Blue Ocean 4 Actions Framework Template
Break the value-cost trade-off and create a blue ocean with four central questions.
About the Blue Ocean 4 Actions Framework template
The Four Actions template is designed to help entrepreneurs think in more innovative ways about the products they are creating relative to the industry. The framework will help you maximize user value and eliminate unnecessary product features by eliminating and reducing user pain, and raising and creating user gain.
Who created the 4 Actions Framework for Blue Ocean Strategy?
The Blue Ocean Four Actions Framework was created by W. Chan Kim and Renée Mauborgne. They are Professors of Strategy at INSEAD, one of the world’s top business schools, and co-directors of the INSEAD Blue Ocean Strategy Institute in Fontainebleau, France. Together, they wrote a best-selling book Blue Ocean Strategy: How to Create Uncontested Market Space and Make the Competition Irrelevant.
Why use the Four Actions Framework?
The Blue Ocean Four Actions Framework can help you assess whether you are spending money in the correct ways around your product to maximize user gain and minimize user pain. Identify the pains that really matter for your product and the gains that really matter with this template. This way, you are getting the most value with the least cost within the total product market.
When to use the Four Actions Framework Template
The Four Actions Framework Template is most useful when you help create value innovation and break the value-cost trade-off. W. Chan Kim and Renée Mauborgne use the terms red and blue oceans to describe the market universe. They say that ‘red oceans are all the industries in existence today—the known market space.’ In the red oceans, industry boundaries are defined and accepted, and the competitive rules of the game are known. As the market space gets crowded, prospects for profits and growth are reduced. Blue oceans, in contrast, denote all the industries not in existence today—the unknown market space, untainted by competition. In blue oceans, demand is created rather than fought over. So the Blue Ocean 4 Actions Framework Template is a great tool to consider when you feel like your company or your product is stuck in the ‘red ocean’ and you are looking for ways to innovate.
How to use the 4 Actions Framework template
Step 1: Eliminate
In each column, it’s important to ask questions about the industry standards in your product space. First, ask yourself, which factors that the industry has long competed on should be eliminated?
Think of the factors that require a lot of investment and effort, but don’t bring a lot of revenue/new customers and, in general, don’t drive key metrics up. These can also be the factors that made more sense in the past but are not as useful now — for example, a feature of differentiated a digital product in the past but became obsolete as time passed.
Step 2: Reduce
Which factors should be reduced well below the industry’s standard? Think of the features/characteristics of your product that are well designed to beat the competition but take to much time and resources. Can you strip this down to something more simple but still competitive and relevant to your users?
Step 3: Raise
Which factors should be raised well above the industry’s standard? What are the pain points that the market does not address? Think of the way you can build features that will help your customers solve challenges that other companies are not solving.
Step 4: Create
Which factors should be created that the industry has never offered? This is one of the most challenging questions and it requires a deep understanding of your customers’ interests and desires, as well as a good insight into where the industry is going. The goal is to think about the future and the challenges customers haven’t articulated yet.
What is the Four Actions Framework?
The Four Actions Framework is a blue ocean strategy tool that poses four central questions designed to help you create value innovation and break the value-cost trade-off. These four key questions or actions include: Eliminate, Reduce, Raise and Create. The framework helps you raise and create customer value, and reduce or eliminate what is not needed.
Get started with this template right now.
Epic & Feature Roadmap Planning
Epic & Feature Roadmap Planning template facilitates the breakdown of large-scale initiatives into manageable features and tasks. It helps teams prioritize development efforts based on business impact and strategic objectives. By visualizing the relationship between epics and features, teams can effectively plan releases and ensure alignment with overall project goals and timelines.
Kaizen Report Template
Works best for:
Agile Methodology, Operations, Documentation
What makes a great company great? They know that greatness needs to be fostered and maintained — meaning they never stop working to improve. If you’re one of those companies (or aspire to be), a kaizen report is an ideal tool. It creates a simple visual guide to continuous improvement activities on a team, departmental, and organizational level. Using a kaizen report approach, every employee in an organization audits their own processes and understands what they might have overlooked, making this a powerful tool for increasing accountability at all levels.
PI Planning Template
Works best for:
PI Planning, Product Management
The Miro PI Planning Template streamlines the Program Increment planning process for Agile teams. It facilitates a collaborative environment, enabling teams to efficiently align on strategies, identify dependencies, and convert decisions into actionable tasks. With features like real-time collaboration, Jira integration, and a centralized workspace, the template supports teams in enhancing efficiency, engagement, and decision-making.
Business Plan Template
Works best for:
Strategy & Planning
The Business Plan Template not only streamlines the complex task of crafting a business plan but also enhances collaboration and creativity. Whether you're a seasoned entrepreneur or just starting, Miro's Business Plan Template offers a practical, comprehensive solution to turn your business ideas into actionable strategies.
Likert Scale Template
Works best for:
Desk Research, Decision Making, Product Management
It’s not always easy to measure complex, highly subjective data — like how people feel about your product, service, or experience. But the Likert scale is designed to help you do it. This scale allows your existing or potential customers to respond to a statement or question with a range of phrases or numbers (e.g., from “strongly agree” to “neutral,” to “strongly disagree,” or from 1 to 5). The goal is to ask your customer some specific questions to turn into easy-to-interpret actionable user insights.
Meeting Template
Works best for:
Meetings, Team Meetings, Workshops
Everyone has been in a meeting that didn’t go as planned. Maybe it ran off course, or you ran out of time to accomplish everything you set out to do -- or maybe it just felt like a waste of time. To avoid that, it’s important to prepare to run a team meeting ahead of time. With this simple but effective template, you can prepare to run a team meeting that ticks all the boxes. By creating a streamlined way to build preparation into your workflow, you’ll ensure your meetings are efficient, enjoyable, and collaborative.