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# Organizational Change for JTBD

Overcoming resistance, building jobs-oriented organizations, and avoiding the feature-factory trap.

## Common Objections to JTBD

### "We already know our customers"

**The objection:** "We've been in this business for years. We know what customers want."

**The reality:** You know what customers *say* they want and what they *do*. You may not know *why* they do it.

**Counter:**
- "Great—let's validate that knowledge. If we're right, research will confirm it quickly."
- "When was the last time we talked to customers about their struggles, not our product?"
- "Do we know why customers choose competitors, or why non-customers don't buy?"

### "Jobs theory is too abstract"

**The objection:** "This sounds like academic theory. We need practical action."

**The reality:** JTBD is extremely practical—it tells you what to build and how to market.

**Counter:**
- "Let me show you a job statement for our product. Does this match how we talk about it?"
- "Here's how [successful company] used JTBD to [specific outcome]."
- "What if we ran one customer interview using this method and compared insights?"

### "We don't have time for research"

**The objection:** "We need to ship features, not conduct research."

**The reality:** Shipping the wrong features wastes far more time than research.

**Counter:**
- "How much time did we spend building [feature that didn't work]?"
- "Five customer interviews take ~10 hours. What's the cost of a failed launch?"
- "We can learn the job from 10 interviews. We can't learn it from guessing."

### "Our data tells us what to build"

**The objection:** "We have analytics. We know what users do."

**The reality:** Data shows *what* users do, not *why*. Jobs research explains the why.

**Counter:**
- "Data shows users drop off at step 3. Do we know why?"
- "Our most-used feature might not be our most-valued feature. Data can't tell us."
- "Correlation ≠ causation. We see patterns but don't understand motivations."

### "Our roadmap is set"

**The objection:** "Leadership has already decided what we're building."

**The reality:** JTBD doesn't change what you build—it changes how you build and position it.

**Counter:**
- "Let's use jobs thinking to make sure we build [planned feature] the right way."
- "Understanding the job might reveal quick wins within current plans."
- "We can influence future roadmaps even if this quarter is set."

---

## The Feature-Factory Trap

### What It Looks Like

A feature factory is an organization that:
- Measures success by features shipped, not outcomes achieved
- Builds what stakeholders request without validating need
- Competes by feature matching competitors
- Has roadmaps full of features without hypotheses
- Celebrates launches, not impacts

### Why It Happens

| Cause | Dynamic |
|-------|---------|
| Easier to measure | "Did we ship it?" is binary; "Did it help?" is nuanced |
| Stakeholder demands | "Important person X wants feature Y" |
| Competitor pressure | "They have it, we need it" |
| Customer requests | "Customer asked for X" (but didn't explain job) |
| Short-term thinking | Features feel like progress |

### The Costs

- **Wasted development:** Features nobody uses
- **Product bloat:** Complexity without value
- **Technical debt:** Maintaining unused code
- **Team demoralization:** Shipping without impact
- **Customer confusion:** Product does everything, nothing well

### Breaking Free

**Step 1: Change the conversation**

| Instead of | Ask |
|------------|-----|
| "What features should we build?" | "What jobs aren't being well-served?" |
| "What did the customer request?" | "What job is the customer trying to do?" |
| "What does the competitor have?" | "What job does that feature serve? Do our customers have that job?" |
| "Did we ship it?" | "Did it help customers make progress?" |

**Step 2: Change the metrics**

| Feature-Factory Metrics | Jobs-Oriented Metrics |
|------------------------|----------------------|
| Features shipped | Customer outcomes improved |
| Velocity | Value delivered |
| Usage | Job completion rate |
| NPS | Would you hire us again? |

**Step 3: Change the process**

Before greenlighting any feature:
1. What job does this serve?
2. Who has this job? How many?
3. How well is the job being served today?
4. How will we measure if this helps?

---

## Getting Executive Buy-In

### Speaking Their Language

Executives care about:
- Revenue growth
- Market share
- Competitive advantage
- Customer acquisition/retention
- Resource efficiency

**Frame JTBD in these terms:**

| JTBD Concept | Executive Translation |
|--------------|----------------------|
| Understanding the job | Reduce failed product launches |
| Job-based segmentation | Find underserved market opportunities |
| Competitive analysis | Identify sustainable differentiation |
| Job-oriented metrics | Improve customer retention |

### Making the Business Case

**Case 1: Failed features**
"Last year we shipped 12 major features. 3 moved metrics. JTBD research could have identified which 3 before we built all 12."

