It's common for UX teams to begin improvement efforts with a friction audit. These reviews analyze where in the user journey confusion, delays, or drop-offs happen – often by tracking clicks, session times, error messages, or abandoned tasks. While useful, focusing strictly on friction points only tells part of the story.

Here’s the limitation: friction audits focus on user interactions, but not necessarily user intentions. They spotlight where users struggle, but not why they came to the product in the first place or what job they were hoping it would help them accomplish.

Think of a customer struggling with an online budgeting tool. A friction audit may reveal that they abandon the setup process. You may simplify the form or shorten onboarding – but what if the real issue is that the user doesn’t understand how this tool helps them save money each month? Without knowing that deeper goal, experience design becomes reactive rather than strategic.

Limitations of focusing only on friction audits:

• Improvements may be superficial – making things easier, but not more meaningful.
• Insights are based on what users do, not what they need or hope to accomplish.
• UX changes risk being feature-focused instead of outcome-focused.

This is where Jobs to Be Done complements traditional UX testing. JTBD allows teams to ask: "What progress was the user trying to make?" and "What triggered their search for a solution in the first place?" It's not just about making the current journey smoother – it's about ensuring the journey is worth taking.

By integrating JTBD thinking into your UX process, your research expands beyond surface-level usability tests. You start designing not just to remove barriers, but to match human goals with intuitive, user-centered product design. The result? Experiences that feel more relevant because they’re rooted in real user needs, not just analytics dashboards.

The Jobs to Be Done framework helps UX researchers dig deeper into the motivations behind user behavior. Instead of asking, “What isn’t working in our product?”, JTBD prompts a more strategic question: “What job is the user hiring our product to do?”

In this context, a “job” isn’t a task or feature – it’s the progress a person is trying to make in a specific situation. Whether that’s ‘stay organized while planning a trip’ or ‘feel confident about managing my finances,’ these jobs reflect emotional and functional goals. Using JTBD to understand user behavior helps teams move from making features better to making users' lives better.

Here’s what the Jobs to Be Done framework uncovers:

• User motivations: What’s the push behind their decision to use your product now?
• Desired outcomes: What are they trying to achieve that goes beyond product functionality?
• Barriers to progress: What emotional, contextual, or functional blockers may stand in their way?

Unlike traditional personas, JTBD focuses on situational context over demographic generalizations. For example, two users with different backgrounds may both “hire” a note-taking app to help stay on track during a busy workday. What matters is not who they are – but what they’re trying to achieve at that moment.

When UX teams adopt this lens, research becomes richer and more predictive. Instead of simply identifying where a feature fails, JTBD helps reveal whether the whole experience supports the user’s larger goal. It drives more empathetic, insight-led decisions that align design with customer needs.

Let’s say you’re working on a food delivery app. A JTBD approach might reveal that users don't just want food quickly – they want relief from decision fatigue after a long day. That insight shifts the design conversation from speeding up checkout to helping users choose more easily. It’s a subtle shift, but a meaningful one. It informs product design that feels tailored, not transactional.

Understanding the ‘why’ behind user choices empowers UX teams to build solutions that go beyond function. It connects customer insights to real-world needs, creating richer experiences through design thinking and user-centered research. JTBD gives you the language and structure to do exactly that – and integrate outcome-driven UX research methods into your process with confidence.

One of the most powerful benefits of applying the Jobs to Be Done (JTBD) framework in UX research is its ability to bring focus to what matters most: user outcomes. Rather than fixating on individual product features or isolated friction points, JTBD helps UX teams align design strategies with the functional, emotional, and social outcomes users are actually striving to achieve.

From Fixing Pain Points to Enabling Progress

Traditional UX design often revolves around identifying usability issues. While important, this doesn’t always reveal the deeper reason behind user behaviors. JTBD flips the script by asking, “What is the user ultimately trying to accomplish?” This question reframes UX problems into progress-oriented design challenges.

For example, a fitness app user may not care about logging workouts simply for recordkeeping. Their “job” might be to stay motivated towards a health goal, reduce stress, or build a consistent routine. Understanding this broader user motivation guides design decisions that go beyond surface-level improvements and into features or experiences that help users truly progress.

