Jobs-to-be-done at scale: Disrupting the status quo with customer focus

Jim Kalbach, Yann Wermuth, Sabrina Duda and Florin Ciontu
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Jim Kalbach: Mural, USA
Yann Wermuth: Vendbridge AG, Switzerland
Sabrina Duda: The Stepstone Group, UK
Florin Ciontu: The Stepstone Group, UK

Journal of Digital & Social Media Marketing, 2024, vol. 12, issue 3, 262-275

Abstract: This paper shows how Stepstone leveraged the Jobs-to-be-done (JTBD) framework to achieve customer focus at scale. Transformations typically span a decade and often fall short of initial goals. In under three years, however, Stepstone successfully ingrained a strong customer-focused mindset throughout the organisation, with tangible contributions to its product pipeline. Four phases were critical. First, recognising the need for change, setting a vision and getting senior leadership in touch with JBTD was critical. Secondly, an extensive customer research project identifying opportunities was conducted; indepth qualitative research uncovered Jobs-to-be-done and unmet user needs and a large sample size survey quantified these unmet needs. Thirdly, internal JTBD champions in the product and research departments were trained on the insights and provided with tools to apply them in workshops across the organisation. Finally, JTBD insights were integrated into regular product development. Stepstone is on course for shifting the mindset from inside-out (ie a technology-driven perspective focused on optimising and scaling existing solutions) to an outside-in viewpoint (ie a focus on unmet user needs in the market and user-focused growth and innovation).

Keywords: jobs-to-be-done; innovation; customer experience; user experience; human-centred; user-focused (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: M3 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2024
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