Outcomes over Output: Why Customer Behavior Is the Key Metric for Business Success

By: Joshua Seiden

Narrated by: Chris Abell

In the old days, when we made physical products, setting project goals wasn’t that hard. But in today’s service - and software-driven world, “done” is less obvious. When is Amazon done? When is Google done? Or Facebook? In reality, services powered by digital systems are never done. So then how do we give teams a goal that they can work on? Mostly, we simply ask teams to build features - but features are the wrong way to go. We often build features that create no value. Instead, we need to give teams an outcome to achieve.

Using outcomes creates focus and alignment. It eliminates needless work. And it puts the customer at the center of everything you do. Setting goals as outcomes sounds simple, but it can be hard to do in practice. This book is a practical guide to using outcomes to guide the work of your team.

©2019 Joshua Seiden (P)2019 Joshua Seiden

Critic reviews

"Josh’s crisp volume brims with insight about how to fly at just the right level - the level of outcomes. If you’ve ever wondered how M your MVP should be, or how to get more R in your OKRs, this book will help." (Nick Rockwell, CTO, NY Times)

Brief and concise

I like how straightforward this book is with cited examples. I was eager for more content but then again I listened to it at 1.5x speed and was able to finish it in less than an hour.

Great use of time

Compact but filled with specific and actionable insights. It's not the magic bullet there is no such thing. This is close. I've had success using similar principles but, not to this degree. Worth the hour or so to hear this audio book.

Clear way results and out of routines

A change in focus that leads to solving problems rather than doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results. The examples were spot on and have me very good ideas on how to improve what my company does.

Good short read

This book is clear, concise and mostly coherent. Mostly emphasized software applications but a bit too much on jargon. Concepts build of lean startup and agile methodology.

Quick and Value Add Read

really good book for a short read and enjoyed the storyline. we'll be able to put some of the content and practice in my organization rather quickly. recommended!

Quick, informative, and easy to understand

The first half was very informative for the individual to learn about the difference between outputs, outcomes, and impacts, and the overall view from different job levels within an organization.
The second half was about implementing an outcome focused approach within your team and company as a whole.

Short, yet thorough explanation: outcome thinking

Short, yet thorough explanation of outcome thinking. Great suggestions (questions) to provoke an outcome approach.

Great ideas. Well explained. a little incomplete.

Very brief. Zero fluff. Great premise and good explanation of the components of his proposed system. The book provided enough value for me to go back and take notes before testing out it's ideas.

Still, some things were missing.

The stories had happy endings and didn't address the usual messy realities.

Lacked approaches to internal organizational systems where outcomes are made up of leading indicators that aren't measured or leaders at different levels disagree about what outcomes matter.

Lacked effective approaches for organizations that tend toward the typical blame-the-person culture that avoids examining the impact of systems. (The type of organizational culture that W. Edwards Deming tried to transform is still alive and well.)

skipped chapter 4

chapter 4 reads chapter 5, chapter 5 reads chapter 6 and so on. chapter 4 is skipped