Over the next week I’ll be posting an email interview with Tony Ulwick – author of the fascinating book “What Customers Want.” I’ve not read many interviews with Ulwick, which is why I’m posting this. He has developed a thorough and unique framework for innovation which brings incredible clarity to an otherwise mis-understood process. In this interview he talks about why innovation can be a repeatable process, and what led Clayton Christensen to heap praise on his methodology.

It’s a multi-part posting as Tony has written full and thought-provoking replies to my questions.

Here’s the first part :

1. How long did it take to develop the idea of outcome-driven innovation?

It took about 15 years to turn outcome-driven innovation theory into a rules-based discipline. We have developed this unique approach to innovation to the point where companies can now uncover and prioritize hidden growth opportunities in any market with near 100% precision.

2. Where did the concept originate?

The initial concept came to me when I was working at IBM on the PCjr. The day after the product was introduced, the Wall Street Journal declared the product a flop. After overcoming the initial disappointment, I thought, “if we knew what criteria people were going to use to judge the value of a product in advance, we could design the product to meet the criteria and ensure its success”. Trying to figure out how customers judge value and how to capture that information from customers in advance became my top priority.

I first discovered how a customer “need” should be defined from the customer’s perspective when engaged in core market growth initiatives and how that definition changes in when working in the area of new market creation. Through the experience of hundreds of customer interviews, I then figured out what the standard structure, content and format of a customer “need” should be. Finally, I went on to create the best methods for capturing these unique inputs into innovation and new quantitative research methods to prioritize them. Most importantly, my team and I have, over the past 7 years or so, discovered how this unique information can be used to more effectively segment markets, position a product, communicate a products value, prioritize the development pipeline, brainstorm new ideas, conduct competitive analysis and perform many other tasks associated with innovation.

(Part two is here)