Hi Sean — this is a really practical way of handling the various stakeholders, and the cascade reminds me a little of how the epic/stories/task hierarchy functions in practice.
Thanks! It is possible to use Epic/Stories/Tasks in a similar way, but it usually only works for small teams working on small features. There are a few reasons why:
1. Epics/Stories/Tasks typically live in the Product and Engineering planning systems, which are a poor place to manage company strategy. Company strategy involves all disciplines, so it needs to be accessible to all. It's the same reason you don't use Salesforce for strategic planning, it's central to sales.
2. Epics/Stories/Tasks presume you already know what you're going to build. Company strategy, especially at the strategic level, are goals and areas to pursue that might not have details yet on what you want to build. For example, a strategic partnership might be critical for FY 2023 but you might not yet know who that partner is or what you have to build.
The Three Product Roadmaps evolved from the need to balance all of these things together!
I just saw your response and thanks to my off-the-cuff comment l I think we may have our wires crossed a little! Your diagram of the flow of roadmap priorities and updates reminded me of the hierarchies between the epic/story/task and a backlog, but I wasn't suggesting they could be used interchangeably. If anything, I was meaning the epic/story/task designation kind of acted as children to your third roadmap, and that the epic is in many ways a vision for discrete functionality/outcome (which you quite rightly point out may not be known/concrete at the time). Your three levels makes great sense for stakeholder engagement and alignment.
Hi Sean — this is a really practical way of handling the various stakeholders, and the cascade reminds me a little of how the epic/stories/task hierarchy functions in practice.
Thanks! It is possible to use Epic/Stories/Tasks in a similar way, but it usually only works for small teams working on small features. There are a few reasons why:
1. Epics/Stories/Tasks typically live in the Product and Engineering planning systems, which are a poor place to manage company strategy. Company strategy involves all disciplines, so it needs to be accessible to all. It's the same reason you don't use Salesforce for strategic planning, it's central to sales.
2. Epics/Stories/Tasks presume you already know what you're going to build. Company strategy, especially at the strategic level, are goals and areas to pursue that might not have details yet on what you want to build. For example, a strategic partnership might be critical for FY 2023 but you might not yet know who that partner is or what you have to build.
The Three Product Roadmaps evolved from the need to balance all of these things together!
Hi Sean,
I just saw your response and thanks to my off-the-cuff comment l I think we may have our wires crossed a little! Your diagram of the flow of roadmap priorities and updates reminded me of the hierarchies between the epic/story/task and a backlog, but I wasn't suggesting they could be used interchangeably. If anything, I was meaning the epic/story/task designation kind of acted as children to your third roadmap, and that the epic is in many ways a vision for discrete functionality/outcome (which you quite rightly point out may not be known/concrete at the time). Your three levels makes great sense for stakeholder engagement and alignment.
Cheers!
Hamish