Idea Facilitation—A Tool for Experience and Service Innovation

1.1 Ideation in cross-functional teams

In the context of product and service, innovation does not happen in isolation, nor does development of a product or service. It requires a cross-functional team—most of whom are not designers and may not even be familiar with design practices such as creative ideation. In digital product or service offering, more often than not the core team developing/enhancing product consists of multiple functions—most of which are not product creators or makers, such as business, marketing, and sales, with little or no familiarity with creating new, let alone design, processes and practices such as ideation.

Instead, in cross-functional settings, ideation has become synonymous with group thinking, cognitive inertia, and adherence to the status quo. The unstructured groups, left to their own devices, are not effective in developing creative ideas (Brown and Paulus, 2002). This is similar to what brainstorm became before the prevalence of the term ideation in corporate America—a roundtable meeting that often gives way to fear of judgment, cognitive inertia, and a lack of innovative or out-of-the-box thinking (Isaksen and Gaulin, 2005). Essentially, such ideation sessions fail to bring out the value of a group with its breadth of knowledge and various viewpoints.

Additionally, it is difficult for most individuals to think beyond their expertise, especially if the cross-functional team has deep, technical expertise in their field and function. Although that deep expertise is extremely valuable in the various stages of experience and service development, it inhibits broad, lateral thinking.

1.2 Gap between insights and innovation strategy

Today, with companies doubling down on accumulating qualitative and quantitative research on product, customers, and competition, there is no dearth of data. Yet, we have witnessed many times how the most amazing research can lead to the most unamazing and underwhelming products. Why does this occur? Is it an organizational problem, or a problem with the field of practice-based research (i.e., short-term research for the purpose of developing products and services)? Most importantly, how might we mind the gap between insight and development of new offerings? The answer is simple—the problem lies in how the data and the generated insights are used to innovate. In such cases, groups tend to narrowly solve the identified problems, resulting in short-term product/service changes that lack strategic vision, or a strategic direction often at odds with the actual research insights.

Most organizations spend time in “quick wins” and “low-hanging fruit,” which is neither revolutionary nor evolutionary—and never results in innovative solutions. In any given service–experience development, the first step is bridging the gap between the research insights and innovation strategy—identification of an offering that has commercial potential. Many refer to this as the “fuzzy front end of innovation,” which is also considered the most challenging and uncertain part of the offering development process. This is where creative ideation and idea facilitation frameworks can help. These creative ideation tools can bridge the gap between research and development.

1.3 A case for idea facilitation tools and frameworks

The role of ideation is threefold—to balance the expertise of the participating individuals with existing insights while prompting the group to imagine and envision new realities. But when ideation goes awry, it becomes a deterrent to innovation. Additionally, ideation is a key part of the fuzzy front end of innovation development. It is the gateway to identifying and developing the plausible solutions. Information gathering, sense making, and idea generation are typical tasks of the front end—having a high influence on project outcomes in terms of innovation and new-to-the-market ideas (Herstatt and Verworn, 2004).

Hence, a structured approach to idea facilitation can help achieve the maximum opportunities availed by ideation sessions: creative and innovative product/service ideas. Structured ideation frameworks can discourage linear thinking and encourage teams to think strategically and laterally—by switching perspectives, identifying multiple points of view (POVs), challenging assumptions, and contextualizing problems.

2.1 Journey mapping jobs

This framework is based on Christensen’s Jobs to Be Done (JTBD) work, which is based on the notion that customers do not want products—they want their jobs/tasks to be done, which essentially means products are a means to an end—in this context, the end is the completion of a job or task. In his famous example of a fast-food company wanting to boost their milkshake sales, the company was looking at other milkshake companies as a competitor, but upon analyzing customer behavior and morning breakfast routines/journey, it was discovered they were in competition with quick bite/breakfast options. That discovery reframed their “milkshake competitive market” to the broader “quick bite/breakfast market.” This reframe brought new opportunities for selling, retailing, and dispensing milkshakes that were never considered before.

This reframe of milkshakes from being a side order to a quick bite substitute explains the job-defined markets perspective compared to the traditional product category–defined markets. Job-defined markets are generally much larger than product category–defined markets. The unit of analysis for successful product is not the price point, or the customer demographic, but the job the product is intended to do (Christensen, Cook, and Hall, 2005). This framework gets more interesting in the age of the sharing economy, or experience economy. Not understanding customers’ perspectives and their task/job journey leads to a lack of understanding of the market, keeping the product stuck and disallowing product growth.

The JTBD framework is easy to understand in theory, but there is a cognitive gap in shifting the thinking from the product category–defined market to the job-defined landscape. In the last decade, JTBD has taken on a life of its own, with rigorous methods from research to product roadmaps, but they do not quite capture the essence of Christensen’s job-defined landscape—understanding the task at hand and the many alternative ways it can be accomplished, to either broaden the product delivery by creating new experiences or offering new products or services.

The Journey Mapping Jobs framework follows the actual JTBD thinking and helps close the gap between product category–defined market and job-defined landscape. It does so by using the customer journey–mapping structure that aids the thinking. This structure has three steps: (1) identifying the core goal—job/task, (2) mapping the customer journey of the existing solution, and (3) mapping the experience by subtracting, shifting, or adding steps.

To illustrate the point, consider ideating for an opportunity around “fast and private localized travel without the hassle of owning a car.” The core goal (job to be done) is to reach the destination without owning a car, but still be fast and private. This eliminates public transportation such as buses, trains, and trams, as they are neither fast nor private. The remaining option is the existing solution of hailing a taxi. The as-usual thinking would be to create a “better taxi service”: newer cabs, faster service, multiple payment options. This thinking narrows the solutions to the product–service category—taxi services—limiting the scope of the opportunity and consequently market share by drawing a boundary and thinking within it. But through the use of the Journey Mapping Jobs framework—first, the core customer goal is identified, followed by the analysis of the current taxi experience, and shifting, adding, and removing the steps in the journey—a new experience/service proposition is identified.

