CX Strategic Knowledge · CX Methods
Documenting task reality: the six behavioral lenses
Document tasks through six lenses: tools, knowledge, workarounds, issues, concerns, obstacles.
Documenting how people actually complete tasks means capturing more than steps. Six behavioral categories reveal unmet needs and opportunities the happy path hides: the tools people reach for, what they must already know, the hacks they invent, and where they stall.
Task analysis fails when it only records the steps people take. The useful signal sits in everything around the steps. Capture all six categories every time.
- Tools: calculators, notes, spreadsheets, searches people reach for
- Knowledge: what users must already know to succeed
- Workarounds: hacks users invent when the system falls short
- Issues: friction points along the way
- Concerns: doubts, fears, uncertainty
- Obstacles: blockers that halt progress entirely
Together these expose unmet needs, preferences, and openings for automation and knowledge design. The most valuable CX opportunities live outside the happy path.
Apply this
Reading about documenting task reality: the six behavioral lenses is one thing. Seeing where it applies in your journey is the useful part.