How to model User-Solution Fit / Problem-Solution Fit?

[Jan-Hendrik Spieth]

As part of our general aim to understand and assess value, we are currently thinking about how to model user solution fit, and/or problem solution fit, in JPD.

This touches questions such as: How ideal is this solution? Does it address every aspect of the entire problem?

One place we'd find this could surface is insights:

For each insight (a user feedback) to an idea that describes a solution, we could determine a rating (1-5) that signifies how much that user's pain points would likely be remedied/improved.

Right now, we can only rate insight impact, though. We think the impact mostly relates to the "problem" nature of an idea, not to it's "solution" nature. But at least, if we used "impact" for our purpose, we think it could easily be confusing.

How are you fellow JPD users modelling user solution fit and problem solution fit?

Do you model it, at all? If so, do you make use of insights for this purpose?

Would you recommend for or against using insights for this purpose, and why?

And to the JPD team:

Have you thought about customization options on rating insights on one or several, custom dimensions (like, certain rating fields, but on insight level)? Does it sound interesting? Or to niche, or not recommendable, for some reason?

And what have you designed the insight impact rating for?

[Tanguy Crusson]

Hi @Jan-Hendrik Spieth , the way you could approach it using the tool as it works today:

• Create a "problem" vs "solution" idea type. 
• Copy insights from the problem to the corresponding solution. Rate them based on how important the problem is in the problem ticket, or how good the solution addresses it in the solution ticket. 
• I know it's not native in the app today (issue types) but you can still do it using a "type" custom field, and slicing/dicing in different views: https://www.loom.com/share/c5acafb1584740c98f6871667bac6df8

The app is built in a way that you'll eventually have the ability to create more properties for insights (e.g. different impact ratings) but we haven't built that into the UI yet. 

The reason we've added insight rating is to help the right ideas "bubble up to the top" based on the insights you gather - but we've always envisioned that each team would define what that means individually, so you're doing exactly what we expected you'd do here 🙂

[Deleted user]

@Tanguy Crusson I just watched your video and it seems like an ok workaround for this.

I'm curious to learn if you will be looking into developing a higher/earlier level "problem" in the near future. Or is the vision to keep it generic as it is now?

[Tanguy Crusson]

@[deleted] I don't think we'll create a specific "problem" concept. We talked to quite a few product managers and there all use different ways to navigate it. The most common ones I've seen: 

• Problem/Solution
• Opportunity/Solution
• Problem/Opportunity/Solution
• Opportunity/Solution/Hypothesis
• Idea/sub-idea

Instead of treating "Problem" as a dedicated noun, we're trying to see if we can let you use the app to define and use your own model. For example:

• Create a "Problem" and "Solution" type
• Let you link them easily (these solutions are for these problems)
• Then, in each view, let you visualize that (e.g. group solutions by problems in a list view or a board)

We want to do this in a way that doesn't turn the app into a steam engine - we've seen product managers value both its flexibility AND the simplicity of use. 

[Deleted user]

Hi @Jan-Hendrik Spieth

I agree with you that the impact of a problem is different from the (foreseeable) impact of an idea. 

I have not yet started fully working with JPD, but I think that when I will, the aim will be to create a clear distinguishment between the problem space and the idea space. As far as JPD currently goes its function is solely idea space. 

For the problem space, the raw feedback and our interpretation of the feedback, I once set up a feedback repository where each feedback item can be given an impact score. I used Airtable for this. 

I am now looking into JPD to see if this tool can improve the way we translate the raw data into ideas for product development. 

Hope that helps a little!