Project roadmap structure. Reasons for using roadmaps. Design of creative works for the exhibition “…”

Any company whose business is not built on the knee feels the need for competent planning mechanisms. Сorporate Roadmap (corporate road map) is a similar practical tool for strategic corporate planning. Unfortunately, due to insufficient popularity, it is not widely used in Russian business.

What is a roadmap? It is the backbone of management's work. It describes the steps planned for a long period of time in a structured and sequential manner. Usually it is a year, three, four or five years. A business roadmap is one of the management tools in a company or group of companies. It is applicable in organizations with more than 200-300 employees, with two or more levels of management hierarchy. Attention is drawn to it by high efficiency, transparency and visibility, as well as the clarity of criteria for monitoring and motivating both individual employees and individual structures of a company or holding.

Essence of Corporate Roadmap

A roadmap is a set of measures to implement the achievement of the planned result, with a clear definition and audit of the starting point of movement. This is a toolkit for identifying gaps in certain processes and self-tuning the control system in the process of application.

To solve the problems, two models can be used. The first model allows you to build on accepted practice as you achieve results, step by step. It is used when the performance of the previous period is rosy and the company used other planning tools. The second model is the introduction of a new mechanism entirely. It is necessary in startups, in anti-crisis management, when changing technologies in the industry.

Corporate Roadmap stimulates those areas in management that will give the maximum effect to achieve long-term goals. Directions in the management of the company are stimulated at all levels of the hierarchy from top management to line managers.

The roadmap builds processes very well and balances the distribution of attention between solving short-term and long-term tasks. In essence, this document links strategic and operational tasks into a single mechanism. It allows you to find solutions that convey the goals and visions of owners and shareholders to all levels of the company, stimulate research and control the development of events in the right direction.

Corporate Roadmap tools are interrelated and include:

  • Development of key technologies and competencies.
  • Risk management and restrictions.
  • Strategic marketing tools.
  • Political management of human resources.
  • Justification and proper use of investments.
  • Development and mechanism for implementing decisions that lead to the success of the company.
  • Support for strategic processes.

Step-by-step planning for roadmap development

The roadmap contains information that is a reference for monitoring and managing the process, as well as indicators of the success of movement along the route and tools for working with deviations (compensations).

Map development can be divided into two major stages:

  • Goal setting and clarification of the real picture of the world.
  • The task of moving towards the goal with clear results and responsibility for the result: what will happen or not happen when the goal is achieved or not achieved, in what areas, with whom, how significant the results will be.

We set goals and clarify the situation in the company

Step one. In terms of KPI, the flagship goals of the company (primarily in the field of marketing) are defined, associated with a new vision of the future. Goals are set by shareholders and management and then adjusted as they are audited and developed based on the Corporate Roadmap toolkit. At the same stage, additional (side) goals are set.

Step two. Audit, during which the choice of marketing and management tools to achieve the company's goals. At this point, it is desirable to assess the opportunities that the company has and determine what new tools it is advisable to introduce into management practice in order to use them. It is also important to evaluate the work of all managerial links, including the motivation of managers and their reorientation to more effective methods. The audit may include an assessment of interaction with third parties, but this work is also impossible without an assessment of the company's internal processes.

The analysis is carried out in different areas: marketing oscillators, commercial analytics, production opportunities, financial and investment evaluation. The heads of the main business divisions, areas and departments are involved in the process of auditing and agreeing on the findings.

After the audit is completed, we get: the first conclusions, a list of white spots, a list of hypotheses and clear target results. Owners of the company either immediately receive processes that provide the business efficiency they need, or information that allows them to prepare existing processes for upgrading to a higher level. The audit allows not to miss the important stages of the implementation of the developed set of measures, without which the stated goals will not be fully achieved.

Step three. Use of recommended tools. Corporate Roadmap tools are applied based on the tasks identified during the audit. The task of this stage is to get an answer to the question, due to which approaches the set goals will be achieved. What are the best practices that will allow us to do this? Analysis successful strategies will not only help to find new ideas, but will also allow you to determine whether business process reengineering is necessary for their implementation.

The third stage covers a wide range of issues and areas:

  • Implementation of planning by sections, setting checkpoints, automation.
  • Changes in technological processes.
  • Management lever in the area of ​​control points and identified white spots.
  • Attraction and involvement of human resources.
  • Establish efficient processes to quickly apply incoming data.

