Tony Ulwick's 'Customer Job Innovation Map' in May Harvard Business Review

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by: John Caddell

Recent Shop Talk Podcast guest Tony Ulwick, with Strategyn colleague Lance Bettencourt, has written an article in this month’s Harvard Business Review ("The Customer-Centered Innovation Map").

The article elaborates on some of the topics we talked about in the podcast, and on Clayton Christensen’s thinking that a product or service is focused on improving how someone completes a particular job (i.e., Levitt’s 1/4" hole). To that end, Ulwick and Bettencourt propose a universal structure for decomposing a job into eight discrete steps, each of which is candidate for innovation.

The authors take the position that a job (what the customer is trying to accomplish) is distinct from a process (how the job is currently done). Focusing on processes leads to tunnelvision and poor innovation, while a job focus opens up a broad terrain for innovation.

Related Posts:
Shop Talk Podcast #4: Tony Ulwick on What Customers Want

Original Post: http://shoptalkmarketing.blogspot.com/2008/05/tony-ulwicks-customer-job-innovation.html