10 Tools to create impressive product roadmaps

10 Roadmap Tools
A collection of tools to create, discuss and
present product and technology roadmaps.

© Radiant Minds Software

Tools Summary
Tool

Description

Slide #

3 Horizons model

Presentation tool to structure roadmap by time and uncertainty
(extend/defend current business, create future opportunities).

3

Technology trend capitalization

Analysis and presentation tool to discuss current and future market
positioning along relevant trends and implications on the product
roadmap.

8

Product Canvas

Communicate the key facts to a product (release) in 1 slide to align
everyone on what‟s the focus.

14

Technology theme Investments

Analysis tool to discover areas requiring more resource investments
and areas to divest.

19

Pictures of the future

Thinking framework to align short-term and long-term vision and
brainstorm new opportunities.

24

Market / technology alignment

Analysis and presentation tool to align marketing messages with
technology innovations.

31

Kano model

Analysis tool which helps to understand product qualities and their
impact on customer satisfaction in order to prioritize the roadmap.

36

Compact QFD

Prioritization tool which focuses on customer needs and product
qualities relative to competitive products.

41

Technology S-curve

Brainstorming tool to shape the discussion around incremental
improvements vs. potentially disruptive technologies.

45

The golden feature

A communication tool to create a singular focus on doing one great
thing.

50


3 Horizons Model
The 3 horizons model an excellent tool to
communicate the high-level product roadmap
structured into activities to extending and defending
the current business and creating future
opportunities.
The original management-oriented model was proposed by Badhai, Coley
and White in “Alchemy of Growth”. Geoffrey Moore picked it up and built on it
in “Escape Velocity”.

Tool summary
Structure your roadmap themes into 3 horizons, make sure to invest into
extending and defending the current business, but also into creating
viable future options.
Exploration into
new markets

Profit
Horizon 3
Create viable options
Horizon 2
Build emerging businesses
Horizon 1
Extend and defend
core businesses

Existing market that
we do not serve

Existing market that
we currently serve

Time (years)

Knowledge of Market

New market

Adjacent growth

10%
20%

70%

Improvement
Extension
Variants
Cost Reduction

Next gen.
products

Exploration
with new
technologies

Knowledge of Technology
Existing technology
that we currently
use

New
Existing
technology that technology
we do not use


How to use for roadmapping?
1

Rate your current roadmap investments
• How would you classify your recent and currently planned roadmap
investments?
• How much did you invest per horizon?
• Do you have ideas in the pipeline in all categories?

2

Define your target investments per horizon
• How much are you willing and able to seed for long-term growth?
• How much does it take to harvest from your core businesses?

3

4

Match target investments with actual roadmap ideas
• Do your current investments match your target?
• Align roadmap themes and budgets with horizon goals.

Share and discuss
• Use the results to discuss with all business functions and align short-term
as well as long-term perspective

What’s the benefit?
 Ensure your innovation pipeline does not dry up
 Balance investments in short and long term opportunities
 Get people on board with your vision


Profit

Resource investment

10%

Resource investment
Resource investment

70%

Theme / Epic
…

20%

Theme / Epic

…
…

…
…
Horizon 3

…

…

Theme / Epic

…
Horizon 2

…

Horizon 1
Extend and defend
core businesses
Time (years)

Technology Trend
Capitalization
A presentation tool to discuss current and
future market positioning and implications on
the product roadmap


Tool summary
The tech industry has historically been shaped by trends which influence both the
customers‟ environment and the resulting product needs. Examples of recent
mega-trends in IT include Mobile, Social, Cloud, Apps or Big Data. Positioning
along a trend can help to better speak the customers‟ language and focus on
problems with high awareness in the market.

Trend

The trend capitalization tool is both a decision support tool and a presentation
tool to align a roadmap with market trends (or purposefully position outside
mainstream if desired).

Today

Implications
What does it mean for our customers and their use of our products/services?
Leverage
What do we do to capitalize on this trend?

Expected end
of hype cycle

Risk mitigation
What do we do to prevent threats resulting from this trend?


1

Identify trends relevant to your business
• What‟s in the media currently?
• What are analysts talking about? Which buzzwords are they using?
• What‟s talked about on relevant industry events?
• What are your customers talking and asking about?

2

Analyze implications of each trend
• What does a trend mean for our customers? Which new challenges will they be confronted with?
What will become easier/better?
• What will become mainstream, which activities/habits etc. will be obsolete?
• Which tools will be obsolete?
• Which new technologies will be available to be leveraged? Which technologies will be outdated?
Are we using any of these? Do we have expertise?

