Value Canvas in Projects

Abstract

Everyday companies design projects, products and services to make their customers’ lives easier. Due to the fast-moving world, technological progress and other aspects, most of nowadays markets are very competitive. On the one hand, this means a wide selection for customer to choose from, but on the other hand, companies need to figure out exactly what their customers want and need. The Value Proposition Canvas as part of the Business Model Canvas helps and supports companies to design projects, products and services to meet their customer requirements. This approach was introduced for the first time by Alexander Osterwalder in the 2000s as part of his work on Business Model Ontology. Similar to the Business Model Canvas, a given template guides the entrepreneur or manager through the two “maps”, namely the “customer profile” and the “value map”. The customer profile is divided in three sub sections – jobs, pains and gains. The second part is the value map, including the company’s products and services, pain relievers and gain creators. In the following article the overall Value Canvas process is described with its roles, meetings and application. In addition, some helpful considerations for the Value Canvas in new projects are provided. Furthermore, the benefits as well as limitations of the Value Canvas methodology are discovered and critically analysed.

The big Idea

One of the main tasks of each company and hence, their project leaders is to design and develop products and services to facilitate their customers live. However, 72 percent of newly developed products fail. That means, customer do not care about 7 out of 10 products introduced to the market. Global players such as Nintendo experienced failure by offering its first gaming console, namely the Famicom console. Further gaming consoles, such as the Atari or Nintendo NES also didn’t convince the customers. Not only Nintendo struggled offering the right products to an emerging market, also other big companies, such as Apple launched a number of failed products to the market. However, it should be the aim of every company not to waste its valuable resources on introducing a failure to the market and hence belong to the 72 percent mentioned above. To avoid introducing a poor product, project managers need to identify and recognise the right approach of a starting project (refer the book A Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge). According to (Book) one specific factor leading to the creation of a project is the customer request. The following steps of the Value Canvas tools help to visualise, design and test how to create value through a new product for a company’s customers. Therefore, it is highly recommended to first identify the customer requirements through the introduced steps of the Value Canvas and starting a new project based on this elaboration. Afterwards, a base for successful project management is created to fit the tailored needs of this new project. However, other strategic management tools and processes can also be used. Furthermore, it is worth mentioning, that the conduction of the Value Canvas works best in conjunction with the Business Model Canvas, but it is not a necessity.

Customer Map

The Value Canvas is composed out of two parts, namely the customer profile and the value map (See figure XX). Within the customer profile, the jobs the customer wants to get done are specified. These jobs can either be functional (e.g. Getting a project done by a specific date or getting from point A to point B), social (e.g. Impressing your surrounded people like family members, friends or colleagues) or emotional (e.g. Gaining a piece of mind). In the second step, customers’ pains should be highlighted. These pains prevent customers from getting their jobs done and are perceived as annoying and frustrating. The desire of customers is to avoid these pains as much as possible. Typical examples of pains customers experience are dissatisfaction of existing solutions or jobs. In addition, challenges, risks or obstacles for future projects can be recognised a typical pain. In the last part of the customer map, the gains are outlined. These gains describe how customer measure and perceive a job well done. Customers hope to achieve this outcome when getting their jobs done. Examples for gains could be concrete results, benefits or aspirations. This customer map is very valuable for project manager, because due to its visualisation of jobs, pains and gains, they are able to understand the customers the organisation is trying to create value for. The more the company learns about its customers, the clearer the map can be developed and hence, the better internal projects can be started to develop the best fitting product or service for their customers.

Value Map

The second part of the Value Canvas is the “Value Map” including the companies “products and services”, “pain relievers” and “gain creators”. In the product and services section, the company lists all the products and services they provide to their customers. These products and services aim to deliver the maximum of value for their customers. For example, one service of an energy supplier is providing energy to its customers. In the next step, the possible pain relievers are described. Project manager should think of possible features and opportunities of the company’s product and services and describe them in this section. The aim of these pain relievers is to eliminate, reduce or minimise pains customers care about and make their life easier. In the last step of the value map, project managers need to consider possible gain creators through the offered products and services. The outline of this section is to describe the benefits the company’s products or services intend to deliver, which the customers expects, desire or would be surprised by. Most of these grain creators have either a functional utility, a social gain, positive emotions or are save costs. The value map explicitly shows the project manager how future products and services can create gains and relief pains. The overall aim for project managers is to achieve a matching fit between the two maps. This perfect connection is achieved by figuring out what matters to customers, how the company’s products and services relief pains and create gains. A well elaborated value proposition targets essential customers’ requirements, jobs, pains and gains. There might be numerous pains and gains on the customer side, but the value map clearly describes on which the new product will focus on.

How to create Value

When starting a new project, the following steps are a helpful guideline to determine whether the future product or service is going to be successful or a failure. If the company is able to answer the following questions with yes, the organisation is on the right path to create a compelling value proposition. The following “4Us” are of great help to evaluate the internal part of the organisation. 1. Is the problem unworkable? The assigned project team working on this problem should scrutinise whether there is a business process which needs to be fixed. Possible consequences through a broken business process could be redundancies. If the answer is yes, the company managed to figure out their internal champion for this problem. 2. Is fixing the problem unavoidable? By figuring out this question, the organisation considers heavy impacts associated with governance or other regulations. For example, the company should examine consequences for their accounting department. If the answer is yes, the company recognised the group that will be the champion. 3. Is the problem urgent? This question addresses the urgency of the problem within the company. Global players and big size enterprises struggle daily with various problems. Therefore, commanding the attention and allocating the resources might be not easy. However, if the answer is yes, the management board will pay attention and consider the problem as urgent. 4. Is the problem underserved? The organisation should pay high attention to this sub question. By answering this question, the enterprise will find out whether there is noticeable absence of valid solutions for the concerning problem. A helpful guide is the following BLAC matrix (Blatant, Latent, Aspirational, Critical). If the answer is yes, the organisation can be certain the market is in high demand for a solution.

Pros

One of the main advantages of the Value Canvas is a very clear overview of the customers’ requirements, needs or desires. If the project team research in depth about these needs, a clear customer map can be created which indicates exactly what the customer wants. Furthermore, if the customer profile provides numerous pains and gains, the Value Canvas lists all of them very clearly. Therefore, the Value Canvas ultimately connects the internal value generations with customer requirements.

Another benefit of the Value Canvas is gaining a competitive advantage compared to competitors. By explicitly defining the customer requirements, companies can design and develop new products and services tailored precisely for these needs. Therefore, the company can allocate resources more efficiently and assign the right project manager and employees for the new product development.

Limitations

One of the main limitations of the Value Canvas is the exclusion of any outside factors. The strategic tool purely focuses on the customer’s requirements and the internal values a company can deliver. Possible competitors, market forces or any other external forces are completely excluded.

-REFERENCE- https://www.strategyzer.com/canvas/value-proposition-canvas