in general—isn’t about blindly jumping into the unknown. It’s about mixing boldness with a plan. It’s not just having an idea and running with it. Before you step into the open air, you take your wild idea, pack it, check it, test it, and bring that reserve - because you may need to pivot mid-jump. Here's the basic framework my teams use: 💡 IDEATE - take in an idea or brainstorm ones within the team to get after problems or inefficiencies you see in your system, and turn it into a problem statement. ✈ DESIGN - design a portfolio of solutions against that problem statement that you can take and test, along with the process you'll use to define and measure success. Start thinking about who will own it, and how you'll resource it. 🏗 PROTOTYPE - build test solutions and MVPs, and run experiments as needed to test their efficacy. Figure out what works, what doesn't, and what you want to scale. Co-build that refined solution with the champion who will own it. 📈 SCALE - time to build out your solution! Communicate, build your change management plan, and roll it out! 🤝 INTEGRATE - execute that change management plan and make sure your solution works in your ecosystem. 📊 ASSESS - keep checking on things. Is your solution working the way it's supposed to? Is it fixing the problem in your ecosystem? What else needs to be changed? And that's usually what leads you to a new idea. Even with a good plan, the leap is still risky and requires you to be bold. But the effort is (or should be!) grounded in preparation, strategy, and the willingness to adapt mid-air as needed. Happy Friday, team! #ArmyInnovation #LetsGo

Misunderstanding Customer Needs = Innovation Failure Most innovation efforts fail because companies don’t truly understand what their customers want. They optimize existing products, chase trends, and build features based on gut instinct—turning innovation into a frustrating, costly guessing game. But it doesn’t have to be that way. This past Wednesday, I had the fun privilege of sharing "Lean JTBD"—how to unlock the secret of making products customers love—with 39 entrepreneurs and business leaders in a TIGER 🐯 Talk at Innovate New Albany. Big thanks to Neil Collins for hosting! Three takeaways: 1️⃣ People don’t buy products and services; they hire them to get their jobs done. 2️⃣ Customers CAN tell us what they want—if you ask the right questions. 3️⃣ If you don’t understand the “job” your customers are hiring your product/service to do, and where their needs remain unmet, then you’re inevitably missing the mark. And that's a completely avoidable mistake. Don’t ask customers what features they want; ask what they need to accomplish. That’s where true innovation starts; not with a "good idea." If you want to make innovation a repeatable business process, it has to start with understanding customer needs. The fastest way to innovate with confidence? Identify your target customers’ important unmet needs—before building anything. This eliminates guesswork and ensures strong market fit—at concept creation. Want to put these insights into action? I'm creating a free PDF: "The Lean JTBD Playbook"—a three-step guide to help you: ✔️ Choose the right growth strategy for product differentiation ✔️ Redefine your market for innovation ✔️ Obtain customer insights that matter Coming soon! Drop a comment or DM me with 'PLAYBOOK' and I’ll send it your way once it’s ready. #Jobstobedone #Innovation #ProductStrategy #differentiation #CustomerNeeds