In today's fast-paced technology markets, corporate strategy cannot be a game of chance. For private equity sponsors and portfolio company CEOs, relying on intuition alone is a high-risk proposition when accelerated growth and superior equity returns are the objectives. Our proprietary and patented Jobs to be Done (JTBD) corporate strategy moves beyond guesswork, grounding decisions in a deep, data-backed understanding of customer needs. This article explains how our JTBD methodology transforms corporate strategy, using customer struggle measured by Customer Effort Scores (CES) to drive resource allocation and align product development squarely with market demand for improved customer value and market alignment.

Table of Contents

• The thrv Edge: Understanding Jobs to be Done
• Shifting to Data: Our JTBD Engine for Corporate Strategy
• Formulating Corporate Strategy with JTBD in Our Portfolio Companies
• Market Definition: Focused Growth
• Competitive Analysis: True Competition
• Strategic Segmentation: Targeting by CES
• Value Proposition: Addressing Unmet Needs
• Customer Effort Scores: Guiding Resource Allocation for Value Creation
• JTBD for Product Innovation: Aligning Development with Market Demand
• Implementation: How thrv Drives JTBD Corporate Strategy
• Measuring Success: KPIs for Our JTBD-Driven Approach
• FAQs: Understanding thrv's JTBD Corporate Strategy
• The Data-Driven Path to Superior Equity Returns

The thrv Edge: Understanding Jobs to be Done

At thrv, we recognize that customers "hire" products or services to make specific progress in their lives or work. This progress is their "Job to Be Done." Traditional market research, often focused on demographics or product features, frequently misses this fundamental motivation. Our JTBD methodology, however, centers on understanding the customer's job in its entirety—including functional, emotional, and social aspects.

We define customer needs as precise metrics of how quickly and accurately customers can execute their job. For example, a customer trying to manage their home energy consumption might have needs such as:

• "Determine current energy usage"
• "Calculate potential cost savings"
• "Identify sources of energy waste"
  
  

Focusing on these granular needs, rather than broad assumptions, is the foundation of a robust JTBD corporate strategy. This approach allows us to find unmet needs and opportunities for innovation that others miss.

Shifting to Data: Our JTBD Engine for Corporate Strategy

In the world of private equity-backed technology companies, speed and accuracy in decision-making are critical. Intuition, while valuable, carries inherent risks and biases. Our JTBD methodology provides the framework for true data-driven decision-making. We systematically reveal precise customer data, focusing on unmet needs identified through Customer Effort Scores (CES). A high CES indicates significant customer struggle with speed or accuracy when trying to get their job done.

Our process for gathering JTBD data within our portfolio companies involves:

Qualitative Research: We conduct rigorous customer interviews to understand the 'why' behind their actions and the context of their job.

Quantitative Research: We use surveys to measure Customer Effort Scores for each step of the job, pinpointing exactly where customers experience the most difficulty. This data reveals where the greatest opportunities for improvement lie.

Our patented, AI-powered software platform accelerates this entire process. It helps our teams analyze vast amounts of customer data quickly, translating insights into actionable strategic initiatives and product roadmaps for our portfolio companies. This allows them to move faster with less risk.

Formulating Corporate Strategy with JTBD in Our Portfolio Companies

A clear understanding of the customer's Job to Be Done, backed by CES data, becomes the bedrock for formulating effective corporate strategy within our portfolio companies.

Market Definition: Focused Growth

Instead of defining markets by product categories, which can be limiting, we define markets based on the Job to Be Done. This JTBD market definition provides a more stable and accurate view of the competitive landscape and growth opportunities, ensuring our portfolio companies focus their efforts effectively.

Competitive Analysis: True Competition

Through a JTBD lens, we help our portfolio companies identify their true competition. Often, these are not just direct product competitors but alternative solutions customers use to achieve the same job. This broader understanding is crucial for robust strategic planning.

Strategic Segmentation: Targeting by CES

Our methodology allows for powerful market segmentation based on Customer Effort Scores. We identify segments of customers who are struggling the most to get their job done. These high-CES segments represent underserved customers often willing to pay for solutions that demonstrably reduce their effort by improving speed and accuracy.

Value Proposition: Addressing Unmet Needs

With a clear view of unmet needs (high CES areas), our portfolio companies can craft compelling value propositions. These propositions promise to help customers get their job done significantly better, faster, or more accurately, directly addressing their points of struggle. This is key to creating superior equity value.

By aligning the entire organization—product, marketing, and sales—around these data-driven insights, we ensure a cohesive and impactful JTBD corporate strategy.

Customer Effort Scores: Guiding Resource Allocation for Value Creation

One of the most powerful applications of our JTBD methodology is in guiding resource allocation based on customer struggle. "Customer struggle," quantified by CES, pinpoints where customers expend excessive effort, or experience unacceptable delays or inaccuracies in executing their job. Companies often misallocate resources due to a lack of precise data on where customers truly need help.

At thrv, we systematically find and quantify customer struggle in our portfolio companies. We use CES data to prioritize investments, channeling time, talent, and capital towards innovations that directly reduce customer effort and address high-CES job steps. For instance, if data shows customers struggle to "calculate required arrival time" for a logistics job, resources are directed to improving that specific function. This data-driven approach ensures that capital is deployed effectively, accelerating growth and maximizing returns. Incorrect resource allocation is a primary reason for poor business performance, a risk our JTBD process actively reduces.

