Jobs To Be Done – The Practical

Guide for Product Managers

Written by: Ankit Shukla for HelloPM.co

It’s easy to fall in love with your product idea.

The new technology (AR/VR/AI/ML/Web3 or anything) that you have recently read
about, appears to create a dent in the universe. You believe that the users would
absolutely love the product because of its latest tech, super dope UI, and whatnot.

However, the reality hits when you launch the product and no one seems to care about
it.

This is, unfortunately, the reality of many products. These products majorly fail to
understand the customer needs well.

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 The good news is, with the right approach we can make a lot of people care about our
product (or create products that people care about). One of those effective approaches
is Understanding the user’s Job to be done.

The fundamental idea behind Jobs to be done

Jobs to be Done is a framework proposed by Clayton Christensen, and is centered

around the idea that “People hire your product to perform a certain job they need to
get done”.

This framework puts the user’s problem and context at the center and then helps us
understand their thought process to find the correct product to address their need.

Product managers can use the Jobs to be Done framework to reveal important user
insights which can in turn help them:

1. Create new products,

2. Improve existing products,

3. Finding the right competitors,

4. Prioritize the product roadmap, and

5. Decide the right marketing and positioning strategies.

Later in this article, we will understand these use cases with relevant examples.

Understanding Jobs to be Done

Jobs to be done help us understand the reason why people use certain products.

For example: When we buy a drill, what we are effectively looking for is a hole in the
wall. The drill is the product we have hired to get the job of “drilling the hole” done.

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 Rather than focus on the demographics of the users, Jobs to be Done focuses on
understanding:

1. The Job: The functional, social, and emotional tasks the consumer wants to
accomplish.

2. The Circumstances: The specific context in which the job needs to be done.

By focusing on these two aspects, companies can better understand customer

motivations and create products or services that effectively meet those needs.

I want to use Spotify to help me play music to make my trip with friends memorable.

Steps to Implement Jobs to Be Done Framework

Jobs to be done can be implemented by following these 5 steps:

1. Identify the job: Talk to users, conduct surveys, and do observational research to
find out why people use or hire your product.

2. Define the job: Clearly define what the job is all about. Consider all aspects
including functional, social, and emotional aspects.

3. Understand the circumstances: Identify the context or circumstances in which the

job is performed.

4. Prioritize the right job: Not every job would be important to customers or relevant
to your business. Filter and prioritize the most appropriate job.

5. Design a solution: Develop a product or service that helps the customer get the
job done more effectively. Find analogies, research competition, and brainstorm
with your team to find the right solutions.

A common mistake to avoid while using jobs to be

done

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 Most people only consider the functional aspect of the job, and miss on important
underlying emotional and social motivations. We, humans, are emotional and social
animals, and most of our decisions are not logical. Hence uncovering the emotional and
social jobs is critical to creating any good product.

Here is a list of emotional, social, and functional jobs taken from Bain’s needs pyramid.

Job steps and variables

To create innovative products, you need to go deep into a job and its context.

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 A great way to look at a job is to break it down into job steps and needs. Job steps are
the intermediatory steps the user has to go through in order to get the job done, needs
are the problems/desires associated with each job step, while variables are factors that
can be optimized to make their experience better or worse.

Let’s consider an example:

The job of Travelling from point A to point B can be broken down as follow.

Job Steps Job Needs Job Variables

Determining the Need to consider factors like traffic, weather,

Time of day, Day of the week
departure time and any appointments at the destination.

Available transport options,

Choosing the Need to evaluate options based on cost,
personal preferences,
mode of speed, convenience, personal preferences,
environmental
transportation and environmental impact.
considerations
Need to consider the fastest, safest, and most
Planning the Traffic conditions, Road
convenient route. Traffic and road conditions
route conditions, GPS availability
should also be taken into account.

Need to ensure that all necessary items are

Commencing Weather conditions, Vehicle
packed (if applicable), and that the mode of
the journey condition
transportation is safe and ready.
Navigating Need to follow the planned route, making
Traffic updates, GPS
through the adjustments as necessary based on real-time
reliability
route conditions.

Arriving at the Need to find parking (if applicable) and ensure Availability of parking, safety
destination personal belongings are collected. of parking location

Job steps, needs, and variables

Now as product managers, we can focus on improving the job variables to give users a
better experience. This unlocks a new world of possibilities for user-centric innovation.
For example, Google map helps us understand traffic condition well, and improve the
job steps of navigation.

How to frame job statements

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 There are multiple ways to frame the jobs statement, one of the popular templates is:

When (situation), I want to (job), so I can (expected outcome).

Here are a few examples:

Music Streaming App “When I’m working out at the gym, I want to listen to high-
energy music, so I can stay motivated and enjoy my workout.”

Project Management Tool “When I’m managing a team project, I want to easily
assign tasks and deadlines, so I can ensure the project is completed on time and
nothing falls through the cracks.”

E-Commerce Platform “When I’m shopping for clothes online, I want to see how
the clothes look on models of my size, so I can make a better purchase decision.”

