When I am considering buying a solution, I want to know whether my problem needs one, so I do not buy a tool for a problem that lives somewhere else.

Job context

Who

Someone trying to fix a problem in their organisation

When

Before starting to look at vendors

Trigger

A previously bought tool that nobody uses

Situation

The problem usually lives in the process rather than the tool

Constraints

Buying a tool is far easier than changing how people work

5 Pains

• Cannot locate where the real problem is

  High

  The symptom is clear and the cause is not.

  Root cause: Symptoms appear far from where the cause sits

• Buying a tool is easier than changing behaviour

  High

  So people choose the easier one.

  Root cause: A purchase can be approved and a behaviour change cannot

• Previously bought tools go unused

  High

  And the fees continue.

  Root cause: Nobody reviews what was already bought

• Each vendor frames the problem toward their own product

  Medium

  Each framing sounds reasonable.

  Root cause: Whoever frames the problem sells the solution to it

• The cost of the problem is not measured

  Medium

  So nobody knows what it is worth spending.

  Root cause: The cost of an operational problem appears in no ledger

5 Desired Outcomes

• Locate the real problem

  Functional

• Weigh the option of buying nothing

  Functional

• Know how already-bought tools are being used

  Functional

• Hear a framing not attached to a product

  Social

• Know what the problem is costing

  Functional

5 Existing Solutions

A solution is not the same thing as a product, a customer can hire a behaviour or a workaround too.

• Ask the people doing the work

  Behaviour

  The most accurate source about the problem, and rarely asked.

• Measure the current process before buying

  Behaviour

  The only way to know what is being solved, costing weeks with nothing to show.

• Take framing from several vendors

  Product

  Gives several framings, each leading back to the speaker's product.

• Try fixing the process before buying

  Behaviour

  The cheapest route and often sufficient, producing nothing to report.

• Audit the tools already being paid for

  Behaviour

  Usually finds something already owned, and is assigned to nobody.

2 Opportunity Gaps

• Whoever frames the problem for the buying organisation sells the solution to it, so the problem is always defined in the shape of a product that already exists.

  Why existing solutions fail: The only source that frames the problem without selling is the people doing the work, and they are rarely invited into the conversation, so an organisation hears about its own problem from outsiders before insiders.

  Potential opportunity: A problem-definition step done internally and finished before any vendor is contacted.

• Organisations can measure the price of a tool because it is an invoice and cannot measure the cost of the problem, so the comparison always has only one side.

  Why existing solutions fail: The cost of an operational problem is spread through many people's time and appears on no line in any ledger, so it is both large and invisible, and every buying decision is made without knowing what it is being compared against.

  Potential opportunity: Measuring the problem in the real hours of the people doing the work, before looking at any product.