There
are two opposing views on the role of the customer in innovation. One
school holds that all innovations start with conversation, observation,
and understanding of the customer (current or potential) with the goal
of surfacing and then filling an unmet need. The other school says that
customers don't know what they need, at least until they see it, and
sometimes a need doesn't even exist until a solution is available to
fill it. There are compelling arguments for both positions, and both
have their advocates.
Complexity theory would tend to favour the
second view. This theory holds that a true understanding of a problem
(such as a need) only emerges in parallel with, and co-dependently
with, awareness of possible 'solutions' or approaches. But it could
also be argued that conversations with customers, to "think them ahead"
and get them to imagine possibilities, and 'cultural anthropology'
observation of customers, are approaches that do start with the customer, in order to "find a need and fill it".
The
evolution of mp3 players is worth a bit of study to decide if this is
really a chicken-and-egg question. Do you remember mini-CDs, about half
the size of regular CDs? They were an early attempt to grapple with the
lack of portability of CD players -- to fill the untapped
(perceived) need for a pocket-sized music player. At the same time,
some large, clunky "jukebox" players used mp3 format to compress
hundreds or thousands of songs into a small hard drive -- to fill the
untapped (perceived) need to transport or back-up a customer's complete
music collection. And at about this time, a new product that no one
thought would ever be accepted, pay (satellite) radio, was introduced.
Contrast the community (the potential customer) and the job-to-be-done (the perceived need) of each of these inventions:
| Community/ Customer | Need / Job to be Done | | mini-CD player | students, commuters, workout enthusiasts who love music on the go | record & play songs with high sound quality with a pocket-size player | | mega-mp3 "juke-box" player | fussy
aficionados with eclectic tastes, and those paranoid about losing
original copies, who sometimes like to port their collection around
with them | record or back up & play an entire 250+ song collection with high sound quality with a transportable player | | pay satellite radio player | picky listeners who lack the time or skill to prerecord their own content | play any of 1000+ 'narrowcast' collections of songs or other audio content, on demand, from anywhere |
I
bought one of the original 6GB "juke-box" mp3 players, transcribed my
entire 'favourite music' collection to it (about 700 songs), and even
bought a waterproof, rechargeable (mono) speaker that attaches to it (I
use it on the pool deck in summer, and for instrumental backup when we
go caroling around the neighbourhood at Christmas). I never understood
the appeal of mini-CD players, or the current lot of mp3 players that
only hold a few dozen songs at a time. Not my community. Nor did I
understand the appeal of satellite radio, since I can simply plug my
"jukebox' into the car radio. But I acknowledge that there was a need
for these products. Music is really important to a lot of people. The three products were designed for three distinct needs and customer communities.
Soon,
the technologies that had been adapted or developed to meet these needs
improved to the point that they satisfied additional needs. The new
iPod-type players render both the mini-CD player and the "juke-box"
player obsolete, since they offer both in one, elegant package, with
some incremental advantages to both products' communities at no extra
cost. And podcasting now allows owners of music players to prerecord
'narrowcast' content as well, opening the potential that satellite
radio, Howard Stern notwithstanding, could be disruptively innovated
out of existence just when it looked like it was getting traction.
But
would the iPod and its ilk have been possible were it not for the
predecessor innovations that filled specific identified needs? Apple
prides itself on its "second mover advantage" -- not innovating, but
rather studying and significantly improving on existing innovations.
And without the Walkman creating the 'need' for portable recorded music
in the first place, and the transistor radio before that, would
customers have had any idea that they 'needed' a portable music player?
Even if someone with great foresight had imagined the possibility of a
device with iPod features fifty years ago, it is doubtful that
potential customers would have viewed it as any less fanciful -- or
'needed' -- than the flying cars that were predicted in that era.
The truth is that most innovations are evolutionary, rather than revolutionary. That doesn't mean they are incremental -- they are discontinuous, making leaps in design, technology application and functionality, but do so in response to evolving customer needs.
Suppose
you wanted to invent the successor to the iPod, the next great portable
electronic device. How would you do it? You'd start with potential
customers, observe what they are doing, converse with them about their
frustrations and wants, identify constituencies or communities of customers with common needs or wants, and articulate the job to be done
by the product or service that will meet those needs and wants. Now you
can fill in the second and third columns of the table above for the
as-yet-undetermined new product or service innovation. When you
identify a whole group of jobs to be done for a whole group
of different customer communities, you are ready to start imagining
possible solutions, using a whole slew of techniques: individual
invention, "thinking the customer ahead" collaborative sessions with
some of the prospective customers, and group brainstorming.
The
successful ideas that emerge from these techniques need to be qualified
for economic feasibility (is the technology ready; can we make money at
it) and organizational fit (do we have the capabilities to produce it),
and then prototypes, pilots or models need to be re-qualified by
potential customers to assess market acceptance (using the flowchart
above).
What might this process come up with in our search for
the next great portable device? Although it's hard to speculate, I
would suggest that the results would be very different from, and much
better than, the results that come from more traditional 'innovation'
processes that start with a 'solution' (some technologically feasible
idea that someone thought up, thought sexy or intriguing, and
sponsored) and then go in search of a 'problem' (need) to apply it to.
Suppose
your target customer community was empty-nesters in affluent nations
who are either retired, semi-retired, or working substantially from
home or virtually. This is going to be a huge
community in a few years. What do they need, what 'job do they need
done', that a portable electronic device might solve? I can tell you
it's probably not about general information, or news -- the kind of
stuff you find on the Internet, or in the information media. It is
quite possibly related to health, and to communication. It may be
related to recreation. It is almost certainly social.
Do you smell some great potential innovations here, and want to know more? Start with some customers.
Flowchart above is further explained in this earlier article. |
MADE IN CANADA
trust your
instincts 
