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book2016

Competing Against Luck

Disciplines:
product management
innovation
jobs to be done
christensen

Summary

Clayton Christensen, Taddy Hall, Karen Dillon, and David Duncan's 2016 book presenting the Jobs to Be Done theory — arguing that customers 'hire' products to do specific jobs in their lives, and that understanding the job (not the customer demographic) is the key to innovation.

Core Contribution

Creates the Jobs to Be Done framework — the insight that customers don't buy products, they hire products to do jobs (the famous 'milkshake' example: people hired morning milkshakes not because of demographics but because they needed something to do during a boring commute) reoriented product strategy toward functional, emotional, and social jobs.

Historical Influences

Clayton Christensen Disruption theory

Intellectual Lineage

Clayton Christensen Harper Business

Allied Works

The Innovator's Dilemma Obviously Awesome

Contemporaries & Peers

The Innovator's Dilemma The Lean Startup

Minds Influenced

Product management Lenny's Podcast

Intellectual Posterity

Competing Against Luck Jobs to Be Done Milkshake example

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Competing Against Luck

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