What Customers Want: Using Outcome-Driven Innovation to Create Breakthrough Products and Services (Hardcover)

~ Anthony Ulwick (Author) "The first step in the innovation process is to define the innovation strategy..." (more)
Key Phrases: The Innovator's Solution, Positioning Current Products, Harvard Business School Press

Editorial Reviews

Product Description

A world-renowned innovation guru explains practices that result in breakthrough innovations

"Ulwick's outcome-driven programs bring discipline and predictability to the often random process of innovation."

-Clayton Christensen

For years, companies have accepted the underlying principles that define the customer-driven paradigm--that is, using customer "requirements" to guide growth and innovation. But twenty years into this movement, breakthrough innovations are still rare, and most companies find that 50 to 90 percent of their innovation initiatives flop. The cost of these failures to U.S. companies alone is estimated to be well over $100 billion annually.

In a book that challenges everything you have learned about being customer driven, internationally acclaimed innovation leader Anthony Ulwick reveals the secret weapon behind some of the most successful companies of recent years. Known as "outcome-driven" innovation, this revolutionary approach to new product and service creation transforms innovation from a nebulous art into a rigorous science from which randomness and uncertainty are eliminated.

Based on more than 200 studies spanning more than seventy companies and twenty-five industries, Ulwick contends that, when it comes to innovation, the traditional methods companies use to communicate with customers are the root cause of chronic waste and missed opportunity. In What Customers Want, Ulwick demonstrates that all popular qualitative research methods yield well-intentioned but unfitting and dreadfully misleading information that serves to derail the innovation process. Rather than accepting customer inputs such as "needs," "benefits," "specifications," and "solutions," Ulwick argues that researchers should silence the literal "voice of the customer" and focus on the "metrics that customers use to measure success when executing the jobs, tasks or activities they are trying to get done." Using these customer desired outcomes as inputs into the innovation process eliminates much of the chaos and variability that typically derails innovation initiatives.

With the same profound insight, simplicity, and uncommon sense that propelled The Innovator's Solution to worldwide acclaim, this paradigm-changing book details an eight-step approach that uses outcome-driven thinking to dramatically improve every aspect of the innovation process--from segmenting markets and identifying opportunities to creating, evaluating, and positioning breakthrough concepts. Using case studies from Microsoft, Johnson & Johnson, AIG, Pfizer, and other leading companies, What Customers Want shows companies how to:

-Obtain unique customer inputs that make predictable innovation possible -Recognize opportunities for disruption, new market creation, and core market growth--well before competitors do -Identify which ideas, technologies, and acquisitions have the greatest potential for creating customer value -Systematically define breakthrough products and services concepts

Innovation is fundamental to success and business growth. Offering a proven alternative to failed customer-driven thinking, this landmark book arms you with the tools to unleash innovation, lower costs, and reduce failure rates--and create the products and services customers really want.

From the Back Cover

"Ulwick's outcome-driven programs bring discipline and predictability to the often random process of innovation." --Clayton Christensen, author of The Innovator's Solution

"We are institutionalizing across the entire company desired outcomes as the essential form of customer input we collect in research, and we've seen the powerful results it's had in our product development, marketing, and sales groups." --Jeff Baker, Senior Market Research Manager, Corporate Market Research, Microsoft

"Outcome-driven thinking made it possible for us to hit a home run in the mature and competitive circular saw market. The Bosch CS20 is a breakthrough innovation and a hit with both users and our channel partners." --Jason Schickerling, Product Manager, Bosch CS20

"Being outcome-driven enabled us to grow our market share in the angioplasty balloon market from less than 1 percent to over 20 percent and to create the stent, which became a billion-dollar business in less than two years." --Rick Faleschini, Vice President of Marketing, Johnson & Johnson

"This approach enabled us to devise breakthrough Web-based service solutions and to make valued operational process changes. Knowing where to focus our creativity made all the difference in the world." --Paul Zarookian, Executive Vice President, Financing Division, A. I. Imperial

"This methodology was used to create the PRO7150 and the TalkAbout--two of our best-selling radio products to date. It was also used to build a valuable patent portfolio in the fuel cell market without making a large investment in technology." --Dr. Robert Pennisi, Director, Advanced Product Technology Center, Motorola

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 256 pages
• Publisher: McGraw-Hill; 1 edition (August 16, 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0071408673
• ISBN-13: 978-0071408677
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 5.9 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (19 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #132,321 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

18 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A must read for all R & D groups, July 10, 2006

By	Mitchell Auran (Miami, Florida) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

I have read several new books on innovation and I finally understand why Clayton Christensen referenced the work of Tony Ulwick frequently in his book the Innovator's Solution. Although at first blush, Ulwick's thinking could be cast aside as common sense, this book has made me realize that there is a brilliant, new way to think about innovation.

