1/ Really enjoyed this presentation and post by @astrange on the coming wave of innovation in fintech. If you're interested in this space, this is a good one to spend a Sunday morning watching and reading. a16z.com/2020/01/21/eve…
2/ As it just so happens that Clay Christensen, whose class I got the privilege to take, passed away this week, when I saw this key slide from the talk it made me immediately pause and think about the "Jobs to be Done" theory. This is textbook Christensen. 
3/ The simple way to approach financial innovation is to say it's all about making loans or earning interest. This was the wave of fintech startups attacking specific lines of business banks had (personal loans/LendingClub, small business loans/OnDeck, student loans/Sofi, etc.)
4/ But as it turns out, the startup/VC ecosystem is not as well equipped to succeed against banks, because what makes loans attractive is the cost of capital, and banks are better at cost of capital. Startups, almost by definition, cannot win on cost of capital.
5/ After the VC investment boom into lending, some thought fintech was dead, but others realized there are lots of "Jobs to be Done" in the financial world that is actually things startups are good at, and better at, than banks. These things all require technology.
6/ Software is something the startup ecosystem is good at. And specifically, more good at than banks. So now people make the point it's more "tech-fin" and less "fin-tech" in the sense that the technology leads the finance. That's as it should be, and as the theory would predict.
7/ The key thing about the Jobs to be Done theory is that it gets to the causality behind a purchase. Why does a customer choose a product to make a purchase? Why does a product specifically fit that "job to be done" in the customer's mind? hbr.org/2016/09/know-y…
8/ Some of this seems obvious now, but it hasn't been forever. I don't know if any organization internalized that theory as much as AWS. Amazon's term of "as a service" is literally just saying "is a job to be done." wsj.com/articles/amazo…
9/ Amazon needed storage, built S3, realized others around the world needed storage, offered it. Job to be done. Storage as a service.
Rinse and repeat.
Rinse and repeat.
10/ As a founder of a fintech company now, I obviously think this theory applies to fintech. But I think you can use the Jobs to be Done theory to decompose just about any industry and offer these products - each, in YC speak, offering a "quantum of utility" - and succeed.
11/ And although "as a service" is the moniker we commonly use, it's only appropriate, this week, to submit that it really is paraphrasing Christensen's "job to be done" theory.
If you're in YC and need to pivot your idea, just do that.
Pick a job.
Do it.
"As a service."
😉
If you're in YC and need to pivot your idea, just do that.
Pick a job.
Do it.
"As a service."
😉
