Goal-Oriented Design

In order to effectively discover and deliver solutions that resonate with your customers it is important to go beyond the needs (e.g requirements) they express and  understand the goals they are trying to accomplish.

The agile user story format is effective for capturing these needs and goals:

As a role I need to be able to do this such that I can accomplish this goal

Here is an example:

As a user I need to be able to upload pictures such that I can share them with friends & family

Taking the goals into account allows us to really understand what the user is trying to do (e.g. share pictures) and the associated pain points (e.g. take a picture, then download to computer and then upload to online photo sharing application) with an existing solution and develop effective alternate solutions that truly resonate.  Take the example of the iPhone. It allows you to take a picture and easily share it with others.

Building Products That Resonate

Customers are hiring products to solve a need. Therefore the products that resonate with your users are the ones that address their needs. So how do you then go about building products that resonate?  …Focus on design projects that improve people’s lives.

"Ways To Grow" is a useful tool that can be applied to innovation projects and while it is similar to the Product/Market Grid, which focuses on existing markets or new markets for the existing products/new products being considered, the “Ways to Grow” tool emphasizes that markets consists of real people and innovation must focus on them. 

The authors (Ryan Jacoby and Diego Rodreiguez) warn that innovation must not just address the functional aspect of the users problem but should also address visceral and reflective design and provide us with “Innovation Outcomes Grid”, another tool to map out what kinds of teams and process will be needed to deliver the right innovation strategy.

Personas and Goal-Oriented Design are other forms of user-focused design tools used in the industry to ensure products being resonate with users.