2.2 Megatrends

Megatrends are large, national, and international transformative forces that impact both consumers and businesses. They have a far-reaching impact on business, society, culture, economies, and individuals. These far-reaching consequences will play out over a decade or more. The term megatrend is usually attributed to John Naisbitt’s book Megatrends, published in 1982. They are a strategic foresight tool used to future-proof product strategy and develop disruptive product innovation.

Like other methods in foresight research, analyses of megatrends are considered more art than science. It is less about predictability and more about how prepared the organization is for the potential scenarios. These foresights and trends are based on deep insights in technology, demographics, regulations, and lifestyles, and they can be utilized to create new markets and identify white space. Although understanding the trends and their implications requires creativity and imagination, the vision and foresight cannot be based on the fantastical (Hamel and Prahalad, 1994).

Typical examples of such megatrends are demographic changes (e.g., global and national ageing and the need for care) and climate change (e.g., rethinking urban planning around the world).

This framework helps in connecting the practice-based design research insights to the larger national and international trends that have broader implications. If practice-based design research is contextual and micro, the megatrends can be considered a macro and broader perspective. Each industry might have a variation of the megatrends, but they are broad enough to encapsulate the key trends that affect every walk of life, including the businesses.

2.3 Strategy paradoxes

This framework asserts that designers approach new product–service propositions from the perspective of designing for attributes and benefits, whereas the service providers and business units within the same organization look at designing for return on investment (ROI) and corporate value. Bau (2010), the author of this strategy framework, argues that neither of the approaches are fit to direct and inspire the vague front end of product–service innovation. Instead, a third approach, “designing for strategy dichotomies and paradoxes,” may be a better fit for leading and inspiring the product–service innovation. Although the conversation about ROI and corporate value tells us what the business objectives are, it does not lead the path to how to achieve them. On the other hand, the benefits and features of a product that bring customers value are hard to translate into 1:1 financial modeling. Neither does the customer benefit/feature perspective translate into innovation.

The dichotomies framework is based on bipolar opposites such as global versus local and tangible versus ephemeral. This highlights two opposing, contradictory perspectives—underlying that you have to choose one or the other. The biggest reframe of this framework is treating these dichotomies as paradoxes—undertaking both at the same time, but perhaps with varying degrees. For example, a food service may feature global cuisine with local ingredients, making it both global and local at the same time.

This framework serves four key purposes: (1) it explores open-ended problems by looking at two seemingly opposing perspectives at the same time; (2) the dichotomies and paradoxes encourage a common frame or references for multifunctional teams and encourage collaboration; (3) it enables long-term objectives and goals, beyond the current customer needs and benefits or the current business value; and (4) it forces the organization and its multifunctional teams to keep abreast of and be in tune with socioeconomic and technology trends.

These five key dichotomies and paradoxes are taken from Bau’s (2010) list. These are the most overarching ones, relevant for any sector and industry:

4.1 Comprehension and applicability

Megatrends. When it came to ease of understanding, the majority of participants found the megatrends framework to be the easiest one to comprehend and execute. Mostly due to familiarity with the notion of megatrends, teams found it easy to pick up and apply.

Journey mapping. Most participants were familiar with journey mapping either as a tool to visualize research findings or to explain a product–service vision. It took a little time for them to understand that this framework covered beyond ideating and finding solutions to the particular pain points. But once the concept was understood by seeing examples, they were able to apply the framework quickly. The success of the framework hinged on their familiarity with journey maps, even if they were not creatively involved in creating one.

Strategy paradoxes. This was the hardest one for most to apply conceptually. It was not difficult to understand, but the application and execution of the framework were hard for most teams, primarily because most are used to using them as dichotomies, as opposing factors rather than paradoxes, utilizing both at the same time but with variable intensity. Although the framework resulted in the most innovative ideas, that surprised even the teams.

Strategy canvas. The comprehension of the framework was medium, as were the application and execution. This framework truly utilized the skills and competencies of those with the perspective of broad offerings versus the product feature view.

4.2 Level of experience

The level of product development experience positively impacted the response and execution of the idea facilitation frameworks regardless of creative or noncreative experience. Participants with less product development experience found the frameworks difficult to understand and utilize and required more time and explanations.

4.3 Illustrative examples

Participants were appreciative of examples, which were crucial to the success of the idea facilitation—they explained the frameworks better than any description.

4.4 Cognitive and corporate inertia

The use of frameworks appeared to curtail the cognitive inertia to some extent. Some participants were observably uncomfortable, as the ideation frameworks forced them to think beyond the norm. It kept them away from the tendency of groupthink, as the ideation frameworks were taking them to unchartered ideas.

4.5 Fear of judgment

The structure of the ideation workshop with its prechosen frameworks decreased the fear of judgment, or peer conformity, if not completely eradicated it. Partly because the framework forced certain perspectives and outcomes,.it lent itself to collaboration rather than conformity.

4.6 Workshop structure

The idea facilitation workshop by design gave participants the ability to execute on the frameworks one by one, along with additional time before team presentations to rethink or augment their ideas.

4.7 Group presentations

Structured toward the end of the workshop, participants were interested in learning from other participants’ application of the frameworks and the outcomes. Overall, the participant feedback was to add group share after every framework to learn from other teams, as each team had varied outcomes.