Build an Outcomes Map for New Product Blueprinting

One of the most powerful things you can do in New Product Blueprinting is to slow down and visualize how customers actually get their work done.
This technique is called Outcome Mapping, a structured way to trace a customer’s job step by step, in their own words, and without reference to any product or tool.

If that sounds familiar, it’s because Outcome Mapping shares its DNA with a Jobs-to-be-Done practice known as Job Mapping. The concept was first published in the Harvard Business Review article “The Customer-Centered Innovation Map” by Lance Bettencourt and Tony Ulwick. Whether you call it Job Mapping or Outcome Mapping, the idea is the same: when you break down a job into its natural sequence of steps, hidden insights start to appear.

---

Why Outcome Mapping Matters

Customer interviews can be messy. People jump between steps, skip context, or assume you already understand the basics. One minute they’re talking about a frustration; the next, about the result they wanted. It’s like trying to reconstruct a puzzle without the picture on the box.

Outcome Mapping gives you that picture.
It brings order to the chaos of interview notes and transforms scattered anecdotes into a clear, linear story.

In Blueprinting, this matters because the goal isn’t just to collect “customer quotes,” it’s to discover unmet outcomes that can guide innovation. When you map a job, you’re not just organizing notes; you’re revealing friction, waste, and opportunity.

Think of Outcomes Mapping as the backbone of customer discovery. It shows:

• The full arc of the customer’s work—from start to finish.

• Where they struggle or hesitate.

• Which steps are underserved by current solutions.

• How different people or tools interact along the way.

Once you see that structure, your entire team—product managers, marketers, engineers—can align around what the customer is actually trying to accomplish.

---

A Trail Map for Customer Work

Imagine you’re mapping the job of “testing boiler water quality.” Some engineers start by gathering samples. Others check the calibration of their instruments first. Some monitor readings continuously; others record data once per shift.

If you take all their comments at face value, it sounds inconsistent. But when you map the job—define what triggers it, the sequence of steps, and how it concludes—patterns emerge. You see common checkpoints, variations, and gaps that point to innovation opportunities.

I like to compare a job map to a trail guide.
When you hike, you don’t care what boots someone wears—you care about the path, the switchbacks, and where people lose footing. Similarly, when mapping a customer job, we’re charting the terrain of their work, not cataloging the gear they use.

---

The Eight Universal Steps

Bettencourt and Ulwick identified eight universal steps that show up across nearly every kind of work. Over the years, Blueprinting teams have validated this structure again and again, whether interviewing surgeons, plant operators, or software users.

Here’s a quick look at those steps, reframed in Blueprinting language:

1. Define – Clarify what success looks like and set boundaries.
   What’s the desired result? What constraints or criteria matter most?

2. Locate – Gather what’s required to start the job.
   Information, tools, materials, or people.

3. Prepare – Set up or organize for action.
   Configure, clean, calibrate, or arrange what’s needed.

4. Confirm – Double-check readiness.
   Is everything in place? Any conditions to verify before proceeding?

5. Execute – Perform the core transformation.
   This is the visible “doing” step.

6. Monitor – Observe progress and evaluate performance.
   Is it going as expected?

7. Modify – Adjust or correct as needed.
   Fix issues, refine parameters, resolve problems.

8. Conclude – Wrap up and reset for next time.
   Store, clean, report, reflect, or prepare for the next cycle.

Not every job will include all eight steps. Some compress or repeat them. But using this framework ensures you don’t overlook crucial transitions—especially those “before” and “after” moments where customers spend surprising amounts of effort.

---

How to Build an Outcome Map

Building an Outcome Map is less about process charts and more about listening with structure.
Here’s a simple workflow you can follow inside any Blueprinting interview sequence.

1. Name the job.
   State it as a “from → to” transformation.
   Example: “From unverified water quality → validated safe water.”

2. Sketch the main flow.
   Capture the major steps that move the customer from start to finish. Don’t obsess over perfect wording; just get the skeleton down.

