Introduction
What Is Jobs To Be Done (JTBD) and Why Does It Matter?
The Jobs To Be Done (JTBD) framework is a method for uncovering what really motivates customer behavior. Instead of focusing solely on product features or demographics, JTBD starts by asking a deeper question: what is the customer trying to accomplish?
A “job” in this context isn’t about employment. It refers to the progress a person is trying to make in a specific situation. Whether they’re booking a hotel, buying a blender, or using a banking app, people 'hire' products and services to do a job for them. And when those solutions no longer help them make the progress they want, they 'fire' them and seek better options.
Why it matters in today’s business environment
The JTBD approach is valuable because it goes beyond surface-level behaviors and explores the motivations behind decisions. Especially in competitive markets where many brands offer similar features, understanding the why behind customer choices gives you a strategic edge. When you truly grasp customer needs, you can design innovations that connect more effectively – and sustainably – with your audience.
How JTBD differs from traditional market research
Conventional consumer research often begins with segmenting audiences by age, income, or lifestyle. While useful, this kind of data doesn’t always reveal why someone chooses one solution over another. JTBD reframes the conversation by focusing on the context:
- What situation is the customer in?
- What outcome are they trying to achieve?
- What barriers are in their way?
By centering on the job rather than just the product or user type, JTBD helps remove assumptions and leads to more actionable insights.
JTBD and product innovation
Many companies use the JTBD framework for product development, refinement, or repositioning. A common use is testing whether a new product idea aligns with an actual customer job. For example, imagine a startup developing a fitness app. Rather than asking, “What features should we include?”, a JTBD-focused approach would ask, “What job does this help the user complete?” The answer could be, “I want to establish a consistent workout habit even when I have a hectic schedule.” That insight leads design and messaging choices that address a real need.
JTBD also complements other methodologies in your market research toolkit. It doesn't replace quantitative surveys or customer segmentations but adds powerful context and purpose behind the numbers.
Key takeaway
Understanding Jobs To Be Done in business gives you a deeper look at your customers’ underlying goals. It equips you not just to meet their needs, but to align with their aspirations. That’s how businesses stay relevant, drive loyalty, and unlock profitable innovation.
The 4 Core Principles of JTBD Explained Simply
The Ideas behind Jobs To Be Done aren’t hard to understand—they’re rooted in the everyday behavior of real people. The JTBD framework is built on four key principles. These ideas help businesses shift from product-focused thinking to customer-centered strategy. Let’s walk through each one, explained in simple terms.
1. People don’t buy products. They hire them to get jobs done.
This is the foundational shift in mindset JTBD offers. People “hire” a product or service to help them achieve a specific outcome in their life. That outcome may be functional (“I need to commute to work”), emotional (“I want to feel confident in my appearance”), or social (“I want to be seen as environmentally conscious”).
For instance, someone buying a home treadmill may not just want fitness equipment – they may be hiring the treadmill for the job of “staying consistent with exercise despite a busy work schedule.” That small shift reframes innovation from features to outcomes.
2. A job is always linked to a specific situation and progress.
Jobs don’t exist in a vacuum. They’re always connected to a situation people are in and the change they’re seeking. JTBD thinking reminds us to look at context – time, place, constraints – because these heavily influence what solution a customer chooses.
For example, the job of “get a quick, healthy lunch before my next meeting” has very different needs than “cook a nutritious dinner for my family.” Even if both involve food, the situation and desired progress are different, and so are the expectations of the solution.
That’s why in JTBD market research methods, the interview or discovery process often digs into the full timeline of a customer’s journey: What led them to seek a solution? What mattered most at each point? What triggered the switch to a new product?
Key benefits of knowing these two principles:
- You gain a clearer view of user needs beyond traditional personas.
- You can identify unmet needs by examining situations where existing products fall short.
- You begin thinking in terms of outcomes, not just offerings.
These first two principles help create empathy and clarity. Businesses using the JTBD approach for product development or strategy use them to ensure what they're building actually helps people make real progress in their daily lives.
In the next section, we’ll walk through the other two equally important principles—and show how all four come together to power more effective innovation and marketing.
How JTBD Helps Businesses Understand Customer Needs
One of the biggest challenges in business is truly understanding what your customers need – and why they make the choices they do. Traditional market research might focus on demographics, preferences, or opinions, but the Jobs to Be Done (JTBD) framework digs deeper. It helps answer a fundamental question: What job is the customer hiring this product or service to do?
JTBD looks at the progress your customer is trying to make. It's not just about the product they buy – it's about the situation they’re in, the goal they’re trying to reach, and the obstacles standing in their way. This approach reveals underlying motivations and helps you understand decision-making in context.
Moving Beyond Surface Needs
Imagine a customer buying a noise-canceling headset. On the surface, they need headphones. But using the JTBD approach, you might learn they’re trying to create a better work-from-home experience, concentrate during calls, or block distractions while traveling. These are the real 'jobs' to be done – and they open new pathways for innovation, messaging, and product design.
Why JTBD Delivers Deeper Customer Insights
When you uncover jobs rather than assumptions, you gain powerful clarity. The JTBD method can help you:
- Identify unmet or underserved customer needs not revealed through standard surveys
- Understand emotional and practical drivers of behavior
- Create messaging that resonates with how people actually think and feel
- Find alignment between what people actually need and what you offer
By starting with the customer's context and desired outcome, you generate insights rooted in real-life circumstances – not guesswork. Understanding customer jobs also helps segment your audience in more meaningful ways, based on what they’re trying to achieve, not just who they are or how they behave online.
