What are some of the lenses your look through or principles you apply when prioritizing a roadmap? How are they weighted relative to each other?

I would look through four primary lenses when prioritizing: Strategic alignment: Does this connect directly to the vision and OKRs? If not, it should not be on the roadmap. User/customer impact: Are we solving a real, validated problem? Again, strong evidence matters – e.g. from research, supporting data, or direct feedback. Business value: Does this drive the key metrics: retention, activation, growth, or revenue/ARR? Effort vs. Impact: A rough assessment of cost relative to expected impact.   ...Read More

There are countless product management prioritization frameworks available, such as RICE (Reach, Impact, Confidence, Effort) and MoSCoW (Must have, Should have, Could have, Won't have). That being said, my favorite is a simple, four-lens model that my very first HubSpot manager taught me. The Market lens - How differentiated will our offering be compared to other solutions in the market that are solving a similar problem? The Business lens - Will prioritizing this initiative allow us to make pro ...Read More

When I prioritize or stack rank a list of items, I typically find it helpful to understand how each item can (a) deliver customer impact and (b) increase engineering happiness. Additionally, I also find it helpful to understand each item's level of (c) feasibility, (d) urgency and (e) effort.  I weigh customer impact and engineering happiness at 50:50 -- after all, you need to make your customers happy while also keeping your team excited. Things that are less feasible are often pulled down the ...Read More

This is a great question. I've been using some variant of cost-adjusted impact scoring to prioritize roadmaps for over 20 years now. Every market, buyer, product and strategic context is different, so there's no one size fits all methodology. RICE is an example of one popular approach, but I prefer something more tailored for the specific situation. Essentially, as an organization we will pick 3-5 outcome measures according to the needs of the business. Examples might be new business growth, chu ...Read More

There are lots of frameworks available for prioritization. The key is to find the one that works the best for your product function and the needs of your stakeholders. Most frameworks are directional and product folks should use product sense and intuition to build a roadmap that makes the most sense for their customers and stakeholders. Some things that I consider Business impact Customer painpoint solved, not all customer pain points are equal Investment to build Cost savings for the business ...Read More

Enumerating the lenses is easy enough. What's truly difficult is advising on their relative weighting. No single lens wins every time—it’s about balancing them to make smart trade-offs. That balance will change over time depending on company strategy, market context, etc. Business impact: Will it drive revenue, retention, or efficiency? Customer value: Does it solve a real pain for a meaningful segment? Effort & complexity: Can we build it well with the resources we have? Strategic alignment ...Read More

I like to start with the product stage, context, and strategy. From these, and your customer data you should be able to determine your priorities With an early stage, pre-PMF product, you may be prioritizing learning about your customer needs and how well your product is meeting those needs above all else. When you know your product is meeting some people’s needs or providing some valued entertainment, you can focus primarily on increasing engagement and retention. How can you make your product ...Read More

I try to make prioritization feel less like intuition and more like a consistent set of lenses we apply to every decision. One thing that’s been important in practice is how we collect input. We gather and stack rank feedback continuously throughout the quarter, not just at planning time. If you wait until the start of a planning cycle, people tend to overweight whatever happened most recently. Ongoing collection gives you a much more accurate picture of what actually matters over time. From the ...Read More

I primarily use a Cost-Adjusted Impact methodology, which helps bring objectivity and clarity to roadmap decisions—especially when tradeoffs are tough. The idea is simple: prioritize initiatives that drive the highest impact relative to effort or cost. But underneath that, I apply a few critical lenses to determine what impact means, and which costs really matter. Lenses I apply: Customer Value Will this solve a meaningful pain point or unlock value for a key persona? Weighted heavily—especially ...Read More