The #Consumer Adventure

Someone once told me that the path to finding one's role in life is in taking heed of what we daydream about when we are doing the things we are required to do.

You know that feeling: you are at work and it's time to go through accounts and find discrepancies, round out loose ends, and call on clients that have avoided you for weeks, or who just seem to be too busy.

What do you daydream about while you are doing the things you have to do? I ask about this because a reader of Bob Moesta's work on innovation has posted a pretty insightful blog post about the dream of spending the time of our lives in the ways we feel will be most satisfying and significant to our family: independence, travel, nature, creativity. 


Blogger "UrbanTangerine" points out this premise by sighting Bob's work mentioned in the Whitney Johnson article we posted yesterday, when she writes about the anxiety of trying out a new situation that was first prompted by something subtle, deep and unconscious moving her forward (pulling her):

These dreams ask should I stay or should I go? At the root they are the same dream of spending the time of our lives in the ways we feel will be most satisfying and significant to our family: independence, travel, nature, creativity. These are all powerful draws. As My Hero said at his workplace this week, "The only thing between anyone and this place is two weeks notice." We've got the itch, the anxious hollow belly feeling that something BIG needs to change. So why don't we just do it? I can answer that with an equation.

The Equation of Progress by innovation expert Bob Moesta.

F1 (push of the situation) + F2 (Pull of the new idea) > F3 (allegiance to current or past behavior) + F4 (anxiety of new solution)

Many would think that the average consumer experience, or the average daily experiences of life are just about split-second decisions made out of necessity for a very common or superficial reason.

I am hungry, so I need that candy bar.

I am tired, so I need to get a coffee.

I hate my job, so I need to find another one. All of these are true to a point. But you can get more granular.

What I like about Bob's Jobs-to-be-done methodology is that it reveals there are layers and layers of emotional meaning and need there that we often never pay attention to. xxx's experience of wanting to sail around the world on a boat seems grand, but it is very true that the same reasons that compel her and her family to try this adventure may also compel her to make other choices.

It may very well be true that we are all trying to tap into these compelling emotional "dreams," or reasons for our actions. What would happen if we did make a practice out of this, and made it a fundamental part of how business, marketing, or consumer choice operates?

I'd say we'd have a very big adventure on our hands.