As a result, we determine the leading trio of "goals - tasks - approaches" and formulate a concept that will be implemented.

We set the movement towards goals

Step one. Determine the starting position. To do this, we start from the results of the audit. The starting position is the starting point of the improvement route and the base for further success. It includes the presence or absence of a necessary and sufficient list of managerial, production, financial and marketing "weapons". As a result of the study, we get a block of the Corporate Roadmap document that describes the current situation "as is" - a description that is shared by all participants in the implementation.

Step two. We define the stages of action in various areas with indicators. This section can contain multiple scenarios. Each scenario (case) describes the structure of the stages, their sequence. Each stage answers the question of what will be done and why. Each stage can be detailed by areas of responsibility. For example:

  • Product planning (portfolio).
  • Planning opportunities and defining implementations in management practice.
  • Segment capture planning (panel).
  • Investment calculations.

At the end of the study of this block, we receive confirmation from the responsible persons of the route along which the movement will take place; if necessary, broken down by cases and areas of responsibility (subplans).

Step three. Implementation. At this stage, the roadmap implementation plan is described. This is the main interactive block, for which either the selected official (individually) or the department (collectively) should be responsible. Motivation and demotivation, authority - everything must be detailed and approved. The task of the stage is to develop a system of interrelated actions.

The action plan provided by the roadmap can be compiled in the form of a table with the following fields:

  • Stage / sub-stage number.
  • Main line of business.
  • Case.
  • Start and end dates (plan / actual).
  • Expected results.
  • Significant milestone milestones.
  • Informing about the result (whom, when).
  • Responsible.

In essence, this is a schedule for the implementation of the roadmap, which allows you to control the process and tie the deadlines for results to specified points in time with the introduction of rapid response (strategic focus). It is very important that actions are taken to monitor these indicators, control results and timelines.

When developing a roadmap, it is necessary to take into account the content of interrelated documents. This will make it possible to correlate the actions envisaged by it with other planned actions in order to avoid intersections, conflict of resources, duplication, contradictions and other embarrassments. Which documents should be reviewed first for inconsistencies? First of all, the main documents of the company: the company's annual report and investment projects. It is also important to study the basic documents: marketing and production planning documents, R&D and development data, analysis of opportunities by profiles. And we must not forget about additional documents reflecting the status of existing projects and programs. Accounting for related documents occurs at the end of the "Implementation" stage.

Document understandable to the cleaning lady

Did you manage to create a working toolkit in the end? Can the draft Corporate Roadmap be finalized? In order to understand this, we use a simple checklist:

  • Minimum administrative resource, maximum practical result.
  • Intelligibility, simplicity, clarity, clarity and transparency of the final document. It should be clear to any employee of the company from a cleaner to a top manager.
  • Rapid movement towards the goal. Moving from stage to stage is easy, deadlines are monitored, progress is reported and gaps are addressed.

Project roadmap development - guidelines and examples of roadmap development. The degree of implementation of each project depends on the plan and control over its implementation. The roadmap format is the most acceptable way to implement any event. This tool is an algorithm with fixed stages of development of an object and a certain time for solving a particular problem within the framework of the project.

A roadmap is a time-based chart. A well-designed chart allows for a qualitative analysis of the relationship between the current state of affairs and emerging prospects.

Purpose and signs of the need to develop a roadmap

The goal in developing a roadmap is to present the development path of an object, taking into account options to achieve the desired result. A political situation, a technological process, interpersonal relations, etc. can be considered as an object.

A well-prepared roadmap should have one goal and several options to achieve it. In this case, priority is given to the scenario that looks more beneficial to achieve the final result. The principle “the end justifies the means” with this method of planning fades into the background, since other scenarios can only be applied in the event of force majeure.

Let us give examples of conditions when roadmap development is a legitimate need:

  • There have been significant changes in the scope of the company.
  • The company is losing market share due to the rapid growth of competition in the industry.
  • The company has a vision of competitive development, but cannot competently draw up a strategic plan.
  • objective of the project;
  • a list of necessary measures with the definition of responsible persons;
  • the main requirements for the work for which the managers are responsible;
  • time intervals required for the implementation of a specific activity;
  • checkpoints at each stage of the project with the provision of reports on the activities carried out;
  • possible options for another way to implement the project.

Types of road maps

There are several types of roadmaps. All of them contain some common elements, but pursue different goals and objectives.

Roadmap in industry- aimed at developing strategies for enterprises, taking into account the demands set by the market.

