It was never about the horses: understanding innovation through customer needs

At the heart of innovation is the concept of “jobs to be done.” Customers ‘hire’ products and services to accomplish specific goals—whether that’s getting from point A to point B, entertaining them, or managing their health. The mistake is assuming that because customers don’t have a fully formed vision of the future, their input isn’t valuable. The real task is to listen beyond their words and understand their underlying needs.

Ford (or whoever originated the “faster horses” idea) might have dismissed direct customer feedback, but if he had framed the question differently—“What frustrates you about travel?”—he would have received answers that pointed to the problem: speed, reliability, and effort.

The automobile wasn’t a response to an explicitly stated demand, but rather an innovative answer to an observed need.

This is where great innovators set themselves apart. They don’t rely on customers to design the future, but they do rely on customer insight to shape it. They look at behaviour, pain points, and aspirations. They explore not just what people say, but what they do, where they struggle, and what they wish could be different.

Steve Jobs, supposedly another champion of not asking customers what they want, still obsessed over user experience. Apple didn’t create the iPhone by conducting focus groups on touchscreen devices, but they deeply understood the frustrations of mobile technology and designed a product that addressed them in ways people didn’t expect.

This is exactly why customer experience (CX) teams are so well-placed to help support meaningful innovation. Their role is to uncover the real needs, pain points, and behavioural patterns of customers day-to-day—not just what they say they want, but what will and won’t work for them in practice.

CX teams bring together research, behavioural data, and customer interactions to identify the friction points that stand in the way of a great experience. They translate insights into actionable strategies, ensuring that innovation is grounded in real user needs rather than assumptions. In essence, they help organisations avoid the “faster horses” trap by identifying the real job to be done.

But innovation isn’t just about solving customer pain points—it’s about doing so in a way that aligns with your company’s expertise and delivers commercial value.

For innovation to be sustainable, it has to make business sense. That means leveraging your company’s core strengths—whether that’s deep industry knowledge, cutting-edge technology, or unique operational capabilities—to create solutions that are not only desirable for customers but also scalable and commercially viable.

Take Tesla as an example. People wanted more sustainable transport, but mass adoption of electric vehicles only became possible when Tesla combined customer demand with their own expertise in battery technology, software integration, and premium brand positioning. Their innovation wasn’t just about solving a problem—it was about creating a profitable, differentiated solution that customers valued and were willing to pay for.

For digital products, this means balancing customer-centric design with business strategy. A pharma company investing in a digital experience for healthcare professionals must ensure that the platform is not only easy to use but also drives measurable engagement, reinforces brand trust, and ultimately supports commercial goals.

The real sweet spot of innovation is where:

• Customers’ unmet needs are addressed
• Your company’s expertise and capabilities are leveraged
• The solution delivers tangible commercial value

In the world of digital products—especially in industries like healthcare and pharma—the principle of listening to customer needs and pain points is critical. Users may not articulate a need for streamlined, personalised, or AI-driven digital experiences, but they express frustration with complexity, inefficiency, and lack of clarity. The job isn’t to ask, “What feature do you want?” but to uncover the underlying problem and design an experience that solves it.

At the same time, those solutions must drive business impact. That could mean improving adherence in patient support programmes, increasing HCP engagement with content, or streamlining workflows to reduce operational costs. The best digital experiences solve both sides of the equation—delivering value for the business while making life easier for the customer.

So, the lesson isn’t that customer input is irrelevant. It’s that we need to ask better questions, observe more closely, and translate insights into solutions that move industries forward. The real role of an innovator isn’t to give people what they ask for—it’s to give them what they need before they know what to ask, in a way that also makes commercial sense.