In a world that changes fast, customer needs evolve quickly. The JTBD framework offers a flexible, human-centered lens for keeping your business strategy aligned with those shifting expectations. It empowers innovation that supports real people, making progress in real life.
When and How to Use JTBD in Your Business Strategy
Understanding when and how to apply the Jobs to Be Done framework can unlock major strategic advantages for your business. While JTBD is often associated with product innovation, its insights can influence broader areas like branding, customer experience, and market positioning.
When to Consider JTBD in Your Strategy
The JTBD method is especially valuable at key inflection points such as:
- New product development – Building something from scratch? JTBD helps ensure your offering addresses a true customer need.
- Repositioning or rebranding – When you're rethinking your place in the market, JTBD provides a clearer understanding of where you add value.
- Growth plateaus – If adoption or user engagement stalls, JTBD can uncover hidden barriers or underperformed jobs.
- Entering new markets – It provides a research-driven way to understand local or niche user needs before investing at scale.
How to Use JTBD Step-by-Step
At its core, JTBD is both a research lens and a strategic tool. Here’s a simplified roadmap:
1. Identify the Situation
Start by specifying when and where the customer faces a problem or seeks progress. Context is essential in understanding the job.
2. Uncover the Functional and Emotional Jobs
Look beyond actions to discover what people are really trying to accomplish – not just the task, but the personal or social outcome they want to achieve.
3. Map the Journey
Break down the decision-making process: What triggers the job? What alternatives do customers consider? What makes them switch?
4. Identify Barriers and Enablers
Explore what’s getting in the way of progress – time, knowledge, cost, complexity – and what makes it easier to complete the job.
5. Translate Insights Into Action
Use your findings to inform product features, marketing messages, UX design, or even internal processes.
Many companies use JTBD in combination with qualitative and quantitative market research to ensure they’re not only collecting data, but interpreting it through a lens that reflects real user needs. Paired with the right methodology, JTBD brings customer insight down to earth – clarifying what really matters and guiding smart, sustained growth.
Real-World Examples: JTBD in Action Across Industries
To see the power of the JTBD framework, it helps to look at how businesses apply it across different sectors. While these examples are fictional and simplified, they illustrate how understanding customer jobs can unlock growth opportunities and sharpen strategy.
Healthcare: Enabling Peace of Mind
A telemedicine startup assumed patients chose virtual care for convenience. But through JTBD research, they discovered the deeper job was reassurance – people wanted fast, trusted answers when feeling vulnerable. Shifting their messaging and interface to emphasize peace of mind improved both adoption and trust.
Consumer Packaged Goods (CPG): Simplifying Morning Routines
A coffee brand struggling with stagnant growth used JTBD interviews to explore consumers’ morning habits. Instead of selling stronger or cheaper coffee, they learned that customers were hiring their morning routine to feel “put together” before work. This insight led to a new sub-brand focused on convenience and emotional readiness – not just caffeine.
Financial Services: Offering Control, Not Just Access
A budgeting app originally marketed itself on simple expense tracking. JTBD research showed that customers really wanted to feel in control of their financial future. As a result, the company added predictive spend alerts, welcome messages tied to savings goals, and a guided onboarding experience focused on confidence, not just tools.
Quick-Service Restaurants (QSR): Solving Mealtime Stress
A family-oriented restaurant assumed parents came for good food at a fair price. Digging deeper with JTBD methods, they found the job being “hired” was to reduce weekday chaos. The result? A new ordering system tailored for parents on-the-go, plus time-saving bundles that addressed real user needs beyond the plate.
Why JTBD Works Across Industries
What all these examples show is that understanding customer jobs provides richer context than features or price points alone. Whether you’re in tech, retail, services, or manufacturing, the JTBD market research approach helps you connect to what customers are really trying to achieve.
By focusing on the progress people seek – what they need, when, and why – you can design more relevant products, improve the customer experience, and uncover unmet demand. The result is strategic clarity and opportunity – no matter what industry you’re in.
Summary
Understanding the Jobs to Be Done framework gives businesses a valuable lens into how consumers make choices. By focusing on the real-world 'jobs' people are trying to accomplish – such as feeling confident, reducing friction, or achieving a goal – JTBD helps brands go beyond assumptions and into actionable insight.
This beginner’s guide covered:
- What is JTBD and why it matters
- The four core principles that guide the JTBD framework
- How JTBD supports deeper customer understanding
- When and how to apply it across your business strategy
- Real-world examples showing JTBD in action
Whether you’re exploring new products, trying to improve conversion, or just want to better understand your audience, JTBD offers a structured, human-centered approach that aligns your solutions with real user needs. It’s not about guessing what people want – it’s about discovering what they’re already trying to accomplish, and helping them get there faster, easier, and with more confidence.
Summary
Understanding the Jobs to Be Done framework gives businesses a valuable lens into how consumers make choices. By focusing on the real-world 'jobs' people are trying to accomplish – such as feeling confident, reducing friction, or achieving a goal – JTBD helps brands go beyond assumptions and into actionable insight.
This beginner’s guide covered:
- What is JTBD and why it matters
- The four core principles that guide the JTBD framework
- How JTBD supports deeper customer understanding
- When and how to apply it across your business strategy
- Real-world examples showing JTBD in action
Whether you’re exploring new products, trying to improve conversion, or just want to better understand your audience, JTBD offers a structured, human-centered approach that aligns your solutions with real user needs. It’s not about guessing what people want – it’s about discovering what they’re already trying to accomplish, and helping them get there faster, easier, and with more confidence.