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It’s annual roadmap planning time — which, I know, I know — but good to have something to work with when thinking about how to achieve the company’s goals next year. ANYWAY...the thing I want to tweet about is alignment with strategy.
We currently have four themes in our product strategy. They’re not evenly weighted per se, but they’re all important as expressions of our beliefs about our market, our users, and how our product will support our growth.
What I’m finding this go round is that it is exceptionally straightforward to align our product opportunities for next year with our strategic themes. Like, super clear.
This is in contrast with past experiences — in one example we hoped to have 70-80% alignment between strategy and roadmap. The other 20-30% being a bucket of shit we have to do that does not support the strategy.
What I’m reflecting on today is that most likely that strategy wasn’t right, or complete, to begin with. If the product strategy is clear, makes actual choices about shit you won’t be doing, products you will never be...then roadmapping is like butter.
Prioritization will always be hard — strategy won’t get you out of that pain. But you can have coherence. If building your roadmap feels dissonant, or theatrical, you are not alone. Recognize that it’s a symptom of strategic misalignment and see if you can fix that first.
