CJML has been developed in close collaboration with industry partners through multiple research and innovation projects since 2012. Guided by user-centered design, more than 11 public and private service providers have been actively involved in its development, alongside four research institutions and two consultancies.

Since its inception, CJML has undergone more than ten iterative releases. The initial versions were based on experiences from industry collaboration on service innovation and customer experience. Their design was informed by literature studies, surveys, interviews with target users, requirements analysis, and workshops with cross-functional teams. A major evaluation and revision in 2015 resulted in substantial changes to both the abstract and visual syntax. Subsequent evaluations have led to further refinements.

Direct collaboration with target users from the service industry has been central to the development of CJML. Case studies with industry partners have driven each development cycle, providing insights into real-world service processes and experiences. The studies have mainly used qualitative data from multiple sources

Design-science research has guided the development of CJML, as illustrated in the figure below. The cases have addressed different needs. Some started from known problems and a need for improvement (journey redesign). Others focused on identifying and documenting complex service processes (journey discovery), sometimes uncovering previously unknown problems or user barriers (journey conformance). A few cases involved the development of new service processes, with CJML used as one of the innovation tools.

The latest version of CJML (v3.0) was developed with support from the Research Council of Norway through the Smart Journey Mining project (no. 312198). Early versions of CJML were called VISUAL, after the innovation project that ran from 2013 to 2016.