Value Innovation Portfolio Management by Tait Richard

Author:Tait, Richard...
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2014-06-27T00:01:22.479000+00:00

Figure 5.4 Pitney Bowes hospital medical records example (Source: © Pitney Bowes, Inc. Courtesy of Jill Lawrence; used with permission.)

CUSTOMER PROBLEMS AS STORIES

The next step is just as crucial as data collection and just as often left to imprecise methods. Customer visits yield stacks of interview transcripts and seemingly random observations. What’s needed is a way to refine the raw customer data and integrate it with results from ethnographic observations (the observation of the carpenters struggling with dust or the princess tossing and turning on her mattress). We use a method called image mapping or image diagramming to identify key images and achieve consensus with the portfolio team on a consolidated image. This method works as a means of prioritizing requirements from the customers’ perspective.

The result is creation of a clear image that identifies a scene, a story, or event from the customer’s perspective. This is where the customer’s pain becomes real, tangible, and memorable. Because it derives directly from experience with a customer in his or her own environment, the image map carries both quantifiable information and emotional weight. For example, one PDC client interviewing customers about medical diagnostics equipment observed a large yellow Post-it Note taped to the existing diagnostic system stating: “Push here twice to start.” That image was clearly etched in the minds of the team members conducting the interview in a way that would never have been conveyed through a phone interview or focus group. When translated into a requirement, that image became the basis for solving the customer’s problem: remembering how to start the system.

The purpose of conducting interviews and gathering images is to define the customers’ expressed problems in getting their jobs/goals accomplished and, more importantly, problems not explicitly stated but implied or latent. The next step, translating the customer’s voice into customer requirements, allows the team to reach consensus on the key requirements the development team will address. The word requirement in this case does not refer to a statement of product features such as “padded sides” or “minimal footprint.” Instead, requirement in the context of portfolio definition refers to attributes that customers value. In the golf example described in the sidebar, the images centered on the golfers’ frustrations that the golf bag got in their way instead of being an asset. Golfers desire the removal of all obstacles to playing better golf. A requirement for a golf bag, then, would be this: Golfers have a bag that stays in the position they put it under a maximum number of conditions. Clearly, this is a different kind of requirement than The golf bag has to have soft sides and a rigid bottom.

Clear requirements definitions lead to clear metrics for each requirement that reveal quantitatively whether the portfolio meets customer requirements, as we will discuss in Chapter 9. Armed with fact-based criteria with which to evaluate changes that may occur during the life of the portfolio, the portfolio team can quickly and confidently evaluate trade-offs against specific customer needs. The resulting balance helps

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