Hauptly: Something Really New

This book gives three "right" questions, and the Eventual Innovators should put these questions on a wall in their office because they must constantly remind themselves of the need to get back to basics and confront these questions,


Step 1: What is this product used for?

  • Differentiate functions vs. tasks
  • Change frame of reference, visit sans assumptions
  • Ask them how they use the product
  • Observe how they use the product. Ask: What is this person trying to accomplish? How can I help him accomplish that?
  • Once you have a thesis based on data on problems, collect test data on a prototype
  • Make sure the thesis has net utility

Step 2: When I know what task a product is really used for, are there any steps that I can remove/combine from that task? (Every step has 1 verb, 1 object) 

Step 3: What tasks are the very next tasks that the customer will want to perform after using my product?



Ok:

What happened in that frescoed room 20 years ago happened because I and they both were products of the culture we grew up in. Those cultures predisposed us to look at the world in a certain way. The more deeply we got involved in our culture, the more difficult it was for us to escape its gravitational pull. The more bounded we were by our own frame of reference, the more difficult it became not simply to understand another frame of reference, but to imagine it at all.

However, the moment we all realized that we were operating with different frames of reference, we were able to shift to a common one and to propose truly innovative solutions.


Focus groups and interviews, if we ask someone what they want to see, or if we show them a concept and seek their reaction, we run an extremely high risk of failure because of this ^ reason. They will respond in their frame of reference only. 

This is why best practice is to collect problems only in these conversations, since that is actually a value-add to be in their frame of reference for.  


This book has one guiding thesis: It takes the perspective that in the world of product and service innovation, utility is the driving force.


Utility and beauty are the reasons we buy things. Innovation must respond to one or the other. 


Ask questions aimed at finding where the customers are expending resources unnecessarily and innovating be reducing those inefficiencies. 


The first step is foundational. It establishes our baseline.

The second step takes the answer to the first question and shows how to apply it simply and effectively in the real world. Genuine innovation follows directly from the answers to the second question. 

The third step moves us from an individual product or service to workflow and thus presents opportunities to enhance customer loyalty and to enter entirely new product areas.


  1. Faucets with removable "skins" ' so that you can change the color whenever you want
  2.   Faucets with various wood tones
  3.   A retractable faucet that hides away when not in use
  4.   A "retro" faucet look
  5.   An ultrathin faucet handle that is virtually invisible
  6.   An easy-to-clean, crud-free faucet
  7.   An easy-to-replace faucet

Is your idea in that group or reasonably close to it? Well, then you lose. None of these are innovations. They are merely mutations.


Bruce Springsteen on the difficulty of covering a song that had long been famous and was deeply associated with the civil rights movement in the 1960’s: "When the idea came to do 'We Shall Overcome,' I was like, 'I can't do that,'" he said. "Everyone knows that song as an icon. But what was it before it became that? So I went back and looked and realized: 'Oh, this is a prayer. I can do that. I know how to pray.'”


Apply this same approach of going back to basics, seek to answer this question in Step 1:

What tasks is the product really used for?

understand the difference between task and function. The function of all faucets is to provide access to flowing water. That's true for the faucet in the kitchen, the one in the bathroom sink, the one in the tub or shower, and the one outside in the garden. The function tells us what a faucet does, not what tasks it is intended to facilitate. If we mistake function for task, then all we can do is change the color or style, and there is no innovation in that because it does not facilitate the task. It does not make the faucet better at doing the thing we use it for.

To innovate, we must get beyond functions and understand the tasks. And tasks differ, even for faucets.

In the bathroom sink, my tasks are:

  •   Wash hands.
  •   Obtain drinking water.
  • Brush teeth

In the tub, my tasks are:

  •   Fill tub.
  •   Rinse hair


Now we are on to something. We are no longer dealing with abstract faucets. We are dealing with faucets in a con-text, and that context includes specific tasks. These tasks can be analyzed, and we can see how well the kitchen faucet performs each of them.


