When envisioning the futurestate of a company or a service, we’re usually faced with the challenge of designing for a customer that doesn’t exist yet. What do we mean by this? Well, they exist in the obvious sense, they’re just not ‘there’ yet.

在設想公司或服務的未來狀態時，我們通常面臨為尚不存在的客戶進行設計的挑戰。 這是什么意思？ 好吧，它們以明顯的意義存在，它們還不是“那里”。

If, in the 90s we’d surveyed people to see if they’d rent out their houses to strangers, they would have largely answered no. Their future selves, with the launch of AirBnB, seem to have turned on a dime. Likewise, if we’d asked them if they’d routinely jump in a stranger’s car after a night out, the answer would also have been no.

如果在90年代我們對人們進行了調查，看看他們是否會將房子出租給陌生人，那么他們在很大程度上會回答“不”。 隨著AirBnB的推出，他們的未來自我似乎已經一毛錢了。 同樣，如果我們問他們晚上出門后是否會經常跳上陌生人的車，答案也不會。

Because, of course, none of us know what choices we’ll make, or behaviours we’ll display, in the future.

因為，當然，我們誰都不知道將來會做出什么樣的選擇或表現出來的行為。

So how can we design for people that we can’t talk to yet?

那么，我們如何為尚無法交談的人設計？

It’s an interesting problem; how to anticipate how a future customer might behave. It turns out that, for all meaningful purposes, we can get pretty close. Remember, futurestate design is near-future-ambitious, not far-future-whimsical. Remember, too, that the biggest breakthroughs come when we enable a new behaviour in people, rather than when we simply meet a current need or fix a current pain-point.

這是一個有趣的問題。 如何預測未來客戶的行為方式。 事實證明，出于所有有意義的目的，我們可以非常接近。 請記住，futurestate設計是近乎雄心勃勃的， 而不是遠古時代的異想天開的。 還要記住，最大的突破來自于我們在人們中實現一種新的行為，而不是僅僅滿足當前的需求或解決當前的痛點。

舊的方法是修復我們可以看到的內容。 (The old way is to fix what we can see.)

Traditionally, a company would conduct research with today’s customers to determine their current and anticipated needs. While customer-centricity is still far from ubiquitous business behaviour, most companies conduct customer research in some form or other, and for many operational purposes it’s invaluable information. Any product team worth a damn should be speaking to customers every day.

傳統上，公司會與今天的客戶進行研究以確定他們當前和預期的需求。 盡管以客戶為中心還遠遠不是普遍存在的業務行為，但是大多數公司都以某種形式進行客戶研究，并且對于許多運營目的而言，它是寶貴的信息。 任何值得該死的產品團隊都應該每天與客戶交流。

However, use this type of research as a basis for futurestate thinking and it will lead to an extremely constrained view of how a future customer will likely behave. In fact, it’s so convincing to hear something in a customer’s voice, that it can lead to full-on blindness to disruptive threats and, equally, to where opportunities for something genuinely new might exist.

但是，將這種類型的研究用作未來狀態思考的基礎，這將導致對未來客戶的可能行為的看法極為局限。 實際上，令人信服的是聽到客戶的聲音，以至于導致完全看不到破壞性威脅的可能性，同樣也可能導致出現真正新事物的機會。

It’s worth remembering that most of the legendary disruption stories involve companies who were at the forefront of customer research, yet were still surprised when those customers flocked to something else.

值得記住的是，大多數具有傳奇色彩的顛覆故事都涉及那些站在客戶研究前沿的公司，但是當這些客戶涌向其他客戶時，他們仍然感到驚訝。

Why is it so limiting? Because in the same way as organisations carry their legacy behaviours with them, so do customers — that oft-quoted ‘faster horse’ scenario is very much alive and well. People, for the most part, naturally think of what would be better than they have today. Their expectations are defined by what they have.

為什么這么限制？ 因為與組織隨身攜帶其遺留行為的方式相同，客戶也是如此，所以經常被引用的“更快的情況”是非常好的。 人們通常會自然地想到比今天更好的東西。 他們的期望取決于他們所擁有的。

So we have to find ways to look beyond the better/faster/smarter/cheaper evolutionary mindset and envision the potential future mindset of a target customer. We can achieve this by exploiting a fascinating change in the way that people’s expectations and attitudes are defined.

因此，我們必須找到超越更好/更快/更智能/更便宜的進化思維方式的方法，并設想目標客戶的潛在未來思維方式。 我們可以通過定義人們的期望和態度的方式發生重大變化來實現這一目標。

我們對一個人的期望是由我們許多人的經驗定義的。 (Our expectations of one are defined by our experiences of many.)

It used to be that your expectations as a customer were defined by the standards of the sector or subject of the service you were using. It made perfect sense to evaluate the standard of one service against others like it because we all accessed them in such discrete ways. We didn’t compare a dry cleaners with a bookstore, or an accountants with a physiotherapist, or travel insurance with a newspaper. Mentally they were compartmentalised into distinct buckets defined by their function.

