Khalid’s note taking skills were never in doubt at school. But once he’s a 1st Year Medical Student, everything changes.
Initially I thought about EXCLUDING this interview from the research (although we would still have posted it here for completeness). The reason: he answered the screener by saying he had joined a full online course, but within moments of starting the interview, it’s clear the only thing he bought was a book.
Worse, this is a story from nearly two years ago – way longer than I would typically look for in a screener (he said 3 months in the recruit).
These things happen from time-to-time, and there is usually some wastage in a JTBD interview project (usually in B2B research, where it’s harder to find the real buying decision maker). Take a look at the video below and think whether you’d keep him or leave him out of the research.
Watch the full interview below:
The good:
- He clearly recalls the situation that led to purchasing this book
- He actually bought something (rather than just borrowing it from the Library)
- There’s a real struggle going on that leads him to change and buy something new
The Four-Forces Debrief
Here’s my analysis for Janis, and a comparison with an existing interviewee (Ben) that ultimately led me to including Khalid’s story in our research:
Khalid - Four Forces Analysis
Khalid is a 4th year University student on a medical degree (6 years total)
In his first year he discovered that there was a vast amount more note taking in University as the amount of course material was 50% higher than pre-University
His notes were occupying time during the lectures where he could have been paying attention but was writing notes
By March/April in that year his attention turned to the exams - so he looked back to his notes to try and revise - at this point he realised the notes didn’t help:
There was a lack of keywords and information to help “jiggle his memory”
Often he had to go back to the source book or lecture slides to learn the same thing - which felt like a waste of time
The studying experience was “hectic” and made him need to look for a better way
By June/July he had finished his exams and had one eye on studying the next year - realising he needed a new way to take notes and learn
He Googled and found Mike Rohde’s website - looking at either the book alone or the course, but he opted for a $33 book (ebook) vs spending the $100 or so on the full course (as it was too expensive)
Mike’s videos explained how you didn't need to be an artist in order to use the course or book - with 4 simple shapes you can draw anything - and Khalid was drawn in as he wondered “do I have the skills to do this?”
He purchased the eBook as it was delivered immediately (vs waiting 3 days to get the hardback version) and he could read it anywhere on the iPad or iPhone
He used to book and finished it in a week - and found that the ideas about annotating parts of his notes were useful but the “4 shape” approach did not help
The course still taught him enough to save time on revision - for every 30 mins previously it now takes him 15-20 to achieve the same thing
The detail of images that Medical students need in (e.g. Anatomy) means that the 4 shape approach is not sufficient, so he wouldn’t recommend the book to other medical students
* There’s not a lot of anxiety here - or habit holding him back - his old way of note taking wasn’t working and he needed a new one before starting the next year
* Whilst $33 was a lot for the book and $100 too much for the course, it wasn’t prohibitively expensive
* He read the whole book in one go - he was harvesting a bunch of ideas rather than trying to learn one specific thing
* There were tutorials to follow that were simple - and fun to follow - showing how to form these basic shapes into more advanced structures
This is the 6th interview – and there’s a definite parallel between Khalid and Ben’s story. As we progress through the next 6-10 interviews we should start seeing more and more overlap, as the main themes of the stories appear.
If you want to follow along, pop your email in the box below and we’ll update you when the next post is released.