3W

What is 3W?

The 3W framework focuses on three fundamental questions that every requirement or goal should answer: Who benefits from this, What needs to be done, and Why it's important.

This triad is essentially a simplified 5W1H, zeroing in on the key actors, the behavior/feature, and the motivation. The popularity of the user story format ("As a [Who], I want [What], so that [Why]") is a prime example of the 3W approach in action.

Purpose and Benefits

The 3W approach ensures clarity and focus by requiring teams to identify the user, the specific need, and the value proposition. This prevents vague requirements and ensures every feature serves a clear purpose.

In early product strategy, the 3W is akin to defining your target persona (Who), value proposition (What you offer), and customer need (Why they care). For instance, Techstars' W3 framework advises founders to specify exactly WHO the customer is, WHAT the customer is actually buying, and WHY the customer cares.

How It Works

For each requirement, ask yourself: Who is the target user? What do they need? Why do they need it? The answers form the foundation of user stories and acceptance criteria.

The 3W framework is often used to formulate problem statements, product vision statements, or simply to sanity-check a user story or feature idea. For example, some teams have a policy: if you propose a new feature, you must articulate it in terms of who it's for, what it is, and why they need it.

Examples

User Story Example: "As a project manager (Who), I want to generate weekly progress reports (What), so that I can track team performance and identify bottlenecks (Why)."

Product Feature Example: "For mobile users (Who), we need push notifications (What), because they want real-time updates without opening the app (Why)."

Example using 3W to write a user story: Suppose you have an idea: a reminder email system. Ask: Who needs this? (Maybe "forgetful customers" or "customers who left items in cart"). What do they need? ("an automatic reminder email about their abandoned cart"). Why do they need it? ("so they don't miss out on purchasing items they intended to buy"). With those answers, a user story could be: "As an online shopper (Who), I want to receive a reminder email when I leave items in my cart (What) so that I can complete my purchase if I still want the items (Why)."

Common Mistakes to Avoid

A common pitfall is focusing on only one or two of the W's and forgetting the rest. For example, sometimes requirements come in as just a "What" – e.g., "Add an export to Excel feature." But who exactly needs that and why? The team shouldn't accept a raw "what" without questioning the who and why.

Another oversight can be incorrectly identifying the "Who". "Who" is not always a simple answer; it could be a specific segment, or multiple personas. If you muddle the who, you might generalize a solution that doesn't perfectly fit anyone.

Conversely, sometimes people specify a "Who" and "What" but no "Why" because it seems "obvious." However, articulating the why can surface assumptions and lead to better solutions.

When to Use

Use the 3W lens at multiple levels: At vision/strategy level (Who is our target customer? What product are we building? Why will they want it?), at feature level (ensure each backlog entry answers 3W), and even at daily standup level to communicate tasks in terms of outcome.

The 3W is basically baked into agile user stories. Even if a team doesn't use the full story format, they might fill a table with columns: Who (user role), What (goal), Why (benefit).