From Inside Out to Outside-In: Why Team Boundaries Must Start With User Needs
At Fast Flow Conf 2025, I delivered a talk titled From Inside Out to Outside-In: Aligning Teams Around What Matters. It’s a message I believe more organizations need to hear: that despite all our agile rituals, product roadmaps, and digital transformation strategies, many teams are still designed around the wrong thing.
We organize around functions. Around systems. Around history.
But rarely around user needs.
In this article, I’ll go deeper into the key messages from that talk, explain why aligning team boundaries to user needs is essential for flow, and share how User Needs Mapping (UNM) gives us the tools to do it.
The Problem With Inside-Out Thinking
It’s surprisingly easy to fall into Inside-Out thinking. Most organizations do it by default. Teams form around technologies (“the mobile team”), internal processes (“the onboarding team”), or functional expertise (“the QA team”), and then we try to bolt on collaboration to make things work.
But here’s the problem: these boundaries don’t reflect how value flows to users.
They reflect how value gets stuck.
In many cases, teams become so focused on their own scope and outputs that they lose sight of the bigger picture. Work bounces between teams, delays mount, and users—internal or external—feel the friction. Agile helps us manage the chaos, but if our team boundaries are misaligned, agility alone isn’t enough.
Reframing the Question: Who Are Your Users?
A foundational shift begins when you start with a deceptively simple question: Who are your users?
It’s not always obvious. For platform teams, it might be internal developers. For compliance teams, it might be auditors or risk officers. For IT support, it could be every employee.
But “everyone” isn’t a useful answer. Teams that serve “everyone” end up serving no one particularly well. That’s why User Needs Mapping begins by identifying specific users with specific needs—not tasks, not wants, but real needs they are trying to satisfy.
What User Needs Mapping Reveals
When we map user needs explicitly, something powerful happens: we see through the noise.
A request like “add SSO” isn’t just a feature request—it might reflect a need for secure access across systems without cognitive overhead. A complaint like “reporting takes too long” might stem from a need for rapid decision-making under pressure.
UNM helps teams distinguish between:
- Wants (surface-level desires)
- Tasks (activities or steps)
- Needs (the outcomes people genuinely care about)
This clarity is what allows teams to organize in a way that minimizes friction and maximizes value flow.
From Islands of Function to Islands of Value
In my talk, I used a metaphor from Pixar’s Inside Out to explain the shift we need to make.
In the film, Riley’s emotions are siloed—each managing their own function. It works until it doesn’t. As her environment changes, these silos start to collapse. The emotions must learn to work together, not by sticking to their roles, but by aligning around what Riley truly needs: her evolving “Islands of Personality.”
It’s the same in our organizations.
We need to move from isolated teams defined by function, to adaptable teams aligned to value. Each “Island” in the metaphor becomes a business capability, and User Needs Mapping helps us surface those capabilities in the context of who they’re meant to serve.
A Visual Language for Better Team Design
What makes User Needs Mapping especially effective is its use of visual narrative. Rather than jumping to team structures or service blueprints, UNM starts with a map of user needs and capabilities, and only then explores where teams fit.
This creates:
- A shared understanding across business and technology
- A neutral language that avoids turf wars
- A safe space to explore future team options without the drama of a re-org
Maps, unlike models, are designed to evolve. And so are our teams. As needs change, so must our structures—and UNM gives us the foundation to adapt without chaos.
Closing Reflection: Organizing Around What Matters
Every team has limits—of time, focus, and cognitive load. The question isn’t whether your teams are working hard. It’s whether they’re working on the right things, in the right way.
By shifting from Inside-Out structures to Outside-In thinking, we start building organizations that truly serve the people they’re meant to serve.
That’s what User Needs Mapping enables.
If this resonates with you, I invite you to watch the full talk below and explore how your own teams might benefit from starting with needs—not org charts.
If you’d like to explore how User Needs Mapping could help your teams, book a short session to discuss your specific needs.