3. Add the before-and-after.
   Customers often skip setup and wrap-up. Probe gently:
   “What do you do before you start?” “What happens right after?”

4. Check for checkpoints.
   Look for steps where customers pause to confirm, measure, or adjust. These are gold mines of friction and hidden emotion.

5. Refine and simplify.
   Combine redundant steps; split vague ones. Aim for 8–12 clear stages.

6. Validate with customers.
   Share the draft back. They’ll correct you, add nuance, or laugh and say, “That’s not how it really works.” That feedback makes your map real.

Outcome Maps aren’t static diagrams, they evolve. As your Blueprinting project unfolds, new interviews will sharpen the order, reveal missing details, or even shift the boundaries of the job itself. Treat the map as a living model of customer reality.

---

What Makes a Strong Outcome Map

A good Outcome Map does more than list tasks. It captures how the customer experiences the work. Here are a few habits of strong practitioners:

1. Observe, don’t assume.
   Watching customers in context exposes steps they never mention. Real behavior always beats recalled behavior.

2. Stay solution-free.
   Avoid tool actions like “press start” or “open app.” Instead, phrase steps as intentions: “Verify system ready,” “Record measurement.”

3. Use their verbs.
   The customer’s language reveals how they think. If they say “check,” don’t translate it to “inspect.” Keep it natural.

4. Cross-compare tools.
   See how the job changes when customers use competing solutions—or no tool at all. It helps you separate the job from the product.

5. Keep revisions.
   Each version teaches something. Early drafts are prototypes of understanding.

By the fifth or sixth interview, you’ll notice something: every note starts to fall neatly into a step. That’s when you know your map is working.

---

The Broader Value for Teams

Outcome Mapping delivers more than research clarity,  it aligns entire organizations around the reality of customer work.

• For Product Development: it surfaces pain points and inefficiencies, guiding feature priorities.

• For Marketing: it highlights moments of tension or relief that make great messaging hooks.

• For Sales: it reframes conversations around the customer’s process, not the product’s specs.

Teams stop arguing over feature lists and start discussing which parts of the customer’s journey matter most. That shared mental model is priceless.

And for those exploring deeper motivation frameworks—like the JTBD Pyramid™—Outcome Mapping provides the functional foundation. Once you can see the functional flow of a job, it becomes easier to identify the identity and emotional layers surrounding it: who the customer is trying to be, and how they want to feel as they perform the work.

---

Where the Opportunities Hide

When most teams think about improvement, they overly focus on the “execute” step, the doing. But in practice, the biggest opportunities often lie before or after execution.

• Before: customers waste time locating tools, preparing environments, or double-checking readiness.

• After: they struggle to interpret results, fix errors, or clean up.

In other words, innovation often lives in the margins of the job—at the transitions.
Mapping makes those margins visible.

That’s why Blueprinting treats Outcome Maps as a gateway to the next stage: capturing desired outcomes (those measurable statements of success or failure customers use to judge each step). The clearer your map, the richer your outcome statements—and the more reliable your quantitative prioritization later on.

---

Bringing It All Together

Outcome Mapping sits at the heart of New Product Blueprinting. It transforms messy qualitative input into structured understanding and reveals the true flow of customer work.

Used well, it helps teams:

• Bring order to interview chaos.

• Discover hidden friction and unmet needs.

• Align product, marketing, and sales around one reality.

• Create a foundation for outcome statements and quantitative research.

And if you’re familiar with The Jobs-to-be-Done Pyramid™, you can think of Outcome Mapping as operating across the bottom two levels—Product Jobs and Core Jobs. It helps us see not only what customers are trying to do, but how those functional goals connect upward into identity and emotion. As a couple of references:

• The Customer-Centered Innovation Map, by Bettencourt and Ulwick
• Job Mapping 101, by Scott Burleson

So next time you’re in a customer interview, grab a pen or open a whiteboard. Listen closely, capture their sequence, and sketch the flow from “not done” to “done.”

Once you’ve seen a customer’s job mapped out, you’ll never look at their world—or your own product plans—the same way again.