3

Identify opportunities and threats
• How can we leverage a trend with new products or services?
• How can we improve existing products to serve the changing needs of our customers?
• Can we shape the trend?
• Could the trend negatively impact our core business? Could essential products become
obsolete?


 Leverage current trends, speak the language of
customers and the media
 Anticipate changes in the customer‟s environment
resulting from high level industry changes and adapt
products proactively
 Identify and mitigate risks resulting from major paradigm
shifts


What it means for our customers and their use of our products/services

Mobile

Change for customers 1

…

Implications

…

…

…

…

Leverage

Risk mitigation

What do we do to capitalize on this trend?
Product / Service /
BM change

…

What do we do to prevent threats resulting from this trend?
Exploration/Research

…

…

…

…

Product / Service /
BM change

…

…

…

Leverage

Product change

Tech/skill acquisition


…

Risk mitigation


Apps



Social

Product change

…

…

…

Product / Service /
BM change

…

…

…

Leverage

Product change



…

Risk mitigation

Implications

Implications


Note: The trends can also well be
integrated with tool #2 (horizon
model) in a presentation.

Resource investment

10%

Theme / Epic

Resource investment

20%

Resource investment

…

Theme / Epic

70%

…

…

Theme / Epic

…

…

Horizon 3

…

…
…

Horizon 2

…

Horizon 1
Extend and defend
core businesses

Market Trends

Trend 1

Trend 3
Trend 2

Trend 4

Product Canvas
Communicate the key facts to a product
(release) in 1 slide to align everyone on
what’s the focus.


Tool summary
The product canvas communicates on one page the key facts on a
product or product release. Its main purpose is stakeholder
communication and alignment. It aims to ensure everyone has the same
understanding for what you‟re building, for whom and why, and how it
will be communicated to the outside.
Product Vision
for
whom?

why?

what?

Success factors
(product)
Key messages and
drivers (market)

References
The canvas has been adapted based on Alexander Osterwalder‟s Business Model Canvas and Roman Pichler‟s Product
Canvas.
http://alexosterwalder.com/
http://www.romanpichler.com/blog/agile-product-innovation/the-product-canvas/

1

Envision the next product release
• Who will be the main users? (Define personas)
• Which problems will the product solve for these users? Particularly, which new
solutions will we offer with the next release?
• Why is our solution unique? How are we solving the problem differently? Why is it
better for our users?

2

Identify success factors
• What is key for the product in order to solve these problems / deliver on these USPs?
• What could make or break it?
• What do we need to get absolutely right in order to succeed? (Note: these are
aspects the team will focus on afterwards in validating early with customers,
designing, polishing to the last detail etc.)

3

Identify key marketing messages and drivers
• If you got the product right, which messages will drive awareness in the market?
• What should we emphasize in our content and messaging?
• Which trends/changes/forces in the users‟ environment will drive adoption of the
new solutions?

 Communicate the focus of a product (release) in one
slide
 Align the inside perspective on the product with the
outside perspective (market messages)
 Be clear about who benefits from a release and why


Product Vision
for whom?

why?

what?

Success factors (product)

Top 3-5 target
personas w. their role
and characteristics

Which problems do
they have today, why
do they need a
solution

What are we doing
differently? How are we
solving the problem?
Why is this product
worth buying?

Which are key factors that will
make or break it product-wise?

Key messages and drivers
(market)
How will this be messaged to the
outside? What will drive
awareness and adoption? What
will we emphasize marketingwise?


Technology Theme
Investments
Analysis tool to discover areas requiring more
resource investments and areas to divest


Tool summary
This tools helps you brainstorm technology areas which require
increased resource investments and others, where the level of
investment can be reduced. Brainstorm in a group and see how each
team member judges the current situation. After having achieved an
agreement on the status quo, draw conclusions on resource shifts.
Step 1 – Brainstorm

Step 2 – Derive action items

Overinvested
Tech A

Tech D

Overinvested, and not
important anymore

Resource shift

Tech B

Underinvested

Importance / Expected market impact

Tech C

Underinvested and
important


1

Create a list of existing products and/or technologies to evaluate
• Be as detailed as needed to distinguish separate building blocks, but keep the list manageable.
• Sources of input: Which items are on the price list? Which technical components exist (and could
be shipped independently)? Which basic technologies/platforms did we build on? Which
integration points do we have?

