Building Stellar Product Roadmaps — An event by Advancing Women in Product (AWIP)
Credits: Thanks to the Advancing Women in Product Boston Team, Bindu Tuli, Kate Hurd, Prathiba Dyavegowda, Anjali Munjal, Divya Bhasin, Malavika Andavilli, Shruti Gupta
Crafting a product roadmap that walks the fine line between strategic and tactical priorities is a challenge all product managers will face. During the panel discussion at Building Stellar Product Roadmaps it became evident this is a demand for PMs in junior to senior roles, from startups to multinational enterprises. Product managers must take all the noise — from customer feedback to internal stakeholder requests — and create a cohesive roadmap that directly links back to the overall product strategy. The method for doing this, however, is a whole other challenge. During the panel discussion product executives offered valuable insight and tips to reaching this zen.
The room at Boston Consulting Group, AWIP Boston’s sponsor for the event, was a mix between aspiring product managers to current product leaders; the latter of which 100% agreed creating the right product roadmap is a struggle. To help solve this challenge, it is essential to pinpoint why a roadmap is needed in the first place. Panelist and AWIP Boston chapter lead Bindu Tuli, Director of Product Management at Dell, explained how various groups are looking for different outcomes from a roadmap. Executives want to know their product team is moving the needle forward, and a roadmap reflects how those strategic objectives are being met. The sales team wants to know what they can sell next. Customers want to know when their own requests will be delivered. And finally, the other internal teams want to start planning ahead, such as how the delivery team will implement and rollout the product. To contrast, Paul Morville, founder and familiar with startups, stressed delivering tactical prospect requests to fulfill functionality needs while communicating how your startup has the best product vision in the space to convince investors to bet on you. When your company is first starting out, this is a vital step for funding the resources to move the needle forward.
Product roadmaps should also connect feature functionality directly to customer problems being solved. In her early days, Jess Petersen, co-founder and VP of product at Pepperlane, learned a valuable lesson in product-market fit. Input does not automatically lead to a valuable outcome, and validating a certain feature set beforehand will ensure development resources are not wasted. Successfully delivering features by certain dates does not necessarily equate to successfully delivering on objectives. Arguably then, when following this rule, a product roadmap should have a hierarchical structure as opposed to a laundry list of items. All initiatives should stem from the north star, and feature development should align with this overall product strategy. As a result, it becomes easier to communicate the right level of detail with the right audiences.
Iuliia A., product manager at BCG, knows a lot about starting with why when structuring the roadmap. When she first started at Boston Consulting Group, interviewing people at her company was key to understanding the product’s strategy. Before she immediately started building the product, Iuliia took a step back and looked at finding the answer to this question, why, before worrying about exactly what to build. By gathering what different personas thought about the current product, she was able to prioritize how the limited resources could be utilized most effectively. This means striving for the minimum viable product so user feedback can be gathered as soon as possible. A product manager must ask herself what can be built today to get the most value put in front of real users, and gather feedback to refocus the iterative direction of the product as a whole. As C. Todd Lombardo, author and VP of product at MachineMetrics concludes, focus on what you can build today with the least amount of effort that will deliver the highest return possible. This helps two-fold: you can make sure you’ve headed in the right direction before depleting all resources and realign if needed, but it also shows stakeholders you’ve moved the needle forward for the company.
It’s no secret creating and maintaining the right product roadmap is an obstacle for a product manager with any level of experience. Each product executive on the panel had pieces of advice for navigating these waters, and utilizing an agreed upon framework to showcase how tactical items roll up to the overall product strategy is key for stakeholder alignment. If every effort can be traced back to the company’s vision for the product, you’ll be well on your way to boost your credibility as a product manager, and as a leader.
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