Science and technology roadmap- allows you to determine the choice of a particular technology to optimize the production process.

Product roadmap allows you to find the best way to develop a product (service). Minimizes the risks arising from the implementation of this process. Enterprise business plan can be a special case of a roadmap of this kind.

Program roadmaps- are used, as a rule, by government agencies to develop strategies adapted to a rapidly changing political and economic situation.

The division of roadmaps into types is rather arbitrary, since the implementation of any major project affects many areas of human activity. The goal of optimizing the operation of each mapping object is to obtain the maximum economic effect using the least costly ways to achieve this result.

Development project roadmaps

The process of developing a roadmap (road mapping) is a complex and costly undertaking. To optimize the activities of any large facility, it is necessary to create a working group, which will include specialists from various industries, science, etc.

To create an effective development algorithm, a detailed study of the processes that have taken place at the facility so far is necessary. Roadmaps are a pretty handy strategy visualization tool.

Road map - this is a visual representation of a step-by-step scenario for achieving the strategic goals of an enterprise, a scenario for bringing to efficiency or maintaining a stable state of the production process, which the working groups adhere to when performing practical tasks on the implementation of "hoshin kanri" (a method of strategic planning and a tool for managing complex projects, a quality management system that allows taking into account the requirements and wishes of the Customer).

The roadmap ensures the management and improvement of each process of the production structure through the application Deming cycle, or PDCA (Plan-Do-Check-Act, i.e. "Plan-Do-Check-Correct / Act"). PDCA is short for scientific method:

  • Plan (define a strategic goal, formulate goal setting);
  • Do (define the main steps (milestones) to achieve the goal);
  • Check (apply Lean tools to control the actions taken, apply management decisions to check the effectiveness of the chosen decisions);
  • Correct / Act (form a standard based on the results of the actions taken, conduct an audit, make adjustments).

Road mapping links the expectation of the idea, strategy and process development plan and builds in time the main steps of this process according to the principle "past - present - future". Roadmaps allow you to view not only likely scenarios and development paths, but also their profitability, which allows you to choose the best ways to achieve in terms of economic efficiency and profitability of enterprises and the process as a whole.

Let's define the reasons why Process Owners should use road mapping tools:

  1. Creating a roadmap is, first of all, effective planning of all areas and factors that are involved in achieving the goal;
  2. Roadmaps include such precise characteristics as time;
  3. The creation of roadmaps helps Process Owners to make sure that at the right time they will have the resources and technologies necessary to implement their strategy and plans;
  4. Roadmaps are the link between the strategy of Process Owners CM, MA and common strategy company development;
  5. With the help of roadmaps, gaps (shortcomings) are detected in the planning of development milestones by Process Owners, which allows avoiding rather than solving possible problems in the future;
  6. At each stage of the process of creating a roadmap, the focus is on several of the most important aspects, for example: the need of the enterprise and its development dynamics. Thus, it is possible to use time and resources in the most reasonable and rational way. With the help of roadmaps, it is possible to set the most realistic goals;
  7. The roadmap develops a kind of "guide" for managers, thus allowing you to identify intermediate results and adjust areas of activity;
  8. Sharing multiple roadmaps allows strategic use of technology throughout the company, such as the process of delivering GNO to the Customer’s site, this process both employees of LLC TMS-Logistics and employees of LLC NKT-Service are involved, the creation of a single road map will allow directing the actions of two organizations to achieve one goal;
  9. The creation of roadmaps involves the exchange of information between representatives of various managed companies, departments, Process Owners and other parties interested in achieving the goal. Using a roadmap, you can very easily explain to everyone in which direction the production process is moving, its potential opportunities and prospects;
  10. The process of road mapping forms within the group a common understanding of the development goal and ownership of the development plan;

From the above, it is obvious that the Roadmap makes it possible to predict possible directions for applying the results of the activities of the enterprise as a whole and employees in particular: firstly, from the standpoint of bringing to the efficiency of inefficient processes (that is, to evaluate the role of the Process Owner, the effectiveness of his decisions), and in secondly, from a commercial point of view (to assess the possible economic efficiency of the introduction of this development). The practical experience of enterprises in building a roadmap is in

Cherepanov M.A.

In a dynamic external environment, companies that are focused on the prospects for the development of their activities need to introduce modern methods of organization management. These methods make it possible to most accurately represent, evaluate and predict the future development trend of the company, develop probable scenarios for the development of facilities, and their potential profitability, as well as make optimal management decisions in terms of resource costs and economic efficiency.

