A Jobs to Be Done (JTBD) workshop is a structured, facilitated session that helps business teams uncover the underlying “jobs” customers are trying to get done – the progress they seek in their lives. Unlike traditional brainstorming sessions or surveys, JTBD sessions dig deeper into customer behavior to reveal what drives their decisions, pain points, and unmet needs.

At its core, the JTBD framework sees products and services as tools customers “hire” to accomplish a specific goal. These goals – or jobs – are often emotional, functional, or social in nature. A JTBD workshop is designed to map those goals clearly, creating a foundation for innovation rooted in real customer context.

How a JTBD Workshop Typically Works

While formats can vary depending on your organization’s objectives, a typical JTBD session includes:

• Facilitated discussions guided by customer interviews or insights
• Team exercises to identify desired outcomes and pain points
• Grouping and interpreting insights to uncover core customer jobs
• Generating ideas that help customers complete those jobs more easily

Participants often include cross-functional team members from marketing, product development, research, design, and leadership. With an objective facilitator (internal or external), the group stays focused, ensures all voices are heard, and turns insights into action.

It’s Not Just About Products

While commonly used in product development, JTBD workshops apply just as effectively to service design, customer experience, and business model innovation. For example, in a fictional case of a fitness subscription brand, a JTBD workshop might reveal that customers are not simply looking for workout routines – they’re hiring the service to stay accountable, feel more confident, or carve out “me time” from busy schedules. That added nuance shifts how teams design and message solutions.

This makes JTBD a useful foundation for different kinds of innovation workshops – whether your team is prototyping something brand new or revisiting a mature product line. It complements tools like design thinking and consumer empathy by emphasizing actionable customer jobs that lead to measurable growth opportunities.

Incorporating the Jobs to Be Done framework into your workshops can transform the way your business approaches growth, product development, and customer understanding. Instead of trying to guess what customers want, JTBD helps uncover what customers are trying to accomplish – and why current solutions may not be working well enough. In short, JTBD emphasizes real-world context over assumptions.

Connect to Actionable Consumer Insights

Many businesses invest in market research, yet still struggle to turn data into strategy. A JTBD workshop bridges that gap. By focusing on the underlying motivations and struggles of your audience, the framework makes it easier to surface actionable consumer insights that directly inform your growth strategy. These sessions give structure to your findings and put teams on the same page about who the customer is and what they actually need.

Fuel Business Innovation with Greater Confidence

Innovation often involves risk – but JTBD workshops reduce that risk by grounding ideation in customer reality. Whether you’re building a new offering or refining an existing one, the insights from these sessions help ensure your ideas map back to real needs. This prevents wasted time solving the wrong problems and provides a faster path to market fit.

Align Cross-Functional Teams

One of the biggest benefits of running a JTBD innovation workshop is cross-team collaboration. Getting product developers, marketers, designers, and sales on the same page about customer needs accelerates decision-making and reduces friction. It creates a shared language to talk about value, rather than personal opinions or departmental priorities.

Unlock Opportunities You Might Be Missing

• Spot under-served customer segments
• Identify gaps in your product or service experience
• Reveal new use cases or moments in the customer journey

For example, a fictional grocery delivery brand might learn in a JTBD session that busy parents aren't just hiring the service to save time – they’re hiring it to ease the mental load of planning meals. That insight opens doors for new features like recipe recommendations or kid-friendly menu filters – a significant leap in product development inspired directly by the customer’s real job.

In short, using JTBD helps surface patterns in customer behavior that aren’t always visible through traditional research tools. It gives teams clarity and confidence – and that can be the difference between a good idea and a successful innovation that drives growth.

Step-by-Step Guide to Running a JTBD Workshop

Running a successful Jobs to Be Done (JTBD) workshop starts with a clear structure and ends with actionable insight. Whether you're introducing JTBD to a product team or using it to refine your innovation workshop approach, following a well-organized format ensures results. Below is a beginner-friendly workshop blueprint to get your team aligned on customer needs and ready to spark business innovation.

1. Define the Objective

Start by clarifying what you want to achieve. Are you exploring new product opportunities? Improving an existing customer journey? Set a focused workshop goal aligned with your broader growth strategy or product development challenge.

2. Gather the Right Participants

Include a cross-functional group – product managers, marketers, designers, and customer service reps – anyone who interacts with the product or the customer. Consider a facilitator familiar with the JTBD framework to guide the session smoothly.

3. Prep Before the Workshop

Send out pre-work materials to align the team. These can include:

• A short introduction to the JTBD framework
• Background on the target customer or segment
• Relevant market research or consumer insights

Encourage participants to think about scenarios where customers struggle with tasks related to your product or service.

4. Start by Framing the “Job”

In the workshop, begin with identifying the main “job” the customer is trying to accomplish. This is usually a goal or problem they're trying to solve, independent of any product. For example (fictional case), rather than thinking “customers want electric toothbrushes,” reframe it as “customers want to maintain dental health with minimal effort.” Think needs first, solutions second.

5. Map the Customer Journey

Break the job down into key steps. How does the customer realize they have a need? How do they search for solutions? What does success look like? Mapping the journey helps uncover friction points and unmet needs that your product or service can address.

