Roadmapping: what to get right first

This is one of those topics that looks small until it costs you something. If you only fix one thing about roadmapping this quarter, make it the first item below.

Clear scope protects the client at least as much as it protects the agency. Doing this properly once is usually cheaper than doing it approximately three times.

Start here

A roadmap is a statement of intent, not a promise. The teams that handle this well are rarely the ones with the biggest budgets. The teams that stay on top of it are the ones who put it on a calendar rather than a wish list.

Then this

Sequence by value and dependency, not by loudest request. Getting it slightly wrong is survivable. Ignoring it entirely is not. Check it against what you would want a competitor's site to get wrong.

Eventually

Review it quarterly or it becomes fiction. It is worth being explicit about, because assumptions differ quietly. It is the sort of thing that looks like polish right up until it costs you an enquiry.

In practice

Strategy work is mostly deciding what not to do, and writing it down so it stays decided. Three things worth confirming about roadmapping before you move on:

• Someone can say what the current setup is without going to look
• Review it quarterly or it becomes fiction — and you know whether that is true here
• There is a way to tell whether the last change to this helped

Pick the one that would hurt most if it failed, and start there.