A Unifying Concept Between Design and Innovation

Jobs-to-be-Done practitioners aren't the only ones to think like this

The Finnish architect and designer Eliel Saarinen said…

“Always design a thing by considering it in its next larger context – a chair in a room, a room in a house, a house in an environment, an environment in a city plan.”

While this is a solution-space concept, it addresses the next larger goal. When I saw this it struck me that this is exactly what we preach in the Jobs-to-be-Done world of innovation. By addressing the larger problem, we find opportunities for growth which can often result in disruption.

For example, how did the turntable play a vinyl record in the broader context of a music enthusiast who was trying to listen to music? It was a single thing in a larger context that required multiple things to get the job done completely. Could the one thing help the music enthusiast in other ways? The answer is probably no.

However, thinking about the objectives of people in a larger context allows us to identify resources as they emerge that can be applied in new ways to help us reach…