6. Identify Emotional and Functional Needs

JTBD is not just task-based – it also addresses how a customer wants to feel. Capture emotional drivers alongside functional ones. For example, “Feel confident their smile looks good” is as relevant as “Remove plaque efficiently.”

7. Prioritize Opportunities

Once needs are identified, use group discussion, voting, or prioritization frameworks (like Impact vs. Effort) to narrow focus. Ask: Which needs are unmet? Which represent opportunities for innovation? Which align with our business strengths?

8. Translate to Product or Service Ideas

End the session by brainstorming initial solution directions. These aren’t final features – they’re jumping-off points for further validation. Use design thinking principles to prototype or test promising ideas.

This step-by-step JTBD workshop guide gives your team a repeatable approach to tapping into deep consumer motivation. It turns assumptions into clarity – and clarifies where innovation can drive real business value.

Common Mistakes to Avoid in JTBD Sessions

While the Jobs to Be Done framework is a powerful tool for innovation, several common pitfalls can hinder the effectiveness of your JTBD workshop. Being aware of these barriers can help your team avoid wasted effort and uncover customer needs with greater precision.

Jumping to Solutions Too Early

This is the most frequent misstep. Teams often come into workshops thinking about features or fixes rather than understanding the “job” behind customer behavior. JTBD is all about staying curious longer – resist the urge to ideate until the needs are fully explored and agreed upon.

Misidentifying the “Job”

It’s easy to confuse product usage with the actual job. For example, buying a meal kit isn't the job – “prepare a healthy dinner with limited time” is closer to the true motivation. Stay focused on the outcome the customer seeks, not what they purchase.

Skipping Emotional Drivers

Many innovation teams focus solely on practical tasks, overlooking how customers want to feel throughout the journey. Emotions like trust, confidence, or relief often drive decisions as much as speed or convenience. JTBD helps connect both dimensions, so don’t neglect the soft side of motivation.

Too Many Participants or Unclear Roles

Having too large of a group or unclear facilitation can result in confusion, side conversations, or dominant voices steering the session. Limit to 6–10 stakeholders and assign clear roles (facilitator, notetaker, observer, etc.) to keep the workshop focused.

Not Anchoring in Real Consumer Insights

JTBD workshops should be informed by facts, not fiction. Bring in relevant customer interviews, market research, or usage data to ground the session in reality. If you're lacking this data, consider running a brief study before the session starts or use fictional scenarios as a primer – but make it clear these are starting hypotheses.

Overcomplicating the Framework

While JTBD is a robust model, keep it beginner-friendly. Avoid excessive jargon or frameworks within frameworks. Stick with a simple storytelling structure – what is the customer trying to do? What makes it hard? What matters most?

By steering clear of these common mistakes in your JTBD workshop format, you set your team up for richer discoveries and more targeted innovation. Many of these missteps can be addressed with planning, structure, and a facilitation mindset rooted in empathy – all vital pieces when it comes to extracting true consumer insights.

How JTBD Workshops Turn Insight Into Actionable Strategy

At its core, the Jobs to Be Done framework is about turning deep understanding into purposeful action. A well-run JTBD workshop doesn’t just uncover what your customers need – it transforms those insights into clear priorities for business innovation, product development, and long-term growth strategy.

From Customer Needs to Opportunities

Once customer jobs and pain points are clearly defined in the session, the next step is identifying which needs remain unsatisfied. These gaps represent the clearest opportunities for creating value – whether through a new product, a better service experience, or enhanced messaging.

For example (a fictional scenario), imagine a financial services team uncovers that customers want to “feel in control of their finances without spending hours budgeting.” That insight might guide two strategies at once: simplifying digital tools and offering bite-sized educational content for time-starved users. One job, many growth paths.

Aligning Teams Around a Shared Language

One of the biggest benefits of JTBD workshops is alignment. When everyone – from design to leadership – uses the same terms for customer needs, roadmaps move faster. Decision-making becomes clearer. You no longer debate opinions; you build around shared truth.

This alignment supports stronger collaboration across silos and helps prioritize initiatives that directly target unmet customer demand. The result is a strategy that resonates both internally and externally.

Mapping JTBD Insights to Business Goals

The best way to ensure insights translate into strategy is to map each core job against your business’s strengths and goals:

• Which jobs align with our current capabilities?
• Which represent new market segments or strategic focus areas?
• What internal barriers (resources, tech, expertise) need to be addressed to act on these needs?

This crossover of consumer insight and organizational readiness creates a roadmap that feels both ambitious and achievable.

JTBD as a Catalyst for Ongoing Innovation

Jobs to Be Done isn’t a one-time exercise – it can fuel a pipeline of experiments, prototypes, customer validation efforts, and future market research. It pairs well with design thinking approaches and helps product teams iterate toward better outcomes.

At SIVO Insights, we see how JTBD connects directly to business use cases like entering new markets, repositioning product portfolios, or driving customer loyalty. By rooting your strategy in real human needs, you reduce guesswork and unlock a clearer path to growth.