The FinLab Toolkit

STRATEGY, INNOVATION & IMPACT | VISION BUILDING

Product Roadmap

60-90 Min

Roadmapping is an important step of clarifying the direction of a startup or programme over the next few weeks, and months. It helps teams align on their priorities and challenges moving forward.

USE CASES

  • Build consensus on a company's or programme's strategic direction.
  • Identify key milestones, and responsibilities for each team.
  • Formulate an actionable plan for teams to work towards.

LIMITATIONS

Teams may be reluctant to get into details of their internal plans in front of a larger workshop audience.

Product Roadmapping | App Annie

UNDERSTANDING THE TOOL

  • The tool helps a team approach product, service or system development through a series of iterative activities and phases.
  • The ‘Team’ column aims to identify teams involved in different phase and their key roles and responsibilities. Teams could be research, design, technology, marketing, sales, strategy or any other group involved in product or service development.
  • Under each phase (POC, MVP, Beta, Launch), a team should first map goals and then the activities of the different teams towards achieving these goals. Next, map the resources required (material, financial, technical), and finally the timelines (weeks and months). Each type of data (goals, activities, investments, and time) should be written down on sticky notes of different colours.
  • ‘POC’ or Proof Of Concept is the first tangible version of the concept. A POC validates basic assumptions with regard to functionality (of the solution) and desirability (addresses basic user needs), without necessarily having resolved all technical issues.
  • ‘MVP’ short for Minimum Viable Product, refers to the earliest experienceable version of a service or product (with only key/necessary features). An MVP is used to better understand the core of the business opportunity, and check if customers respond favourably.
  • ‘Alpha’ is the first product or service release with a set of actual users in a controlled, experimental environment. This allows for feedback from a sizeable set of real users, without having resolved all bugs and technical challenges.
  • ‘Beta’ is the first public release used to gather feedback from a wide array of users. Beta tests often serve as a 'soft launch' for a product or service, testing an organisation's ability to respond to feedback. It is the stage to reach 'early adopters' who have the potential to become users.
  • ‘Launch’ milestones cover any final priorities before going to market at scale; like additional features to be integrated, service elements refined, adjustments in communication, distribution channel logistics, etc.
  • ‘Success Metrics’ for each phase should be derived from goals set, and help measure whether the goals have been achieved. Metrics should be both internal facing, and external market focused.

STEP BY STEP

  1. Map goals for phases: Review the various phases of development (POC, MVP, Alpha, Beta, Launch). Start by discussing what goals, the team should set for itself. Go phase by phase, map goals through consensus.
  2. Map teams and effort: In the left-most column, identify the different teams, functional/discipline wise (like marketing, technology, design), and cross-functional/multidisciplinary (like a payments team may have individuals from technology, design, and partnership teams working together). For each team, write down expected activities under each. Estimate the kind of skills and the number of people required. This has to be a loose estimate at the beginning, becoming more concrete as the product or service offering evolves.
  3. Map resources: Some teams may want to additionally map a resourcing roadmap - financial, material, and technical resources that may be needed to achieve each phase.
  4. Map timelines: Add the different phases against expected timelines (in terms of weeks and months).
  5. Digitise and share: After completion, share your roadmap within your team, and with other stakeholders.
  6. Note: Use different colour sticky notes for goals, activities, resources, and timelines.

HOW TO FOR FACILITATORS

  1. At the start: Make sure the participants understand the goal of the activity and the direction. Refer to facilitation questions if they are feeling stuck.
  2. During the exercise: Help participants understand where they stand on the roadmap and if any edits should be made to the template.
  3. At the close: Make sure clear milestones have been formulated, and encourage participants to get input from representatives of the teams listed in the roadmap that may not have been available for the activity.

FACILITATORS QUESTION BANK

  • Are you familiar with this format? Do you use a version of this in your organisation?
  • What kind of visibility do you have into what the next 3-6-12 months look like? What are some key goals for each phase?
  • How far are you currently on this roadmap? Should anything here be changed to reflect your own approach?
  • What are the different kinds of teams you have in your organisation? What are the different project teams? Let's list the major ones in the left column.
  • What kind of milestones have you been using so far? How do they link to the different teams?
  • How well have your milestones worked for you?
  • What kind of metrics have you been using? Are those tied to the milestones?
  • Do your metrics cover both internal, and external elements?

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