The Problem with "Find a Problem Worth Solving"

A common piece of Product advice is for people to "Find a Problem Worth Solving." This is often the first piece of advice in a list of how to build a company. On the surface, it makes sense—why focus on a problem that's NOT worth solving? But "worth solving" is doing a lot of heavy lifting.

What exactly IS a problem "worth solving"? How do we know we have one? What does it look like? At its origin, was Twitter—letting people send status messages—a problem worth solving? On the other hand, Neeva raised $77M for an ad-free, privacy-focused search engine and shut down after only a few years. Was that a problem worth solving?

The point is that we don't always know what a problem worth solving is. VCs invest in startups and about 35% of those startups explicitly fail because there was no market need for their product—they didn't solve a problem worth solving to people.

Given that over a third of startups fail because of no market need, addressing that issue significantly increases the odds of success. When working with clients, focus on being intentionally specific about the problems you want to address: WHAT are the characteristics? Exactly WHO has that problem? WHEN does it manifest? HOW are they currently trying to address it? WHY is a better solution needed? WHAT barriers might there be to adopting your solution?

While there is no surefire way to know that a problem is "worth solving," there are ways to evaluate problems. A framework with five factors can help: Unworkable (how painful), Unavoidable (how necessary), Urgent (how time sensitive), Underserved (how many alternatives), and Universal (how widespread for that audience).

Two things to consider: (1) The Problem isn't Really the Problem—in Neeva's case, the problem wasn't building the search engine or getting people to pay; it was getting people to switch from Google. Ask "What Would Have To Be True?" (WWHTBT) to uncover the real problem. (2) Opportunities Expand With Knowledge—start small (a niche, a use case, a region), learn, and over time your markets will grow. Every large company started small. Think small; focus on a problem only a small number of people think is worth solving as a great starting point.