過去，您作為客戶的期望是由所使用行業或服務主題確定的。 相對于其他服務來評估一種服務的標準是非常有意義的，因為我們所有人都以這種離散的方式訪問它們。 我們沒有將干洗店與書店進行比較，也沒有將會計師與物理治療師進行比較，也沒有將旅行保險與報紙進行比較。 精神上，它們被劃分為由其功能定義的不同的存儲桶。

Well, those divisions don’t exist any more. In the digital age, this compartmentalised behaviour has changed, dramatically.

好吧，這些分裂已經不存在了。 在數字時代，這種分隔行為已發生了巨大變化。

Each new innovation or improvement that we experience as a customer sets a new bar for all of the services we use, not just those that are peers or competitors — because we access those services in progressively more consistent ways; via multiple apps on our phone, for example. Our earlier mental models of subject or purpose-based subdivisions are evaporating as our access to services converge on digital devices.

我們作為客戶經歷的每一項新創新或改進都為我們使用的所有服務設置了新的標準，而不僅僅是同行或競爭對手的服務-因為我們以越來越一致的方式訪問這些服務； 例如通過手機上的多個應用。 隨著我們對服務的訪問逐漸集中在數字設備上，我們較早的基于主題或基于目的的細分的思維模型正在消失。

The digital devices that we rely on for an enormous amount of everyday life now have led us to form one ever-evolving meta-expectation from all of our service experiences.

現在，我們賴以生存的大量數字設備使我們從我們所有的服務體驗中形成了一種不斷發展的元期望。

Your expectations of a bank are now directly influenced by your experience of a ride hailing company. We don’t make a distinction between services in the way we used to: we judge everything by everything else, and our behaviours change constantly to reflect an overall standard of what is acceptable to us (like sharing personal data) or expected by us (like frictionless payments).

你的銀行的預期現在直接由你一程海陵公司的經驗的影響。 我們不會像以前那樣在服務之間進行區分：我們通過其他一切方式來判斷一切，并且我們的行為會不斷變化，以反映我們可以接受(例如共享個人數據)或我們期望的總體標準(例如無摩擦付款)。

Today’s great experience is tomorrow’s baseline expectation, and we can use that to help define what our future customer design target should be like by casting our research net wider to consider influences on behaviour more comprehensively — and imaginatively.

今天的經驗是明天的基線期望，我們可以通過擴大研究網絡以更全面和富有想象力地考慮對行為的影響，來幫助定義未來客戶設計目標的目標。

您必須休息一下，“他們永遠不會那樣做”的心態。 (You have to take a break from the ‘they’ll never do that’ mindset.)

Exploring and articulating holistic experience influences — with the individual in the centre of that holistic view — is a powerful tool in futurestate design exercises. By demonstrating that what seems like a radical shift in behaviour in our future customer really is not — because that very behaviour is already very much adopted by them elsewhere — we can get much closer to their futurestate customers’ mindset.

探索和闡明整體體驗的影響力(以個人為整體視角的中心)是Futurestate設計實踐中的有力工具。 通過證明我們的未來客戶的行為似乎發生了根本性轉變-因為這種行為已經被其他地方的人們所接受-我們可以更接近他們的未來狀態客戶的思維方式。

Think of it this way: over the next few years, what behaviours might become acceptable, or commonplace, that would open up entirely new ways for your company to service customers? The best way to figure that out is to cast your research net widely, from understanding what behaviours are driving the success of fast-growing startups to speaking to people who are far outside of your usual domain. Look for the outliers.

這樣想：在接下來的幾年中，什么樣的行為可能會變得可以接受或司空見慣，從而為您的公司服務于客戶開辟全新的方式？ 弄清楚這一點的最佳方法是廣泛地研究網絡，從了解什么行為正在推動快速成長的初創公司取得成功，到與不在您通常領域內的人們交談。 尋找離群值。

Take as your working assumption that if people are, say, already allowing a relatively unknown startup’s algorithm to take money automatically from their bank account by learning and tracking their spending habits, then you might be able to leverage that behaviour too. It’s basically collecting emerging patterns today to use as fuel for thinking about your own future.

假設您的工作假設是，如果人們已經允許相對未知的初創公司的算法通過學習和跟蹤他們的消費習慣來自動從他們的銀行帳戶中提取資金，那么您也可以利用這種行為。 它基本上是在收集當今的新興模式，以用作思考自己的未來的動力。

This approach establishes an entirely different frame of reference for how you might service customers and can unlock an enormous amount of inventive, progressive thinking — even in people whose incoming attitude is ‘they’ll never do that’, or ‘that’ll never happen’. Entrenched beliefs, and rigid mindsets about what customers will accept, quickly fall away when you construct that holistic ‘meta-expectation’ picture of the futurestate customer’s mindset.