2

Have each team member position the items on the technology investments matrix
• Classify all items collected in step 1 by perceived market relevance and importance to the
current/future business and whether the current level of resource investment is perceived too
high or too low (relative to other products, relative to competition – make sure to agree with the
time on these criteria first)

3

Discuss, re-arrange and get consensus
• See how everyone positioned the items, discuss items with fundamental disagreements
individually

4

Draw conclusions on technology themes and resource investments on the next roadmap
• Once the positioning is final, discuss concrete possibilities to reduce investments into resourceintensive, but unimportant areas in order to shift to highly relevant areas with lack of resources.


 Redistribute R&D resources continuously according to
current market priorities
 Establish shared understanding of resource situation
 Derive actionable measures to invest resources where
they have most impact


Theme /
Technology

Overinvested

Resource shift

Underinvested
…
Theme, Technology,
or Product
…



Pictures of the future
Pictures of the futures is a thinking framework
originally developed by Siemens. It helps shaping the
thought process from the current business and
products to future opportunities.


Tool summary
Think “logically ahead” from the current business, and backwards from
future scenarios, and align the resulting technology, product and service
needs.
Strategic
Visioning

Scenarios

Business area [..]

Extrapolation
Current
business

Retropolation

Via Roadmaps

On the basis of scenarios
New Markets
New Customer Needs
New Technologies
New Business Impacts

Products
Technologies
Customer Needs

Today

Short-term

Mid-term

Business area [..]
Cross-sectional segment [..]
Cross-sectional segment [..]

Influential
Factors
Individuum
Society
Politics
Economy
Environment
Technology
Customers
Competitors

Long-term

© Siemens AG, 2005


1

Start with your current business
• Which customer needs are satisfied?
• What„s the current product mix and technologies?

2

Extrapolate from there
• If you continue, what would „naturally“ be the next steps?
• Which features would you build to serve current needs even better?
• What are customers asking for?

3

Imagine future scenarios
• Where do you see current customers or new customer segments in few years from now?
• With which challenges will they be confronted?
• Which technologies might be predominant at this point in time?

4

Retropolate from the future scenarios
- What do I need to create short and mid-term to fulfill future customer needs?
- (How) can long-term needs be aligned with short-term development?
- Which product/platform features support both future and current needs?
- Which risks result from my current position in relation to all future scenarios? Are we prepared?
- …


 Think outside the box of current customers and usage scenarios
 Shape the discussion to discover potentially disruptive technologies
and ideas

 Align long-term vision and short-term activities – don‟t just address
any new greenfield area


Short-term focus area 1
• Enter ideas here to strengthen
current USPs or address
immediate threats
• Focus on todays offering
• …

TODAY
Key personas we serve

USPs / Unfair advantage

Focus on key segments you service
today, how are they characterized
and why do they use the
products/services?

What’s unique today? Which USPs
work with current customers?

• …
• …
• …

• …
• …
• …

Weaknesses / Immediate Threats
Any immediate threats from competition, new technologies, dissatisfaction with the
offering, perceived weaknesses in the market,..?


Future scenario 1

TOMORROW

Future scenario 1

Key assumptions

Expected impact

Key assumptions

Expected impact

Describe the most
important assumptions in
your future scenario

What’s the potential impact on
your current business?

…

…

Future scenario 1

Long-term focus area 1
• Enter ideas here to address
future scenarios
• Focus on potential future
USPs in case a scenario
materializes
• …

• …
• …
• …

Key assumptions

Expected impact

…

…

• …
• …
• …


Roadmap Theme 4
…


Roadmap Theme 3
…

Roadmap Theme 2
…


Roadmap Theme 1
Roadmap focus area
catering to short-term
needs in alignment with
long-term vision



Market / Technology
Alignment
Analysis and presentation tool to align marketing messages
with technology innovations


Tool summary
Content is product, and vice versa. Everything a company presents and offers to
the outside, either products or free content should be in sync and communicate
one message. Avoid marketing a technology which you don‟t have, or leaving
technologies unleveraged.
The market / technology alignment tool simply puts the key items from
technology and market perspective next to each other in order to identify if these
are in line. Fill out the template with the top 5 content themes and next top 5
technology innovations. If you can‟t clearly relate them to each other, it‟s a red
flag for misalignment!
Market
Top 5 Messages / Content Themes
Core message /theme which shall be
communicated to customer segment XY…

“
…

Technology
Top 5 Product Innovations

?

New product / Product enhancement &
key USP
…

1

Collect top 5 marketing messages / content themes
• What are you planning to message alongside upcoming releases?
• Which aspects/benefits will be emphasized?
• Which customer needs/pain points will be addressed to create awareness?