JTBD for Product Innovation: Aligning Development with Market Demand

Our JTBD framework ensures that product development in our portfolio companies is firmly aligned with market demand. We use a Job Map, a detailed visual blueprint of every step the customer takes to get their core functional job done. This map, informed by CES data, allows us to:

• Identify all discrete steps of the customer's job.
• Pinpoint opportunities for innovation—unmet needs, inefficiencies, or high-effort points (high CES)—at each step. For example, a customer need like "verify system functionality" becomes a clear target for innovation if it has a high CES.
• Use these insights to guide feature prioritization and build robust product roadmaps.
  
  

This transitions product development from being feature-driven (often based on intuition or competitor actions) to being need-driven (based on hard data about customer struggle). Focusing on the underlying job, not just the product, is key to our approach. This systematic approach helps reduce development waste on features that don't help customers make meaningful progress, accelerating time-to-market with products that customers value.

Implementation: How thrv Drives JTBD Corporate Strategy

thrv operates as an equity value creation platform, implementing our proprietary JTBD methodology within our portfolio companies to drive growth. Our AI-powered platform and structured processes are central to this.

Our implementation includes:

Deep Immersion: We work with portfolio company teams to define the core customer Job(s) critical to their business.

Rigorous JTBD Research: We conduct thorough qualitative and quantitative research using our established methods to find unmet customer needs. Our AI capabilities significantly accelerate this data collection and analysis, turning insights from weeks into hours.

Data Analysis & Prioritization: Our platform helps analyze the data to identify high-CES needs and quantify growth opportunities. We focus on customer needs formatted as action/variable pairs like "determine optimal configuration" or "identify compatibility issues."

Strategic Integration: We integrate these JTBD insights directly into the portfolio company's strategic planning cycle, product roadmaps, and marketing strategies.

Continuous Measurement & Iteration: We establish metrics to track progress, such as reductions in CES and improvements in the speed and accuracy of job completion, ensuring ongoing value creation.

This hands-on approach, powered by our unique JTBD software and expertise, ensures that corporate strategy is dynamic, data-driven, and consistently focused on customer value.

Measuring Success: KPIs for Our JTBD-Driven Approach

The success of our JTBD corporate strategy is measured by tangible results that contribute directly to equity growth in our portfolio companies. We focus on metrics beyond vanity, such as:

• Reduced Customer Effort Scores (CES): Demonstrating that products are easier to use and more effective.
• Improved Speed and Accuracy: Quantifying how much faster and more accurately customers can complete their jobs.
• Market Share Growth: Capturing a larger share of the JTBD-defined market.
• Higher New Product Success Rates: Ensuring that product innovation efforts consistently hit the mark.
• Increased Customer Willingness to Pay: As solutions better address high-effort needs, customers value them more.
• More Efficient Resource Utilization: Ensuring capital and effort are focused on the most impactful initiatives.

Our JTBD methodology, by systematically identifying and addressing unmet customer needs, leads to predictable growth and superior equity returns for our investors and portfolio company leadership. This is the core of thrv's value creation thesis.

FAQs: Understanding thrv's JTBD Corporate Strategy

Q1: How is thrv's JTBD approach different from traditional market research?

Traditional market research often focuses on demographics, existing products, or stated customer preferences. Our JTBD approach goes deeper by focusing on the underlying "job" the customer is trying to get done—their fundamental motivation. We use Customer Effort Scores (CES) to precisely measure difficulty, speed, and accuracy in job execution, providing a quantitative basis for data-driven decision-making that traditional methods often lack.

Q2: What role does AI play in thrv's JTBD process for corporate strategy?

AI is embedded in our proprietary JTBD methodology and platform. It significantly accelerates the process of identifying unmet customer needs by analyzing large volumes of customer data much faster than manual methods. Our AI helps scale JTBD analysis and translates customer needs into actionable product roadmaps and strategic initiatives for our portfolio companies, giving them a critical speed advantage.

Q3: How do Customer Effort Scores (CES) help in corporate strategy?

Customer Effort Scores are a key metric in our JTBD corporate strategy. CES measures the percentage of customers who report difficulty in executing a specific step of their job. High CES indicates significant unmet needs and customer struggle. This data allows us to prioritize innovation, guide resource allocation, segment markets effectively, and develop value propositions that directly address the most pressing customer challenges, leading to accelerated growth.

Q4: Can JTBD be applied to any technology company?

Yes, the Jobs to be Done framework is highly versatile and particularly effective for technology companies, where understanding user needs and innovating rapidly are crucial. Whether it's enterprise software, consumer tech, or any other technology-driven sector, focusing on the customer's job helps clarify market opportunities and guide product development. thrv specializes in applying JTBD to private technology companies to create equity value.

The Data-Driven Path to Superior Equity Returns

In conclusion, our JTBD corporate strategy provides a clear, systematic path from intuition-based assumptions to robust, data-driven decision-making. By focusing on the customer's Job to Be Done and meticulously measuring Customer Effort Scores, we enable our portfolio companies to make strategic choices that resonate deeply with market needs. This deep customer understanding leads to focused innovation, efficient resource allocation, and ultimately, accelerated growth and superior equity returns.

To understand how our proprietary JTBD methodology and AI-powered platform can accelerate growth and create substantial equity value in your portfolio companies, we invite you to explore our approach further on thrv.com or contact us to discuss your specific objectives.