Let me try to explain how Ulwick frames his thinking. Generally speaking, innovation is the process of finding solutions that address the customer's unmet needs. Most companies agree that they should first uncover and prioritize the customer's unmet needs and then devise solutions that address them - but, as Ulwick explains very well, although companies think they understand this concept, they continue to get it so very wrong - to the point where their customer-driven, "voice of the customer" led efforts are causing the failures they are trying to avoid!

This book makes it clear that because companies are focused on customers and products (and not the job the customer is trying to get done), they are simply getting the wrong inputs into innovation, and incredibly, they don't know it. In my experience, this is exactly right. Ulwick contends that to truly succeed at innovation companies must understand just what a customer "need" is. Ulwick's notion that different innovation strategies require different customer inputs (needs) was an epiphany for me.

In his books and articles on innovation, Clayton Christensen mentions the jobs-to-be-done theory, but Ulwick turns this theory into a science by making the job the customer is trying to get done - not the customer or competition - the focal point of innovation. Ulwick provides ample evidence that the customers desired outcomes are the building blocks of innovation - the customers' measures of value - but they are rarely the company's focus of capture when using traditional "voice of the customer" techniques. In fact, Ulwick suggests that companies should "silence the literal voice of the customer", an argument that I now understand and agree with. His argument that there is no such thing as a latent, unarticulated need is also quite compelling.

Rarely does a book offer such new insight and theory along with practical ideas for execution and implementation. I have since read other articles on their web site (strategyn.com) and have become a fan. This sounds like the future of innovation to me.

16 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Good but not great, January 17, 2007

By	V. L. Gallagher (Almere, Netherlands) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

If you are new to market research or product innovation, this book is practical and easy to read and I recommend it. No need to read further in my comment.
For the more experienced reader: As a businessperson, I was disappointed in this book. At first I was carried away; Ulwick is a good writer. I was so excited, I restared the book and took notes. That is when I realized that this is essentially a marketing tool for his company. Ulwich doesn't give insight into how to find the "50-150" criteria he mentions beyond saying that good marketing researchers are important. Furthermore his comments about customer-driven innovation are incorrect. While I agree with him that many companies behave as he describes, this is because, as with other business tools/concepts, customer-driven innovation is misunderstand and misused. Most of what he talks about is identical to what I tell employees during training. What I got out of this book was a handful of sentences about focusing on the job your customer needs done, the constraints and the criteria by which customers will measure your "solution".

16 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Don't use a Shotgun to target Customers, December 22, 2005

By	Michael Davis "www.byvation.com" (Arlington, TX) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

Question: What do people want?

Answer: To get their job done? (Whatever the job may be, such as to regain energy in their bodies, or to be entertained).

In his series on innovation, Clayton Christensen touches upon the Jobs-to-be-done theory. Ulwick dives into it by showing us that what customers really want is desired outcomes.

Customers are strange creatures. On one hand they openly say what they want and then turn around and do exactly the opposite. The reasons for this is that customers often are not able to articulate what they want - except in the form of desired outcomes.

Stop spinning your wheels. If you're serious about creating something new and innovative, then you need to study this book to learn how to find out what customers really want.

Venture Capitalists, Angels, and almost every serious investor in the world wants to see two things in every venture: 1) Customers who love the product because it satisfies a burning need, and 2) Business Models that capture a significant amount of value created.

Customers are by far the most important aspect of any successful venture, yet time and time again attention is not paid to proving beyond a shadow of a doubt that a given product gives customers what they want.

Ulwick says that "... most companies come up with ideas and solutions and then test them with customers to see if they will buy - without ever knowing how customers measure value." From my personal experience I know that Ulwick is dead on. Most entrepreneurs and business professionals understand very little about what customers truly consider value. Instead they heap on the features - hoping to shotgun their way to hitting that one aspect customers want.


If you're serious about creating a successful enterprise, then you need to read this book. And, if you are just too hard pressed for time, at least read his article in Strategy & Innovation titled "Do You Really Know What Your Customers Are Trying to Get Done?" (Harvard Business Online).

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Michael Davis, Editor - Byvation

"Business Success through Innovation"