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Roadmap Planning
1 answer
VP Product at Airbase | Formerly Skype, Microsoft, Blink and Pipedrive
Without full context, I will assume you are not a start up but rather a
profitable business with growing revenue.
When considering whether to build, buy or partner (BBP), work with your team to
put together a set of principles that are informed by your :
* vision and strategy
* differentiated core
* ability to deliver value to market quickly
Once you've identified the high leverage items that brings differentiated value,
then work with your engineering team to model each of the 3 BBP options, and
score them (doesn't matter how , just align on a framework).
1. How quickly can you pr...more
3 answers
VP Product at Airbase | Formerly Skype, Microsoft, Blink and Pipedrive
The answer lies in the breakdown of how the organisation intends to hit it's goals.
See this answer for context - https://sharebird.com/h/product-management/q/how-do-you-handle-exec-input-in-the-roadmap-and-convey-a-point-of-view-while-also-accommodating-1
To take an extreme example, if 70% of the organisations revenue target is based on the acquisition of new customers then that's a good guideline for your investment levels, eg
65% - Prospects
25% - Existing customers
10% - Tech debt
Group Manager, Product at GitLab
I typically start from what are the annual business targets set by the company
to answer this question. Oftentimes, the sales organization, CEO, and
professional services organizations have targets around expansion, new logo
acquisition, and win rate which will help portion out what the backlog needs to
be to support the business goals.
In absence of these targets set by leadership, I would use a RICE framework
(https://www.intercom.com/blog/rice-simple-prioritization-for-product-managers/)
to establish what is the highest value driver for the business. That way I am
not really focused ...more
Vice President Product Management at Momentive
I find that this type of division can be misleading. In many industries, there is little difference between what an existing customer would want vs what a prospect would want. Many times, the two would like to see the same kinds of capabilities built (but their priorities might be different). I think more about the buying centers I’m targeting, the use cases they have that my product can solve, and prioritize the roadmap based on the importance of those.
4 answers
Director of Product Management at Braze
Let’s say that a product team and an executive team are aligned on the goal of
improving customer satisfaction with the product (measured by a CSAT survey).
The product team will then do research and perform experiments to validate the
best way to impact customer satisfaction. Including executives in the research
process via stakeholder interviews is a great way to get input early -
executives are viewing things from a much different perspective than team ICs
and often have great ideas. When the team prioritizes opportunities to pursue,
the framework they use for prioritization can also be ...more
VP Product at Airbase | Formerly Skype, Microsoft, Blink and Pipedrive
Exec input is key so that you're aligned on the company goals.
First get a breakdown from the Execs and finace on which levers the company
intends to pull so that it achieves it's goals, and then categorise, eg, X% from
new customers acquired , Y% from existing customers , Z% from cost savings.
Then map the biggest customer problems to each of these categories - this gives
you your key themes.
Now that you have this mapped out
1. First playback your understanding of the importance and priority of each
category / lever
2. Second highlight the customer problems that align to each ca...more
Group Manager, Product at GitLab
This is certainly a tricky one! I like to think of a roadmap being made up of
four sensing mechanisms:
1. External stakeholders - investors, board members
2. Market landscape - competitors, analyst reviews or reports, and prospects
3. Internal stakeholders - CEO, leadership, cross-functional teams
4. Customers - install base or existing paying and free users
When you are able to attribute the sources of your roadmap features
transparently, it becomes a trade-off conversation with executives - rather than
a top-down mandate. Being able to show that certain bodies of work have be...more
Vice President Product Management at Momentive
The most helpful way to maintain alignment with the exec team is to align early
and often on the product vision and strategy. Those conversations will likely
surface gaps or areas of misalignment that you can address or close at the
strategy level before you ever get into a roadmap discussion.
If however, you find yourself at the receiving end of some exec input that isn’t
aligned with a strategy you have socialized, there are several ways to handle
it.
