Competing Against Luck: The Story of Innovation and Customer Choice

by Clayton M. Christensen

3. Workarounds and Compensating Behaviors As an innovator, spotting consumers who are struggling to resolve a Job to Be Done by cobbling together workarounds or compensating behaviors, as Kimberly-Clark did with Silhouettes, should cause your heart to beat a little faster. You’ve spotted potential customers—consumers who are so unhappy with the available solutions to a job they very deeply want to solve that they’re going to great lengths to create their own solution. Whenever you see a compensating behavior, pay very close attention, because it’s likely a clue that there is an innovation opportunity waiting to be seized—one on which customers would place a high value. But you won’t even see these anomalies—compensating behavior and cobbled-together workarounds—if you’re not fully immersed in the context of their struggle.