2

Collect top 5 upcoming technology and product advancements
• What‟s new in the product in the upcoming releases?
• Which problems will these advancements solve?

3

Analyze linkages and relations
• Does a market message relate directly to the upcoming product advancements?
• Does a technology advancement deliver on a particular message/content?
• Do marketing content and product advancements reach the same group of users/buyers?

4

Identify out-of-context items and react if necessary
• Technology advancements with no linkage to any marketing message are not leveraged
currently and might get lost – make sure these improvements will be visible to the market!
• Marketing messages with to linkage to technology advancements are in danger to be just
marketing buzzwords on which you can‟t deliver. Reconsider these messages (unless they
are based on technology which you already have for longer time).


 Ensure your content and products speak the same
language and present a consistent message to the
outside
 Avoid to disappoint customers by not having product
depth and substance behind marketing sizzle
 Discover unleveraged technology advancements to
create content


Market
Top 5 Messages / Content Themes

Technology
Top 5 Product Innovations

Core message /theme which shall be
communicated to customer segment
XY…

New product / Product
enhancement & key USP

…

…

…

…

…

…

…

…

“
“
“
“
“


Kano Model
Originally developed by Professor Noriaki
Kano in 1984, this tool helps to understand
product qualities and their impact on
customer satisfaction.


Tool summary
The Kano model is a tool to analyze customer needs in relation to expected satisfaction/excitement. It
helps prioritizing features, and identify excitement attributes which are great to emphasize in marketing
messages. Kano differentiates 5 types of customer preferences:
•
•
•
•
•

Attractive quality – provides satisfaction if achieved fully, do not cause dissatisfaction if not fulfilled
One-dimensional quality – Satisfaction if fulfilled, dissatisfaction if not fulfilled
Must-be quality – taken for granted if fulfilled, dissatisfaction if not fulfilled
Indifferent quality – Neither good nor bad
Reverse quality – High degree of achievement results in dissatisfaction (e.g. due to feature overload)
satisfied

Delighters

Performance
needs
Indifference

Not
implemented

Fully
implemented

satisfied

Over time, exciting
innovations turn into
perceived basic needs.
Not
implemented

Fully
implemented

Basic needs

dissatisfied

dissatisfied

Source: N. Kano, 1984

Another good discussion on using the Kano model can be found here.


1

List the key features for a new products or the enhancements in an
upcoming release

2

Discuss and categorize which product qualities they add according to
Kano’s categories
• Which are attractive qualities and potential delighters?
• Which one-dimensional quality attributes do we serve and do which degree?
• Which are must-be to be viable?
• Anything that is in danger to be “too much”, i.e., a threat for a reverse quality?

3

Brainstorm gaps based on your target personas
• Look at your target personas – any must-have‟s you do not fulfill on yet?
• Which one-dimensional quality attributes might not be well-served yet after a
release?

4

Balance resource investments and leverage the “delighters”
• Complete your features list based on the analysis
• Categorize and communicate as part of your roadmap
• Figure out ways to underline and leverage the delighters among your product
qualities


 Understand and manage customers‟ expectations with
regards to different product qualities
 Balance the roadmap to be viable by fulfilling basic needs
but also excite with delighters
 Identify those product qualities which really make a
visible difference and focus the positioning and go-tomarket


Very satisfied / excited

How we’ll delight users
Delighters

The more, the better
Performance Features

Theme / Epic

Theme / Epic

…

…

…

…

…

…

Need well fulfilled

Need not fulfilled

Reverse qualities
We should not:
- …
- …

Basic needs
Theme / Epic
…
…
…

Unsatisfied

What could be even
counterproductive?

What is simply expected
to be viable?


Compact QFD
Prioritization tool which focuses on customer
needs and product qualities relative to
competitive products.


Tool summary
Compact QFD is a simplified variant of the quality function deployment methodology
originally described by Dr. Yoji Akao. It aims to prioritize product features based on
underlying customer needs and their importance relative to competitive solutions. The
analysis is done in two steps:
1.

