Jobs to Be Done

Biological Parallel

Beavers don't 'build dams'—they solve the job of creating deep-water refugia from predators while accessing food. This niche construction transforms the environment to satisfy the underlying need, not the surface behavior. Jobs-to-be-Done mirrors this: customers don't want drills, they want holes; organisms don't want behaviors, they want fitness outcomes. The beaver's engineering reveals how understanding the true job (safety + food access) predicts what solutions will succeed better than studying dam-building techniques.