The domestic theory of management does not attach sufficient importance to many modern methods that could not only facilitate the management of modern organizations, but also create a detailed scenario plan for the development of any object.

One of the little-studied methods, which is a scenario for the development of a particular object, is the "Roadmap". This method is based on the deductive decomposition of the process of achieving a goal into steps, this process is called "Road Mapping". In general, road mapping serves as the basis for information support of the management process, and in particular, this technique serves to develop the stages of development of an object and determine the time for making management decisions, as well as to rationalize the cause-and-effect relationships between various stages of the project.

The theme of road maps is reflected in the publication of K.L. Lidin "Varieties of building roadmaps", which describes the essence of the method of road mapping, and its application in real organizations. The work "Roadmaps of Russian business: Analytical report on the study" by the team of authors Manchulyantseva O.A. and others, is devoted to the practical use of road maps. This work is based on an original study, which includes a questionnaire survey, expert and in-depth personal interviews with executives and top managers of 50 largest Russian companies. The analysis of these works makes it possible to identify the grounds for the productivity of using this method, which separates road mapping as an effective method of project management. Based on the sources presented, it is possible to identify the limitations and barriers to the application of the road mapping method, as well as predetermine methods for overcoming these negative circumstances.

The purpose of this article is to define the content of the road mapping method and its application for the development of the organization.

The author refers to the objectives of the study carried out a comparative analysis of road mapping and other tools for the development of the organization; explore the benefits and limitations of road mapping; consideration of the possibility of creating project portals based on the method of road mapping.

Currently, there are many tools that contribute to the development of the organization. Such tools are used to form guidelines and priorities for making managerial decisions. A comparative analysis of these tools is presented in Table 1.

Table 1 — Comparative analysis of management decision-making tools

Method

Method Essence

Application result

Delphi method

With the help of a series of sequential actions - surveys, interviews, to achieve maximum consensus in determining the right solution

Defining a solution to a specific problem that satisfies all participants in the method

SWOT analysis

Evaluation of factors and phenomena that affect the project or enterprise. Based on the description of strong and weaknesses internal environment, and the opportunities and threats of the external environment of the organization

Identification of activities based on a combination of strengths and weaknesses of the internal environment and opportunities and threats of the external environment of the organization.

brainstorming method

An operational method of solving a problem based on stimulating creative activity, in which the participants in the discussion are asked to express as many solutions as possible, including the most fantastic ones.

Selection of the most successful ideas from the total number of ideas that can be used in practice.

Scenario method

The method is based on a repeated sequence of building scenarios in order to select the appropriate option.

Obtaining a logically and scientifically sound forecast for making a management decision

Target tree method

A method of structuring tasks, problems, goals for their disaggregation and concretization in the form of a hierarchical system (tree), in which a level-by-level decomposition of more general goals into private ones, those into goals of the next level, and so on.

Allows you to present a picture of the relationship of future events, obtaining a list of specific tasks and information about their relative importance.

Road mapping method

Visual representation of a step-by-step scenario for the development of a particular object

Presentation of information on possible alternatives for the development of the facility and simplification of managerial decision-making. Revision of the existing development potential of the object under study, detection of bottlenecks, threats and growth opportunities, the need for resource support.

All of the above methods, with their proper use, create an information base that facilitates managerial decision-making:

The application of the Delphi method results in several well-founded decisions based on a survey of a group of people.

SWOT analysis provides a structured description of the situation regarding which a decision needs to be made, the conclusions drawn on its basis are descriptive without recommendations and prioritization.

As a result, the brainstorming method presents a list of solutions to a specific problem expressed by experts, and then, from the total number of ideas expressed, the most successful ones that can be used in practice are selected.

The scenario method is a text that allows you to create a preliminary idea of ​​the system in quantitative terms and their relationships, however, the scenario, like any text, is subject to ambiguity in its interpretation, so it should be considered as the basis for further development of a model for solving the problem.

The goal tree method allows you to present a complete picture of the relationship of future events up to obtaining a list of specific tasks and obtaining information about their relative importance. The construction of a tree of goals and objectives ends at the level of determining the executors. In the process of building a goal tree, algorithms for the joint work of experts are often used, but, nevertheless, the method is based not on group work as such, but on a special logic of reasoning.

