Job Map Template

About the Job Map Template

Job mapping deconstructs the steps a customer takes to “hire” a product or service for a job they need to do. Your team’s user experience researchers or product managers can first use the Jobs to Be Done framework to understand why customers “hire” or “fire” your product or service.

Job mapping is the next logical step to dig deeper into what customers are trying to do at every step of the process — and Miro's job map template can guide you through this breakdown.

How to use the job map template

Miro's job map template can guide you through the job mapping process. Follow these steps to begin filling it in:

1. Define the characteristics of the job to be done

Conduct user research and interviews to understand the core need your customer has. Think of it in terms of the functional need or emotional task that a customer is trying to achieve.

To use a simplified example, imagine a business that makes lasagnas. The core need of the customer buying a lasagna is to "quench hunger and provide a satisfying meal."

2. Determine what is needed to get the job done

Think about the context behind this need. For example, if the customer is rushing home from work, they'll want a lasagna they can pick up on the way and heat up at home.

3. Brainstorm what you can do to make the process easier

Use template to jot down ideas for how your product can fulfill the fundamental need. Review data and insights to better understand your customer's motivations, such as what they prioritize, and how they think about aspects such as their time, money, and safety. 

4. Focus on your product or service as a solution

Based on your learnings, frame your product or service as a way to meet customer needs and motivations. Use this to influence product development, marketing strategies, and customer satisfaction.

Tips for making a job map

Job mapping is a staged process that helps organizations better understand what their customers want to do. The mapping also highlights opportunities to offer something new or different from competitors. 

UX researchers and product managers should remind their teams:

• Every job is a process, from start to finish, viewed from the customer’s perspective. 

The value of mapping out the steps is to critically examine, and improve, each step. Steps may need to be removed, introduced, reshuffled, enabled, or responsibility transferred from customer to organization. Job mapping helps teams articulate the what, why, and how of these changes. 

• Job types can change, but what needs to happen from start to finish stays the same. 

Every customer is different, but jobs are structured similarly. Customers must figure out what they need to do the job. First, they'll find any necessary inputs, then prepare each part of the job and where it will happen, follow through on tasks, make changes as needed, then finish the job.

• Jobs are different from solutions. 

Customers can hire both you and your competitor for different steps in the “jobs to be done” process. Less about solving a problem, jobs are more about improving a product or service offering to pursue new market opportunities.