1. Pull the suggestion into your input process and work the idea through your
product development lifecycle to see if it will make...more
3 answers
VP Product at Airbase | Formerly Skype, Microsoft, Blink and Pipedrive
Let's align on terminology first.
https://medium.com/productfolio/release-plan-vs-launch-plan-774526d2817b
The PMs lead on the Product Roadmap, but the PMMs lead on the GTM / Launch Plan.
We package up our features that we want to launch into 3 -4 sizes (small ,
medium , large launch). Each launch classification will have it's playbook. The
PMMs / PMs meet weekly to classify anything ongoing or new into these launch
classifications.
If necessary the relevant PM and PMM will align on the details for how they GTM
for a particular feature OR feature bundle so that we can more easily highligh...more
Group Manager, Product at GitLab
Wow, what a great question! I like to think that product marketing offers a
different lens to the market landscape, competitive positioning, and product
launches. As a result, I typically rely on four main activities:
1. Include product marketing in the annual product theme and road-mapping
processes
2. Have a set sync with the product marketing to review shared performance
indicators such as the top of funnel leads, website performance, and release
post/notes engagement
3. Assign tasks and responsibilities to Product Marketers in the Release
Post/Notes process where they can contri...more
Vice President Product Management at Momentive
Our Product Marketing team is a key cross-functional partner and therefore
provides us with suggestions, feedback, and market factors they are noticing
through several channels. This is one of the ways in which our PMM team
influences the roadmap.
Additionally, our product marketing and product management teams work closely
together to define key elements of the product strategy (key buyers, use cases,
value proposition) as well as the go-to-market strategy and enablement
activities. These pre & post roadmap activities help us make sure we have
alignment between what we are building and ...more
2 answers
VP Product at Airbase | Formerly Skype, Microsoft, Blink and Pipedrive
I wrote this post that covers a high level framework I use, aka Value stacking:
https://medium.com/@TheUpstartGuy/value-stacking-multiplying-product-growth-88230ee4cfc2
I will post a follow up on medium in which I'll deep dive on prioritisation, but there are many frameworks already in use out there, but the thing that I see missing is a coherent vision or strategy that provides direction that should inform your prioritisation.
Vice President Product Management at Momentive
Prioritization is the most important role of the product management function,
and there seems to be a general sense that there is one major moment of
prioritization that culminates in a completed roadmap. The reality is that the
exercise in prioritization starts much earlier. Like many organizations, we are
resource-constrained and have many more ideas than we can realistically action.
Therefore, prioritization is one of the most important things we can do to help
the company succeed. This means we are constantly prioritizing at all levels of
work, not just the roadmap items.
Prioritizat...more
1 answer
Vice President Product Management at Momentive
At Momentive there are several stakeholders that have input into our roadmap, a
few main partners and collaborators are listed below:
* Other Product & Design Teams
* Sales/CS teams
* Marketing & Growth
* Research
* And more…
Most cross-functional partners just want to be heard and want to understand
whether their requests will be addressed or not. This is why transparency is a
key element in all 3 of the following tips to help you maintain the balance
between influence and control:
1. Give your cross-functional partners an acceptable avenue to advocate for
customer requests a...more
1 answer
VP, Product at Barracuda Networks
I think this depends on whether you've been a people manager (e.g at the
Director or Head level) previously.
If you're a fist time people manager, it can be a challenging transition. The
biggest trap people fall into is not delegating aggressively enough. You got to
where you were by being a rockstar PM. There will be many, many situations where
one of your employees is struggling with something and you will be so tempted to
do it yourself. It will way less work than coaching them through it and the
results will likely be better. Avoid it at all costs, you are going to
disempower your t...more
3 answers
Director of Product Management at Braze
Good framing is essential for effective prioritization, especially in cases
where departments have different perspectives on what to prioritize. In many
companies, including my own, the sales team is an important stakeholder in the
product roadmap.