這種方法為您如何服務客戶建立了完全不同的參考框架，并且可以釋放出大量的創新性，進取性思維，即使對于來訪態度是“他們永遠不會那樣做”或“永遠不會發生”的人們'。 當您構建關于futurestate客戶心態的整體“元期望”圖片時，根深蒂固的信念和對客戶會接受的態度的僵化態度很快就會消失。

Sector or product-based expectations are only relevant to short-term thinking. If you only look at today’s competitors, or speak to today’s customers, you’ll never achieve a real breakthrough. By conducting research into services that would be considered irrelevant commercially but are highly relevant behaviourally, you can articulate a futurestate behavioural benchmark that helps everyone involved step out of current state ‘they’ll never do that’ constraints, and into the ‘what if?’ mindset that is so critical to any form of innovation.

基于行業或產品的期望僅與短期思維有關。 如果您僅關注當今的競爭對手或與當今的客戶交流，您將永遠無法實現真正??的突破。 通過對那些在商業上不相關但在行為上高度相關的服務進行研究，您可以闡明一個Futurestate行為基準，該基準可以幫助每個參與人員擺脫當前狀態，“他們將永遠不會那樣做”，進入“假設情況”？ ' 對任何形式的創新都至關重要的心態。

在研究而非希望上建立對明天客戶的看法。 (Build your view of tomorrow’s customer on research, not hope.)

Futurestate design should never rely on science fiction or fantasy. Its value lies in envisioning an achievable target vision of the future, not in pretending that anything can be done. Sometimes we need to push the envelope a little further (for example, anticipating the use of a new technology that doesn’t have a large scale application yet) but that’s rare. Usually, we stand back from the futurestate experiences we capture in our work with clients and we are all confident of achieving them without first inventing unobtanium.

Futurestate的設計絕不應依賴科幻或幻想。 它的價值在于構想未來可能實現的目標愿景，而不是假裝任何事情都可以做。 有時我們需要進一步努力(例如，預期使用尚未大規模應用的新技術)，但這很少見。 通常，我們會從與客戶合作中獲得的futurestate經驗中退縮，我們都有信心在沒有首先發明unobtanium的情況下實現這些目標。

That applies to customers equally: don’t construct a fictional persona as a design target based on your hopes and dreams for what they might be. Do the research and build a view of the customer that your futurestate company will serve, based on rationale and sensible inferences. Infer, but don’t imagine their behaviour.

這同樣適用于客戶：不要基于您對他們可能的希望和夢想而構建虛構的角色作為設計目標。 根據基本原理和合理的推論，進行研究并為您的futurestate公司服務的客戶建立一個視圖。 推斷，但不要想象他們的行為。

The time to apply imagination and lateral thinking is in how you might exploit those characteristics: the aim is to liberate creative thinking by releasing some of the constraints of today.

發揮想象力和橫向思維的時間在于您如何利用這些特征：目的是通過釋放當今的一些限制來解放創造性思維。

廣度和多樣性總能獲得最佳結果。 (Breadth and diversity always get the best results.)

When we work with teams to envision the futurestate of their company, we always fuel the thinking process with insights from services and experiences beyond their own sectors. We watch long-held views on what’s impossible, or will never be adopted by customers, fall away and we see their creative brains switch on as they get excited about the opportunities presented by tomorrow’s customer.

當我們與團隊合作以預見其公司的未來狀態時，我們始終會通過自身部門以外的服務和經驗中的見解來推動思考過程。 我們看到了長期存在的觀點，認為不可能發生的事情或永遠不會被客戶接受的想法消失了，當他們為明天的客戶提供的機會感到興奮時，我們看到了他們的創造力。

So, don’t limit how you think about your future customer by what they can tell you today — whether in-person or via data. They might be the same basic human as they are today, but they’ll behave very differently in a few years’ time and you need to get your brain closer to that person than today’s.

因此，不要以他們今天可以告訴您的方式(無論是面對面還是通過數據)來限制您對未來客戶的看法。 他們可能是和今天一樣的基本人，但是幾年后他們的行為將大不相同，因此您需要使自己的大腦比今天更接近這個人。

Between now and then their expectations of, and attitudes towards, your futurestate services will be the product of a diverse range of influences. Most of those will come from experiences far outside of your domain, so don’t be afraid to look far and wide to build a picture of where they might end up.

從現在開始，他們對未來狀態服務的期望和態度將是各種影響的產物。 其中大多數將來自您的領域以外的經驗，因此不要害怕走遠，以建立最終結果的圖片。

That thing you think that they’ll never do? We bet they’re doing it right now.

你以為他們永遠不會做的那件事？ 我們打賭他們現在正在這樣做。

To explore the Futurestate Design series to-date, visit The Human Layer, where you’ll learn what it is and why it’s important, how to approach it, and we share the rules and tools to help your futurestate design programme succeed. Make sure you subscribe to receive next week’s post, where we’ll be challenging current-state analysis and showing you how to make it work for the future of your business.

要探索迄今為止的Futurestate設計系列，請訪問 The Human Layer ，在這里您將了解 它的意義以及為什么重要 ， 如何實現它 ，并且我們共享 規則 和 工具 來幫助您的futurestate設計計劃取得成功。 確保您訂閱接收下周的帖子，我們將在該帖子中挑戰當前狀態分析，并向您展示如何使其適用于您的業務未來。