Defining the Challenge
From Opportunity to the Right Problem
A prioritized opportunity is not yet a solvable problem, and most innovation effort is wasted on well-executed answers to badly framed questions. This Step frames the specific, high-leverage challenge worth solving. You map the opportunity space, work Jobs to Be Done to find what customers are really hiring you for, trace symptoms to root causes, and craft a How Might We statement that opens the right doors. It closes with a charter aligning scope, sponsors and what success will look like.
The Studio is the hour with an SME Practitioner that earns the badge for this Step. What a Studio is · All sixteen Steps
Self-paced, and yours to keep once you enroll. Add as many Steps as you want and check out once.
The Whole Step, Before You Buy It
This is the real structure, named exactly as it is inside. Eight parts carry the method. Three more put it against your own initiative. All of it opens the moment you enroll and stays yours.
Start Here
Problem Framing: Reframing and Questionstorming
Problem-Solving Theory: Structure for Turning Uncertainty into Action
Systems Thinking and Feedback Loops: Mapping the Forces Behind the Problem
Root-Cause Analysis: 5 Whys and 5W1H
Jobs to Be Done: What Customers Are Really Hiring You For
How Might We: Turning the Challenge into an Open Question
Framing the Challenge: From Insights to a Validated Problem Statement
Project Charter: Locking the Shared Understanding
Reading the Altitude
Toolkit: Apply It to Your Project
Accelerating This Step with AI
What Your Initiative Carries Forward
Everything below is built against your own organization rather than a case study. A badge marks this Step, and the badge is earned in the Studio. Add the four Studios in Inquire, plus the Advance Studio that closes the Phase, and the Inquire certificate follows.
- A framed challenge, reframed and traced to root cause
- A validated How Might We statement
- A project charter aligning scope, sponsors and success
Eight parts, worked at your pace
Office hours twice a month
Yours to keep
Eight parts. One artifact.
Watch The Video
Short, plain, and to the point. Every part opens with one, and none of them run long.
Go Deeper
A written dive that sits behind each video, so you can go straight to the part your initiative needs first.
Check Your Understanding
A short self-check closes every part. It is there to catch a gap before you carry it into the artifact, and it is yours alone to read.
Build The Artifact
The tools run against your own organization. What you complete is what your initiative carries into the next Step.
Developed by a team of alumni and faculty, and run across engagements in energy, manufacturing, healthcare, and community organizations. APHIONE holds it under license.
The Studio For This Step
A Studio is one hour, one to one, with an SME Practitioner. You apply this Step to your own project. Finishing the Studio is what earns the badge for Defining the Challenge. The Studio is optional, and the Step is complete without it.
You prepare
You complete the Studio Preparation Sheet for this Step and send it ahead. It asks what you built, what you are unsure about, and where you want the hour spent.
You meet
Sixty minutes with an SME Practitioner, on your own project rather than a case. You walk through the work you have done and they press on it.
You make the changes
You revise your artifact and complete the Studio Reflection Sheet. The changes the hour produces are the point of the hour.
$325 added to this Step
The Step on its own is $425. The Step with its Studio is $750. You can add the Studio today or a year from now, and the price is the same either way.
It is not a group session.
One hour, one to one, on your own project.
It is not required.
The Step is complete on its own. Adding the Studio later never costs more.
It is not more content.
Everything you need is already inside the Step. The hour applies it to your project.
Begin Step
From Opportunity to the Right Problem. Worked against your own organization, at your own pace.
Add the Studio and you also add the hour that earns the badge, plus ninety days of office hours. You can add it later instead, at the same price.
