3. Aspire to transform

Products and services that merely connect, delight, and provide positive experience don’t go far enough. What’s needed is a better way to envision users as they may act.

Enter The Ask, a single question outlined by MIT Professor Michael Schrage in his book Who Do You Want Your Customers to Become? Successful innovations, Schrage contends, don’t merely ask users to do something different: they ask them to become someone different.

For example, George Eastman didn’t just invent an affordable, easy-to-use automatic camera at the end of the 19th century; he created photographers. His innovation allowed everyone to do something only trained professionals could previously do.

Through the lens of The Ask, Google is not just a sophisticated search algorithm. It lets everyone become expert researchers. Or consider eBay. The popular trading platform has created a new breed of entrepreneurs.

However, innovations that ask people to become something they don’t want to become typically fail. Take the Segway. What does it ask us to become? A mad, helmeted scientist racing down the sidewalk? Or an authority figure (e.g., a policewoman) extending a few feet above other pedestrians? Or maybe just a weirdo on a scooter (Figure 1-9)?

McDonald’s “super size me” campaign is another example. From a business standpoint it was very effective. For a few extra cents in cost to the organization, customers got what appeared to be a good deal. But it asked them to become unhealthy. That ended up hurting the reputation of the company.

Figure 1-9. The Segway asks us to become someone we don’t want to.

Table 1-2 summarizes the preceding examples. It shows the transformations these products and service had on people, both positive and negative.

Kodak	= Camera	> Photographers
Google	= Search engine	> Expert researchers
eBay	= Trading platform	> Entrepreneurs
but...
Segway	= New vehicle	> Weirdo on scooter
Super size	= Value for money	> Unhealthy person
Table 1-2. A summary of the transformations selected innovative products and services had on people, both positive and negative.

Here is how to apply The Ask to alignment diagrams.

1. At each major division in the diagram, pose the question, Who do we want our customers to become?

2. Collect potential answers and decide which is best.

3. Continue for each major division of the diagram.

4. Finally, brainstorm solutions.

For example, Figure 1-10 shows a service blueprint created by Brandon Schauer. Overlaid on top of it are hypothetical answers to The Ask at each phase in the journey.

The Ask opens up the doors for truly aspirational thinking and transformative innovation. It starts with the outcome, not the solution. Brainstorming around those outcomes generally yields new ideas that stand out from previous exercises in the alignment workshop.

Figure 1-10. An example of a service blueprint shows possible responses to The Ask at each phase.

Evaluate

Integrate evaluation activities directly into the workshop. You will be making presumptions at this point, but that’s OK. In fact, it’s better to presume and fail than to overrationalize the merit of an idea based on its face value alone.

After divergent thinking, select ideas to move forward. At this point you’ll switch from divergent thinking to convergent thinking (Figure 1-11).

Figure 1-11. After divergent thinking, converge ideas into concepts and prioritize them.

Prioritize your ideas, articulate the details of each concept, and test them quickly for immediate feedback.

Prioritize

Use the “feasibility versus value” matrix for an initial prioritization, shown in Figure 1-12. On the one axis, consider how easy an idea is to implement, or its feasibility. On the other, consider its value to the individuals.

The idea is to sort the output of ideation into these quadrants. Once sorted, you can then do subsequent prioritization within each quadrant.

Figure 1-13 shows an example of a prioritization matrix from a workshop I once conducted. We used the window frame for the matrix grid. We quickly identified five high-impact ideas that the engineering team could implement immediately—literally the next day—with no extra funding or resources.

From the obvious things to implement, move to the ideas that are of high value but are harder to implement. These generally take planning, design, and development effort. Select the concepts to develop further that have the most potential and that people feel passionate about. Have a product owner make these selections or do dot voting to get group consensus.