JTBD Helps Prioritize What Users Actually Value

Using the Jobs to Be Done framework for UX research changes how teams evaluate design options. It encourages a shift from asking, “What feature do we build next?” to asking, “What job does our user need to get done, and what’s standing in the way?” This approach leads to:

• More intentional feature development – Features aim to support real objectives, not just fill gaps on a roadmap
• Clearer design priorities – Teams can measure ideas against user-defined success criteria
• Less rework and better alignment across teams – When everyone understands the job to be done, teams move with purpose

Linking Customer Insights to Design Thinking

Because JTBD offers a window into how users define “success,” it supports user-centered design by ensuring experiences are built around people’s real goals – not just assumptions about what users should want. This helps UX teams make customer insights more actionable and develop solutions that resonate emotionally, practically, and contextually.

In short, JTBD prioritizes value, not velocity. It ensures UX research guides product design toward outcomes that matter to your audience, helping solve the right problems for lasting impact.

The value of Jobs to Be Done in user experience design becomes even clearer when we examine how real teams use it in practice. Across industries – from tech and retail to finance and healthcare – UX researchers are applying JTBD to uncover user motivations and shape better experiences.

Example 1: Streaming Service – Reducing Drop-off by Understanding the Real Job

A streaming platform noticed a high number of trial users weren’t converting to paid subscribers. Initially, the team explored common friction points: signup flow, navigation, video quality. But nothing stood out as a major blocker.

Digging into JTBD interviews, researchers discovered that many users were not just looking to “watch movies,” but to “unwind before bed” or “bond with their partner.” The issue wasn’t technical – it was emotional. The interface didn’t make it easy to find relaxing or shared viewing content quickly. By redesigning the homepage to support those underlying jobs, retention improved significantly.

Example 2: Health Insurance Platform – Simplifying Language by Identifying User Goals

A digital health plan provider applied JTBD to redesign how customers choose insurance plans. Instead of focusing solely on plan comparisons, researchers uncovered people were trying to “feel confident they won’t regret their choice.” This outcome-focused insight led to the development of guided decision tools and plain-language explanations – reducing confusion by addressing the core job, not just the symptom.

Example 3: B2B Software – Moving from Feature Requests to Outcome-Driven Roadmaps

A SaaS company serving marketing teams kept receiving conflicting feature requests. The UX team introduced JTBD interviews to understand the bigger picture. They found that although requests varied, most users were really trying to “get clear attribution for campaign performance.” Instead of building unrelated individual features, the product team developed a unified reporting tool focused on that outcome. Customer satisfaction and user adoption both increased.

These examples show how JTBD helps teams move past surface-level feedback and short-term fixes. When you identify the real jobs users hire your product to do, it’s easier to create user-centered design that supports meaningful product experiences.

If your UX team is new to Jobs to Be Done, the good news is you don’t need to overhaul your entire process to start seeing its benefits. Instead, JTBD can be layered into your existing UX research and design workflows – enhancing your understanding of user behavior and elevating the quality of your experience design.

Start with Problem Framing

Begin by reframing your user challenges in terms of outcomes instead of tasks. Ask, “What is the user trying to accomplish in their life or work, and how does our product help them progress?” This mindset naturally opens new angles for exploration and innovation.

Conduct Outcome-Focused Interviews

JTBD often starts with qualitative interviews designed to uncover user motivations. Unlike traditional usability studies that focus on specific actions, JTBD interviews dig into the context behind choices. You might ask:

• “What led you to seek out this solution?”
• “Can you tell me about the last time you used this product – what were you trying to get done?”
• “What would success look like for you after using this?”

Over time, patterns begin to surface – helping you segment users not by demographics or personas, but by the jobs they’re trying to achieve.

Translate Insights into Design Direction

Once you’ve mapped out the core jobs your users are hiring your product to do, you can use these findings to guide:

• Product decision-making – Focus your roadmap on solving the most important jobs
• Experience flows – Prioritize flows that enable user progress with the fewest obstacles
• Messaging and positioning – Align with the language your users use when thinking about their goals

Integrate JTBD into Ongoing UX Research

JTBD is not a one-time tool – it’s a continuous perspective. As your users evolve, so do their jobs. Revisit JTBD insights regularly in design sprints, usability reviews, and customer interviews. When paired with ongoing UX research practices like journey mapping or A/B testing, JTBD adds context and clarity that keeps design decision-making aligned with user needs.

Combining the clarity of job theory with human empathy helps teams create product experiences that are not only usable but deeply relevant and motivating.