Building a roadmap, as a result, gives a graphic plan-scenario for the dynamic development of the organization, taking into account alternative paths and the possible identification of areas of performance degradation (bottlenecks), as well as detailed description such important components of the organization as resources, technology, product, market, customer, strategic goal, and creates a well-coordinated system of communicative interaction between all organizational structures.

All the methods presented cannot fully represent the results that are achieved by creating a roadmap, but they can act as a basis for using the roadmapping method.

One of the main features of roadmaps is their appearance, namely, they look like a variant of the analysis based on the selection of possible solutions for individual parts of the main problem - the construction graphic network, consisting of "nodes" (stages of technology development, or points for making managerial decisions) and "links" (causal relationships between "nodes").

As a strategic project management method, road mapping has two main functions:

foresight and planning of the development of the situation, including technological, social, economic and political aspects (forecast of the future);

managing the development of the situation depending on the set strategic goals (designing the future).

Roadmaps imply long-term development of an object for up to 10 years, and reflect the resulting economic effects, determine the effectiveness of alternative options for using resources.

Based on the goals of road mapping, the following types of road maps are distinguished:

Corporate roadmaps;

Scientific roadmaps;

Technology roadmaps;

Product roadmaps.

Any type of roadmap represents the evolution of a product, technology, scientific component of a company, or a corporation as a whole, and creates a graphical representation of various options for the development of an object in time space. Different kinds roadmaps are interconnected and interdependent, which is associated with the need to simultaneously take into account product, technological, industry or corporate components.

Types of road maps are divided by relevance depending on specific goals and time periods. Relevance criteria are based on the versatility of roadmaps, the more components a roadmap includes, the more informative it is for an organization. The lack of strict regulation distinguishes the mapping process high level creativity, which makes it possible to make roadmaps a simple, visual and adaptive tool for making managerial decisions.

On the initial stage development of the organization, the creation of a corporate roadmap, which includes scientific, technological and product aspects, is of particular importance. The next most important is the scientific goal, which includes technological and product components. In the future, the organization no longer needs to develop global roadmaps, because at subsequent stages of development only concentrated methods of organizational management are needed, which are aimed at researching production technologies and products.

The optimal form of a roadmap is a schedule that provides answers to questions about what exactly, how, in what period of time and why will lead to the achievement of the organization's strategic goals.

Table 2 - Advantages and limitations of using roadmaps

Advantages

Restrictions

A good tool for collecting information, involving all experts in the creative process of its construction and subsequent discussion.

Complexity, high cost and duration of development due to the need for knowledge in many specific areas of management.

A good marketing tool for analyzing which product has a key value for the company.

The need for coordinated work of a large number of specialists from different fields and areas of management.

It shows which R&D areas are the most significant, what technological solutions can be developed on their basis, what promising products can be created as a result, and what social changes can occur as a result.

The method may not take into account all aspects of the developed layers.

Allows you to evaluate the market prospects of products and the possibility of entering new markets.

The method does not answer the question "who and how will do all this?"

Allows you to set clearer and more achievable goals.

Lack of required data, information and knowledge.

Allows you to identify priority areas for investment

A large amount of current tasks that do not allow you to concentrate on the strategy.

A good tool for visualizing the developed strategies and plans and identifying logical inconsistencies and "gaps" that may not be visible in the "smooth" text.

Lack of a clear methodology for developing roadmaps.

An effective communication tool that explains the needs of the company to its employees, management, customers and all stakeholders, allowing them to realize what the company needs to change in order to achieve overall success, and to participate in these changes.

Lack of educational literature, seminars and trainings in the field of roadmaps.

Established planning practices in the company.

Provides employees with clear guidance on what to do in the event of a change in environment.

The design process allows you to prepare the company's employees for future changes and form proactive teams.

The creation of a roadmap involves many companies united in a consortium or simply belonging to the same industry. At this level, through the roadmap, it is possible to jointly develop new key technologies and products, which makes it possible to avoid excessive funding for the same research area.

To overcome the limitations and barriers to the use of roadmaps in organizations, various authors propose the following activities:

Establishment of a strategic planning department.

Creation of organizational and regulatory support for road mapping within the organization

Training of employees of the strategic planning department in road mapping;

Creation of a strategic monitoring system.

The barriers to the implementation of road mapping include well-established planning methods in organizations, which is caused by conservatism and the lack of a generally accepted road mapping methodology.