Once you identify the tasks, then you can bring proposed innovations to focus groups and the like. If you have analyzed the tasks correctly, then you will see a response that includes a lot of "Wows." If you haven't analyzed the tasks correctly, you will hear a lot of "Huhs?" or "So whats?" instead.

If you do not hear "Wows," then you have not changed a thing. If you do hear "Wows," then some consumers will be motivated to buy new faucets even when they are not remodeling because the new faucets that you designed will help them complete their tasks so much more efficiently.


What tasks is the product really used for?

From that point on, our analysis always included asking that basic question at the outset. Sometimes it would be phrased, "What will people do with this?" Sometimes, more formally, we would say “But, what is the use case?”


People in the third group, whom I will call Unassuming Persons, can innovate constantly. They really have no strong assumptions. That makes them curious about everything, and they have a sense of endless wonder. There are not many Unassuming Persons out there because very few people are actually able to be that detached from the assumptions that help us all get through life.


With subway tokens, the underlying assumption was that the problem was in the design of the tokens. In fact, the problem was with the use of tokens as a means of gaining entry to the subway.


For the pump per cup faucet, if one is making pasta, a little extra water probably will not hurt anything. And if a little extra water won't hurt anything, the value of our innovation is low.


The Hesburgh Library (where the famed Touchdown Jesus can be seen hovering over the football stadium during telecasts) had just been completed, and it was in a part of campus that was just being built on. One day, as the library was being opened for business, I noticed something startling:

There were no paths to the building. It was all a sea of grass. As time went by, students walked to the library, and earthen paths gradually began to emerge. Come spring, the concrete trucks moved in and put down permanent paths where the students had "marked" them. No one would ever have drawn the paths the way the students actually ended up making them, but this simple pilot ensured that the "product" was perfectly suited to the users needs, and doing it cost nothing.


Hm: We buy curtains to maintain pri-vacy, but we focus on their color and style. We buy furniture to sit in, but we test it for comfort before we buy it. But among the equally comfortable, we choose the most attrac-tive. We buy a blue car because we like the color blue, but we buy a brand of blue car that we regard as safe, mechanically sound, and filled with the features that we believe are valu-able. We may be interested in looks when we buy, but we do not buy on looks alone. Utility is the reason we went shopping in the first place.


Step 2


  1.   Pop-up toaster
  2.   EZ-Pass
  3.   Automatic window shutters
  4.   Tide with Downy softener
  5.   Quick Tank propane tanks
  6.   Self-inflating tires

You probably know the answer, but just in case, here it is. Each one of these product innovations does exactly the same thing: It removes one or more steps from a task.


Step 3:


Then you see it.

In the lobby, there is a kiosk for checking in. You move in quickly and insert a credit card. Your name comes up, and in just a few seconds a key is presented to you. You are very relieved, and you have a newfound respect for this particular hotel chain. You are smiling for the first time all day. Then, you notice that the screen on the kiosk is flashing a new mes-sage. You read the message and your smile turns to a grin.

You may even giggle a little. You spend another couple of minutes at the kiosk, go to your room, and vow to stay only at this chain from now on.

What did the screen say to bring out this kind of reac-tion? Did you win $1 million for being the millionth guest? Were you upgraded to the Presidential Suite?

No. The screen simply said, "We notice you are checking out tomorrow morning. Do you need a boarding pass for to-morrow?" If you said yes, then it provided access to the online check-in sites for all the major airlines and printed out your boarding pass for you. The kiosk exceeded your expectations dramatically because it not only took care of your current task (checking into the hotel) well, but it also recognized an adjacent task that you might wish to complete and facilitated its completion. It did so seamlessly from your per-spective, and you saved time and anxiety.


Checking into a hotel one day and getting on a plane the next day are consecutive steps on my itinerary and in my mind, but truthfully, I do not expect someone else to connect them for me. So when someone connects seemingly disconnected tasks for customers, those customers are not just pleased, they are surprised and delighted, and rightfully so.