**Case 2: Churn analysis**
"Customers leave because we're not doing their job. Exit interviews reveal jobs we didn't know about. What if we knew before they left?"

**Case 3: Competitive loss**
"We lose deals to [competitor]. Is it features or job understanding? Interviews with lost customers could tell us."

**Case 4: Market expansion**
"Our market seems saturated. JTBD reveals non-consumers with the same jobs. That's greenfield opportunity."

### The Pilot Proposal

Start small to prove value:
1. One focused research project (10 interviews, 2 weeks)
2. One product decision influenced by findings
3. Measure the outcome
4. Report back with concrete results

---

## Building a Jobs-Oriented Organization

### Team Structure

**Option 1: Embedded researchers**
- Researchers on each product team
- Continuous discovery, integrated with development
- Best for: Large organizations, complex products

**Option 2: Central research team**
- Shared research capability serving all products
- Standardized methodology, cross-product insights
- Best for: Multiple products, resource constraints

**Option 3: Everyone does research**
- Product managers, designers, engineers all interview
- Research is a skill, not a role
- Best for: Small teams, startups

### Cultural Practices

**Regular customer exposure:**
- Monthly customer interviews for every PM
- Recordings shared team-wide
- "Customer of the week" highlights

**Decision-making rituals:**
- "What job does this serve?" in every roadmap discussion
- Job canvas for every major initiative
- Retrospectives include job validation

**Metrics and reviews:**
- Quarterly job completion metrics
- OKRs connected to customer progress
- Celebrate outcomes, not outputs

### Knowledge Management

**Job documentation:**
- Job atlas maintained and updated
- Interview insights aggregated
- Competitive job mapping shared

**Searchable repository:**
- All interview notes and recordings
- Tagged by job, circumstance, dimension
- Accessible to entire organization

---

## Change Management Playbook

### Phase 1: Awareness (Weeks 1-4)

**Activities:**
- Present JTBD concepts to leadership
- Share case studies relevant to your business
- Identify internal champions
- Conduct one pilot research project

**Milestone:** Leadership agrees to pilot, one team engaged

### Phase 2: Pilot (Weeks 5-12)

**Activities:**
- Train pilot team on JTBD methodology
- Conduct 10-15 customer interviews
- Document job findings
- Apply findings to one product decision
- Measure results

**Milestone:** Pilot produces actionable insights, one decision improved

### Phase 3: Expansion (Months 4-6)

**Activities:**
- Share pilot results broadly
- Train additional teams
- Establish research operations
- Build job documentation
- Connect to roadmap process

**Milestone:** Multiple teams practicing, methodology documented

### Phase 4: Integration (Months 7-12)

**Activities:**
- Jobs language in all product discussions
- Metrics shifted to job completion
- Hiring includes research skills
- Continuous discovery established

**Milestone:** JTBD is "how we work," not "that initiative"

---

## Handling Resistance

### From Engineers

**Concern:** "This is just going to change requirements mid-sprint."

**Response:**
- JTBD happens before sprint planning, not during
- Better job understanding = fewer requirement changes later
- You'll build things people actually use

### From Sales

**Concern:** "Customers tell me what they want. I don't need research."

**Response:**
- Customer requests are input, not output
- Understanding why they want it helps you sell better
- Competitor feature requests aren't always right

### From Marketers

**Concern:** "We already have personas and segments."

**Response:**
- Jobs complement personas with motivation
- Circumstance-based targeting often outperforms demographic
- Job statements make better copy than feature lists

### From Product Managers

**Concern:** "I don't have time for research—I need to ship."

**Response:**
- Five interviews take less time than one failed feature
- Research prevents building the wrong thing
- Good PMs always talk to customers; this just structures it

---

## Measuring Adoption

### Leading Indicators

| Indicator | Sign of Progress |
|-----------|------------------|
| Customer interviews conducted | Research is happening |
| Job statements documented | Learning is being captured |
| Decisions citing job research | Research is influencing work |
| Job questions in meetings | Language is changing |

### Lagging Indicators

| Indicator | Sign of Impact |
|-----------|----------------|
| Feature success rate | Building right things |
| Customer satisfaction | Serving jobs better |
| Retention/churn | Jobs being done |
| Time to value | Onboarding aligned to jobs |

### Anti-Patterns to Watch

- "Job-washing": Using jobs language without doing research
- "One and done": Research project that doesn't continue
- "Cherry-picking": Only sharing findings that support existing plans
- "Performative interviews": Going through motions without learning