Identify relevant product qualitites and compare your product relative to competition
Product
quality
attribute

Our
product

Competitor A

Competitor B

…

…

…

Enhancement 4

…

Enhancement 3

Weighting

Enhancement 2

Product quality attribute

Enhancement 1

2. Weight the quality attributes: the more your product is behind, the higher the weight
3. Classify enhancements/projects according to whether they improve a particular quality
attribute (from 1 to 10) and calculate a weighted total score to prioritize the
enhancements

…

Weighted Total

20


 Prioritize a roadmap based on the competitive landscape
 Focus on emphasizing your strengths or catching up with
competition
 Clearly explain why certain features are chosen over
others


Product quality
attribute

Our product

Competitor A

Competitor B

Competitor C

Competitor D

PQA 1

10

6

4

8

7

PQA 2

2

8

10

4

3

PQA 3

6

10

9

5

4

PQA 4

7

5

6

8

7

Product quality
attribute

Weighting

Enhancement 1

PQA 1

1

4

PQA 2

10

PQA 3

7

PQA 4

4

…

…

Weighted Total

Enhancement 4

Enhancement 2

10
3

Enhancement 3

…

1

1

7

1

11

2

30

20

85

Technology S-Curve
Brainstorming tool to shape the discussion around
incremental improvements vs. potentially disruptive
technologies


Tool summary
Proposed by Clayton Christensen* in order to explain how disruptive innovations rise and
ultimately wipe existing players out of the market, this tool can be used well to spark a
discussion around the status quo of a firms‟ current product and idea pipeline, as well as
how resources are invested currently.

Measure of advancement

Tthe S-curve indicates that technologies, after an inception phase, will see a steep curve of
advancement, until the boundaries of a solution approach are reached and improvements
are only marginal. Disruptive technologies might be inferior first, but by taking the route of
advancement, they have the potential to ultimately outpace previous solutions.

New technology
Existing technology

Measure of applied effort
*Clayton Christensen: The Innovator‟s Dilemma. http://www.claytonchristensen.com/books/the-innovators-dilemma/

1

List the assets in your current product portfolio, and the technologies you are
working on
• Focus on groups / themes of technology, not individual features

2

Position your products and technologies on the S-curve
• Where do you see yourself?
• Is a technology still in its infancy with lots of opportunities for a big performance jump
forward? Is it well established and mature?
• Is it a new solution to a problem?

3

Position competitive solutions from your market research
• Who‟s competing along the lines of an established technology?
• Who‟s solving the same problem, but with different technologies and solution
approaches?

4

Balance your pipeline
• Reconsider your resource investments based on the results
• Focus on ideation for novel solutions if you mostly invest in established solutions
• Focus on improving and maturing emerging technologies ahead of competition

 Get potential substitute solutions and disruptive
technologies on your radar
 Identify “dead ends” of a technology early enough to
react
 Align resource investments and balance them across
technology horizons


Current product(s) and pipeline vs. competition

Advancement

Core product 2
Core product 1
Competitor A
Competitor B
Product 3

Applied effort

The golden feature
A communication tool to create a singular focus on
doing one great thing.


Tool summary
The golden feature methodology was originally proposed by the experts
at the 280group. In Brian Lawley‟s words* “The idea behind the Golden
Feature technique is that you choose a single feature that is the absolute
most important priority for the release, and then you get the entire team
to rally around it as the focus. This single feature provides enough
customer value to hang the entire release on.”

*Source: Brian Lawlay, 280 Group LLC: How to Create Compelling Product Roadmaps
Available from http://www.mii.lt/files/product_roadmap_white_paper.pdf

 Focus around a simple, compelling message for a release
 Focus the team to get this one aspect really right from all
perspectives
 Be flexible and clear in planning – the golden feature
needs to be in for sure, cut scope in other areas if
necessary
 Increase likelihood to get the release you want to market
on time due to singular focus


Release v1.0

Golden Feature of Release 1.0
USP of golden feature– what is it and what makes it unique? What do we need to
do to make it great?

Other roadmap themes and features
…
…
…
…


Closing remarks
• Tools don‟t solve problems, but they can help structure the path to find a
solution
• There‟s no right or wrong approach – tweak the tools to make them work for
your team!
• We’d love to hear from you!
• You have other tools we definitely have to include in this collection? Disagree with a
methodology or see downsides we should mention? Any other thoughts on
roadmaps and roadmap tools? Feedback on how a tool worked for your team?
• Mail it to me at martin@radiantminds.com or reach us via Twitter
(@RadiantMindsHQ), LinkedIn, Google+, Facebook or whatever media works best
for you!

Happy roadmapping!

Martin Suntinger

Founder, CEO @ Radiant Minds Software

10 Tools to create impressive product roadmaps

Empfohlen

Empfohlen

Weitere ähnliche Inhalte

Andere mochten auch

Andere mochten auch (18)

Kürzlich hochgeladen

Kürzlich hochgeladen (20)

10 Tools to create impressive product roadmaps