Stop Chasing Shiny Objects: Data-Driven Roadmaps 🚫 In the world of product management, where success hinges on strategic vision and tactical execution, roadmapping while indispensable, is usually mishandled.
Introduction🔍
Product management practices are customized to fit unique company and industry needs, empowering the function to perform its ‘magic’ as the glue that fills the gaps in the organization and gets things (the right things!) done. However, certain core competencies are essential, and roadmaps top the list for both importance and poor execution.
Roadmap outcomes🎯
Although roadmaps take many forms, the desired outcomes are always consistent. The roadmap answers two vital questions: Strategic, ‘Where are we headed?’ and Tactical, ‘When will we get there?’
To understand the separation and interaction between strategic and tactical planning in roadmapping, consider the following table:
| DO FIRST | DO SECOND | |
| Strategic: Where are we headed? | Tactical: When will we get there? | |
| 1 | Define the Vision: Articulate the long-term objectives of the organization. | Establish the Timeline: Outline key milestones and deadlines for the roadmap. |
| 2 | Align Strategy with Business Goals: Ensure that the roadmap aligns with the broader business objectives and market position. | Resource Allocation: Identify and assign necessary resources (human, financial, etc.) to achieve tactical steps. |
| 3 | Prioritize Projects: Choose initiatives based on strategic value (impact on company vision and goals). | Detailed Task Breakdown: Break down each initiative into manageable tasks with specific deliverables. |
| 4 | Market and Industry Analysis: Continual assessment of market trends and competitor strategies to refine strategic focus. | Monitoring and Adjustment: Regular reviews and adjustments to the roadmap to stay on target and adapt to any changes. |
These are the essential components of strategic and tactical roadmap planning. While simple on the surface, the real-world application can be more difficult. Let’s review the correct approach.
The biggest stumbling block🚧
A good roadmap has two distinct aspects and both must be present and separate. One of the biggest mistakes product organizations make is tangling them up into a single process or skipping one entirely.
Where are we headed🧭: This question must be answered first: it frames success, aligns the organizational strategy and ensures focused tactical execution.
When will we get there⏳: Second you need to build the commitments based on organizational and other constraints.
How to do it 🛠️
These two roadmap processes must be data-driven. They need to be clear, transparent, and have the buy-in of the broader organization. This is the only way to remove opinions and shiny objects from the priorities and focus solely on tasks that drive successful outcomes.
Where are we headed🧭: All organizations have ideas for exploration and possible investment. They need to be captured, organized, and vetted.
- Create a rubric. This should include hypotheses of the business and customer value, the cost to execute, industry risks, and the organizational impact (to help surface the benefits and concerns from department leads).
- Capture ideas. List ideas and establish a lean process for scoring them with relevant stakeholders.
- Work iteratively. Filling out the form should only take stakeholders a few minutes. Ideas that float to the top can get business cases and additional planning rigor as needed.
Don’t be tempted to skip this process as it drives tactical execution. A clear, shared, organizational understanding of the strategic objectives and how the roadmap addresses them is required.
When will we get there⏳: After defining ‘where you are headed’, it’s time to build a more detailed plan. Three things are needed to do this properly:
- Where you are headed: Establish a well-defined, data-driven, and widely understood set of success criteria.
- Resources and constraints: Ensure a clear understanding of the personnel, budget, partnerships, competitive landscape, timelines, and skills available.
- Build the roadmap. There are numerous methodologies for doing this. What’s important is creating a tool that will empower you to ignore nonsense and focus on activities that drive success.
You’re now in a position to make commitments to the business and customers and you can let everyone know ‘when you will arrive’!
Wrap up 📌
For product managers, building an effective road map that answers these two questions is foundational. Fail to excel here and nothing else you do will be fully recognized or appreciated.
Let’s embrace roadmapping not simply as a task but as the cornerstone of our professional contributions and value proposition.
Have any questions? I am here to help.
Let’s Collaborate 👥
Based in New England but working globally, I am dedicated to transforming visionary ideas into tangible, successful outcomes. Let’s connect and discuss how we can elevate your product management to new heights.
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Data-Driven Roadmaps
Data-Driven Roadmaps