The 5 Why’s is credited to be initially described by Taiichi Ohno at Toyota as a method to find the root cause of a problem. As with all methods it has pro’s and con’s and should not be followed to the the letter.
However in this case we will steal parts of it to find an approach to find opportunities in data use cases. In order for it to be useful for us we have to combine the Why’s with How’s.
When approaching a data use case it is important to always remember that it is the change in the business process that brings value. This is where the Why’s (and in our case How’s) come into play.
We start with the first Why
–We have a large base of customers that are not returning customers
Why are they not returning customers?
-We are not sending the right offers to our customers.
Why are we not sending the right offers to our customers?
–The decision when selecting the right offers is not good enough.
Why is the decision not good enough?
-We are sending a broad offer to a lot of customers and very few use the offer
Why are we not matching the right offer to the right customer?
-The process does not allow for personalization of offers.
Then we come into the first How:
–How should we select the right offers to send to customers?
And now we continue digging.
–How do you find the offers? What data do you base the decision on? What indicators are you looking for?
–How do you find the right customer? What data do you base the decision on? What indicators should drive the decision?
–How can we automate the decision?
–How do we know if we have succeded?
Combining 5 Why’s with (at least) 5 How’s allows for getting to the root of the business problem you are trying to solve and how to use data to improve the process for both effectiveness and speed.