Food Delivery App “When I’m too tired to cook after a long day of work, I want to
order food from my favorite local restaurant, so I can relax and enjoy a good meal.”

Online Learning Platform “When I’m trying to learn a new programming language, I
want to practice with real-world projects, so I can gain practical experience and build my

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 portfolio.”
Each of these Job Statements gives a clear idea of the job to be done, the context in
which it arises, and the goal that the user wants to achieve. This clarity can guide the
product development process, ensuring that new features or products are designed to
meet real user needs.

Practical uses of jobs to be done for Product Managers

Product managers have a lot of important applications of Jobs to be done. Here are a
few of them with examples.

✨ Create new products

Understanding the important user needs and desires is an absolutely essential part of
any new product or service development. Looking at user needs from a Job to be done
perspective makes it easier and more effective to uncover the real user needs:
For example, Uber might have been created from the job statement

“When I need to get from one place to another quickly and conveniently, I want to
request a reliable ride from my current location, so I can reach my destination on time
without the hassle of driving or finding parking.”

This statement captures the core job that Uber does for its customers: providing a
convenient, reliable transportation option that can be requested on-demand from
virtually anywhere. It highlights the convenience factor, the need for reliability, and the
desire to avoid the common hassles associated with traditional transportation methods,
such as dealing with traffic and finding parking.

🛠 Improve existing products

By identifying the right job users hire your product for and breaking it down into job
steps and variables you can make the right additions and improvements to your
product.

For example, Uber understood that one of the critical job steps to give the best
experience to the user is to make sure the rider feels safe across the journey. Hence

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 they have launched many safety features like share location, emergency contacts, and
even an SOS button.

The key here is to go deep into the jobs users are trying to do, map the complete user
journey inside and outside your product into job steps and then improve for associated
variables.

🥊 Find the right competitors

The Jobs to be Done (JTBD) framework can be used to identify competitors by focusing
on the job that customers are trying to get done, rather than focusing on the product or
service itself.

In the JTBD framework, a competitor is any solution that a customer could use to get a
job done. This can include traditional direct competitors that offer a similar product or
service, but it can also include indirect competitors that offer a different type of solution
for the same job.

Let’s consider the job of “Booking a Cab.”

Job to be Done: “When I need to reach a destination at a specific time, I want to book a
reliable and timely ride, so I can arrive promptly and comfortably.”
Potential Solutions (Competitors): Uber, Lyft, traditional taxi services, public
transportation (buses, trams, metro), bike or scooter rentals, walking, driving your own
car, car rental services, etc.
In this example, while Uber and Lyft are direct competitors in the ride-hailing market,
traditional taxi services also serve the same job and can be considered competitors.
Other modes of transportation like public transit, bike rentals, or driving one’s own car
also get the job done and are thus competitors.
Even non-transportation solutions could be seen as competitors if they serve the job,
such as teleconferencing software that eliminates the need to travel for a meeting.

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 Understanding these competitors gives a broader view of the competitive landscape
and can inform decisions about how to differentiate the product, improve service, and
appeal to more customers.

🎯 Prioritize the product roadmap

Every job and job need is not the same. As a product manager, you need to solve for
jobs that are

1. Important for the user

2. Impactful for the business

Jobs to be done will help you assess the importance of the job by understanding its
criticality and how painful is the current experience for the user.
The Reach and Impact part of RICE prioritization is drawn from the importance of the
job that the user is hiring the product for, given a specific context.

📣 Decide the right marketing and positioning strategies.

By far we have known that the users care less about our products, and more about the
job in their life that the product accomplishes them to do.

This insight can help marketing and growth teams to craft compelling value propositions
with the user’s job and context at the center.
In your value proposition, you need to communicate the job in the language the user
can relate to, and clearly mention how you help them accomplish it in a better way.

For example, the job statement for Slack is:

“When I’m working with a team, I want to communicate and collaborate efficiently, so we
can get more done and keep everyone in the loop.”

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 Taking help from this job statement, Slack positions itself as a “channel-based
messaging platform,” emphasizing its ability to bring team communication and
collaboration into one place, making it easy to stay organized and productive. It’s
messaging often highlights features like integrated file sharing, searchable history, and
integration with other tools, showing how it does the job better than alternatives.

Major ideas to take away from the Jobs to Done

Framework

The three important takeaway ideas from implementing Jobs to Be Done are:

󾠮 Focus on the problems and context of the users, rather than only their
demographics. From persona to problems.

󾠯 Generally the core jobs of the users remain consistent. The basic jobs of commuting,
being healthy, earning money, saving money, building relationships, etc. are constant
across the ages. The products which do these effectively are able to replace the older
ones. Innovate solutions by understanding the problems well.

󾠰 Empathy inspires Innovation. Understand the job steps and variables really well in-
depth. This will help you get to the real needs and motivations of the users.

That was all about Jobs to be done, I hope you folks use it to create better
products.

Here are other product management frameworks that can help you create better
products.

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