Part 1: Problem Statements in Digital Innovation: The Importance of Asking the Right Question
This post is the first in a twelve-part series in which we’re sharing what we’ve learned about healthy starts to digital innovation.
Problem Statements
Digital innovation starts with a problem worth solving. We’ve found it’s amazingly helpful to have a single statement that represents the nature of the problem, who’s experiencing it, and why it’s so important to solve. We have a simple template you can use, inspired by the ongoing work we do with our friends at IDEO.org, to help work through a single-sentence expression:
How might we [human-oriented problem to solve] through/by [big hunch about the innovation] so that [important outcome that will happen].
I can’t tell you the number of RFPs and multi-page project briefs I’ve been sent over the years that don’t have a compelling and refined problem statement. I’m often left to ask the question myself: “What difference will this project make that is worth my team’s time and investment?”
Problem Statement Examples
Here are a few good examples:
- How might we help time-crunched early learning educators find books through a better discovery experience that helps meet their students’ specific needs?
- How might we help entrepreneurs navigate their journey with a city-wide platform so that economic growth is supercharged?
- How might we help match social causes and funders through an intelligent, turnkey product so that more time is spent doing good and less time spent looking for funding?
And some examples that really need iteration:
- How might we solve world hunger? Too broad, not specific enough to ideate around.
- How might we increase revenues through a new digital product line? Not human-centered. Note with this one that’s it’s not bad to increase revenues, but we miss a lot of energy by leaving out the human reason to do so!
- How might we help citizens improve their financial security? It’s a great start but does not advance a specific “with” or “through” or big why. We often will start brainstorming sessions in this way and complete the sentence having filled out the hunch and why to have something we can test against.
Drawing Board Sessions
Drawing Board sessions are all about iterating and refining the problem worth solving, better understanding the pain points of those experiencing it, and getting on the same page about the key opportunities around it.
Drawing Boards help us make sure we’re focused on the core problem before going neck-deep into potential solutions. We find that just two weeks empathizing and contextualizing in this way reaps incredible benefits over the many months, sometimes over a year, it takes to pull off a digital innovation.
At CauseLabs we have a recurring company-wide Drawing Board session once a week. It’s 30 minutes, informal, high energy, and wide open to new and returning ideas alike. It’s a space where problem statements are drafted, teams form, and empathy’s catalyzed.
When working on specific projects, we plan two Drawing Board sessions with core client team members. The first one is focused on refining the problem, understanding people and their pain points, and brainstorming all the potential ways of solving it. The second starts to bubble up top hunches, assumptions, and priorities that will lead to rapid prototypes built in Lab Days (we’ll talk Lab Days in another post).
The important thing is that Problem Statement + Drawing Boards = getting on the same page and letting the minds of team members start to work before you invest more dedicated time into exploring solutions; it’s like marinating before grilling.
Fancy a Webinar to Go Deeper?
Sheryle Gillihan and T.J. Cook gave a webinar about this very topic live from the Nonprofit Technology Conference in San José: “The Path from Problem to Idea to Solution.” We shared plenty of examples from real work, lessons learned, and concise takeaways to inspire your work. Watch the webinar below!