When working with other departments or teams, you want to ensure that there’s a
common language in which to communicate. For example, are both departments
aligned on the prioritization of high level business goals? Is there a clear
ownership model?
Once there's tentative alignment on these topics, it's much easier to have an
objective discussio...more
VP Product at Airbase | Formerly Skype, Microsoft, Blink and Pipedrive
What are your company goals for the year, and how much is dependent on new sales
vs retaining exist customers and growing customers?
It's important to know, as It can cost five times as much to attract a new
customer, than to keep an existing one. But if there is no clarity on this, ask
the execs - What % should we allocate to new sales? An effective leadership team
should be representiative of other voices too , like marketing, customer
success, support etc. Make sure you reflect that voice back effectively.
Bring your data to the table so that you can share your perspective on the risk
...more
Group Manager, Product at GitLab
Well, I often incorporate multiple sensing mechanisms into the roadmap - the
field and sales team are definitely an important lever to drive revenue, which
really is why product managers exist.
So, a tactic I use is to show how much of my engineering capacity is dedicated
to enabling revenue, technical debt, and long-term vision. The long-term vision
is often a "big bet" that is about making a splash in the market or analyst
review. Oftentimes, sales and the field are supportive of carving out time for
long-term bets because analyst ratings, whitepapers, and affirmations of the
product ...more
3 answers
Director of Product Management at Braze
The level of detail that people on other teams need depends on what they are
using the roadmap for. Our roadmap planning tool enables us to create multiple
views of the roadmap - we tailor each view to the use cases of the consumers.
For example, we have the following views:
* A view for our quarterly planning process - this view is primarily used to
communicate to execs so it focuses on the high level business goals that each
roadmap item supports and doesn’t contain many implementation details.
* An internal view that go-to-market team members can use to understand
estimated d...more
VP Product at Airbase | Formerly Skype, Microsoft, Blink and Pipedrive
Identify who wants and needs visibility of the Roadmap. Ask each group why and
what they will do with the information. Then tailor the experience for them.
For example sales may want to demonstrate to customers that the company is
continually investing in product, or share the vision for you are headed. If
that's the case using a Now / Next Later format maybe sufficient.
Whereas support may need to consider the spikes in calls and plan their work
around the release of a new feature. If so then knowing spefiic GTM dates for
the next 3 months may suffice.
It's also worth testing formats w...more
Group Manager, Product at GitLab
I love this question - the audience is everything! I typically have 3
pre-prepared altitudes for my product roadmap which correspond to a specific
persona and time horizon
1. Annual Thematic Roadmap with Big Boulder Features - Executives and Buyers of
Product: This roadmap has a conceptual, initiative-based view. So, it features
connected narratives of multiple features for what the themes of the roadmap
will deliver for a buyer or an executive interested in the ROI of the roadmap.
2. Quarterly Feature Review - Field Teams/End users: For internal teams that
sell the solution and are w...more
2 answers
VP Product at Airbase | Formerly Skype, Microsoft, Blink and Pipedrive
A public roadmap can serve as a tool to attract potential customers and increase
the retention of existing customers by demonstrating that you are continually
investing in the product and addressing their queries and concerns.
There are Pros and Cons to having a public roadmap, and IMO the Pros needs to
significantly outweigh the Cons, as the cost of maintaining this roadmap is not
insignificant. Having an out of date roadmap could have an adverse impact so you
can't afford to be misaligned in your communications.
Get all the stakeholders (especially customer facing roles) involved, to bu...more
Group Manager, Product at GitLab
Since I have joined GitLab, where our product roadmaps are publicly accessible
(https://about.gitlab.com/direction/), I don't think I will ever go back to
internal roadmaps. A public roadmap as a number of benefits:
1. You keep everyone internal to the company aligned and up to date on what the
product organization is building
2. You can encourage contribution (if you use open source) from the community or
customers to help build your roadmap - delivering on a dual fly wheel mechanism
3. Reduces external and field team confusion on what the business is
delivering.
If you use dis...more