How can you navigate career paths in product road mapping?

- know the market you serve, beyond your client base. This is critical as your development should cater to your market segment and you should strategize your product portfolios by universal adoption. - understand the value you will deliver by those who use features most intimately, a huge mistake I often see is catering to upper level management who have little knowledge of the problems they want solved. - don’t make assumptions. There should be some sort of index you track to understand the problems you’re solving and the exact impact it serves your market. - let the market dictate priority in your roadmap. The only way to understand the true value you bring is by feedback and analytics.

Though product road mapping is the responsibility of a product manager/owner etc. depending on the size of the team, I believe that the whole product team should be iterating the road map and detailing it out keeping the customer needs in the centre. Customer or client (depending its B2C or B2B) should be the guiding light, the product manager should be the guide monitoring and evolving it and the whole product team should be the owners of these road maps in their respective expertise area.

As a product manager it is important to know your market and the users that you are going to serve, the roadmap is eventually the order in which you will bring impact for the user as well as the business in terms of growth and revenue. 1-Need to begin by defining the high-level objectives and goals of your product. What problem does it solve, and what value does it provide to users and the business? 2- Know your target audience and their needs. Define different user personas, collect customer feedback, and market research to inform your roadmap decisions. 3- Collaborate with various stakeholders like product managers, engineers, designers, sales etc, to gather input and insights. 4- Prioritize Features and Initiatives 5- Create a Timeline

Navigating product road mapping roles involves understanding your strengths and interests. Product managers define strategy, while product owners ensure alignment in agile teams. Product marketing managers handle promotion, product analysts provide data-driven insights, and UX/UI designers focus on enhancing the user experience. Choose a role that aligns with your skills and passion to create value for customers and stakeholders.

Product manager: They work with a variety of stakeholders, customers, engineers, and designers, to define the product vision, strategy, and roadmap. Product marketing manager: Product marketing managers are responsible for creating and executing go-to-market strategies for products. Product designer: Product designers are responsible for designing the user experience and interface of products. Product strategy manager: Product strategy managers are responsible for developing and executing the long-term strategy for products. Product data scientist: Product data scientists use data to inform product decisions. Product growth manager: Product growth managers are responsible for growing the user base and engagement of products. .

While we look for the obvious skillset for Product managers, one shouldn't miss out on the basics. To put it simply, one should focus on the 3C's - 1. Collaborate with the stakeholders 2. Clear Communication on the vision and objective and how it aligns with the goal each one is trying to achieve 3. Conceptualize the entire Product Roadmap keeping all the important aspects in view - customer centricity, feasibility, stakeholder viewpoint to name a few.

“Interpreting data is a skill, understanding data is an art.” - you should have tools that provide necessary data to drive your vision. Clients don’t always know what they need and sometimes don’t truly understand the underlying problems that need to be solved. - tools: journey mapping, surveys, win/loss analysis, competitive landscape, chatGPT, market research, exception handling. Yes, some of these aren’t items you would add with code, but they are high value items organizations can build to develop roadmaps that solve market problems.

Emotional Resilience is a pivotal skill, especially since product management often mirrors the role of a soloist in an orchestra. Just as a soloist captivates the audience, a product manager must inspire teams and stakeholders with a clear, passionate vision. In today's fast-paced, ever-changing market, this resilience isn't just about coping with stress or setbacks. It's about agile problem-solving and strategic flexibility. The product manager, like a soloist, must navigate uncertainty with poise, keeping projects on track even when plans go awry. This emotional grit enables you to pivot when needed, maintain team morale, and adapt to new market conditions, akin to changing musical compositions.

One of the most ignored skill in product roadmapping is ability to influence your team members in a positive way so that they believe in your vision for the product. If this is done properly then the entire productization journey becomes fulfilling for everyone.

According to me anything a product manager does requires a combination of soft and hard skills in definite proportions. Product roadmapping is a crucial skill for product managers, as it involves planning and visualizing the strategic direction of a product. 1- Product managers should have the ability to align the product roadmap with the overall business strategy and goals. 2- Need to inhibit a very important skill in evaluating and prioritizing features, enhancements, and initiatives based on factors like customer needs, business value, technical feasibility, and market trends. 3- Need to have strong communication skills to effectively convey the roadmap's objectives and timelines to cross-functional teams, stakeholders, and executives.

In addition to this, a product roadmap must be practical, flexible and executable. - Practical in terms of achievable with available resources & budget, we may have an aspirational roadmap which we think is ground breaking but if we don't have resources it's of no use. - Flexible so that if needed there should be scope to redirect the product which may be due to technological changes or be flexible to incorporate a different target market basis segmentation where we see opportunity. - Executable so that we achieve the milestones as planned and incorporate relevant technology/people in advance to reach where we want to see our product.

An experienced product manager also needs a foundational knowledge of data strategies, data collection, and how to interpret the business impact of the data. Algorithms can contain basis. Data can be clouded or dirty. Roadmaps needs to built off of solid data in order to meet the key performance indicators of the organization.

- Collect user journey data and map to your product journey. -Priorities high impact feature or product enhancement over complex feature development.

Know the technical stuff to the extent of its basic usage. A PM may not need to be technically sound however learning basic tech skills like API structure, functioning, code execution, error mapping, Browser dependencies, and Basic code syntax - how code works, will give you an edge and hence you will be more confident with your dev teams and with your overall product-led approach.

Pay attention to acceptance tests and verification. The product manager shuld test the product after every new feature added. And make sure the product has been testing in a high scale.

Once, My team faced a crossroads: we had enough resources to develop either Feature A, a highly requested user feature, or Feature B, a revolutionary but untested concept inspired by machine learning algorithms. We initially leaned towards Feature B due to its exciting potential. However, I decided to engage in deeper discussions with stakeholders and held a couple of focused virtual meetings with key team members. We even conducted a flash A/B test to gauge initial responses. The results were eye-opening: the 'must-have' Feature A had clear, immediate impact, while the 'nice-to-have' Feature B lacked strong initial user engagement. By utilizing data-driven decision-making, we chose Feature A. It became one of our most successful updates.

When creating a product roadmap, consider: 1. Customer Feedback: Incorporate user input and pain points. 2. Market Trends: Stay updated on industry shifts. 3. Business Goals: Align with company objectives. 4. Resource Constraints: Be realistic about resources. 5. Competitive Analysis: Understand your rivals' moves. 6. Iteration: Roadmaps can evolve as you learn. 7. Clear Prioritization: Focus on high-impact features. 8. Communication: Share the roadmap with stakeholders. 9. Milestones: Set measurable goals for progress. 10. Adaptability: Be ready to adjust to changes.

- Consider cross team dependencies while designing a feature. - Automation and AI should be consider if it is solving a problem which will impact the user productivity.

Have you already heard the clumsy excuse “We don’t have any roadmaps, we’re agile!” ?? ? Roadmaps are great companions for agility. Too often, arguing against a roadmap disguises a lack of planning as agility. The belief that roadmaps are superfluous or anti-agile comes out of some misunderstanding (at best). More often they are just plain excuses to cover for a lack of vision or planning. Not a coincidence that these arguments often come from teams who are unable to articulate their goals and strategy. They’re just lost. Roadmaps foster transparency and alignment. A well-crafted roadmap showcases your organization’s vision and goals to stakeholders, customers, and the team themselves… enhancing trust and collaboration.

To be good at product roadmapping, besides having deep understanding of customer needs, market trends, competition, technical skills and product knowledge, one also needs to understand business case, marketing, and distribution channels, so that one takes into considerations how to effectively position each of the products on the roadmap.