Table 3 - Universal methodology for building roadmaps

Stage

Events

1. The stage of defining the problem and setting a strategic goal

  1. Identification of the problem to be solved;
  2. Objective substantiation of the relevance of the problem;
  3. Formation of strategic goals
  4. Objective justification of the profitability of achieving strategic goals

2. Provision stage

    Creation of a working group, selection of a leader;

    1. Material support of the group;
    2. Regulation of the work of the group;
    3. Ensuring that the group has access to all relevant information in the organization.

3. Information gathering stage

  1. Analysis of customer needs;
  2. Analysis of the list of available and required resources;
  3. Analysis of possible technologies for creating a product or providing a service;
  4. Analysis of possible options for manufactured goods or services.

4. Stage of concretization of information

  1. Designation of a specific list of available resources;
  2. Definition of specific technologies;
  3. Identification of specific products produced or services provided;
  4. Identification of target market segments;
  5. Definition of specific types of clients;

5. Stage of graphic design

  1. Arrangement of roadmap elements in order of importance;
  2. Creating chains, namely:

    establishing links between elements that show what resources, using what technologies create a certain product, which, in turn, is sent to a specific market segment for a specific buyer, and what kind of strategic goal this whole process implements.

6. Stage of presentation to management

7. Discussion stage

  1. Highlighting the positive and negative sides of each chain;
  2. An approximate definition of indicators of the benefits of achieving each goal, in value terms.

8. Stage of joint decision-making

  1. The selection of one or several chains as the most effective methods for achieving strategic goals.

Based on the developing external environment, the algorithm proposed by the methodology can be amended in the stages and activities that will most effectively build a roadmap in relation to a particular organization.

The essence of creating project portals is to organize an electronic space that allows you to track the progress of a specific project in real time, as well as to carry out electronic document management for the project. That is, the project portal is an effective system for storing and accessing internal corporate information necessary for project management and project communications by absolutely all project participants. The scheme of interaction between project participants through the project portal is shown in Figure 2.


Rice. 1. Scheme of interaction between project participants through the project portal

The project portal contains a list of ongoing programs, which consist of projects. Inside each project is a roadmap, which is divided into 3 scenarios: optimistic, optimal, and pessimistic. Each of the scenarios involves its own chain of project implementation.

Every project starts in the optimal implementation scenario because the project inputs are always known. Further, as the project progresses, scenarios may change as risk events occur and their results.

When planning a project implementation roadmap, all scenarios must be carefully planned, namely: what inputs are present in the project; what risk events may occur during the implementation of the project, and what are their consequences; what actions should be followed after the occurrence of a particular risk event; and what is the end result. As the actual implementation of the project, its scenario is marked in red. A graphical example of a project roadmap is shown in Figure 3.


Rice. 2. Project roadmap

The main elements of the roadmap are:

Beginning of the process;

risk event;

Action;

Process result.

In general, each element of the roadmap should contain source documents or other objective grounds on the basis of which a management decision is developed. In particular: the element "Beginning of the process" contains information about the available resources at the beginning of the project; "Risk event" contains information about the scenarios that must be applied when a risk occurs; "Action" contains technologies and methods; The Process Outcome element contains information about the end product of the project.

This system will allow centralizing the management decision-making system, get rid of information distortion, and form a document flow of projects. Also, on the basis of already implemented projects, you can create a typical roadmap, when implementing similar projects, this will greatly simplify the process of achieving strategic goals within the organization.

Today, in state bodies, project management methods are just beginning to be introduced. Road mapping based on a system of project portals must also be introduced into the system of interaction between state bodies with each other. This innovation will facilitate the process of interaction in the implementation of identical projects, will reduce both labor costs and, accordingly, material costs. According to the author, the widespread introduction of project portals based on the road mapping method will create a database of projects in various fields of activity.

The project portal allows you to effectively solve organizational, communication and other tasks related to the administration of the organization's project activities, as well as increase the efficiency and timeliness of managerial decision-making. The project portal is an innovative method of interaction between the subjects of any activity, which increases the effectiveness of this interaction.

Summarizing all of the above, it is necessary to conclude that road mapping is an effective method used for organizational development, on the basis of which management decisions are developed and implemented. This method, at present, is not widely popular, as most management personnel try to use established management methods, and, due to their conservatism, do not consider road mapping as an effective management method.

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A roadmap or roadmap in the hands of a skilled product manager is a real strategic weapon. Just as most strategists know how to properly use their working tools, so the product manager must be able to tactically apply the roadmap and use available services for this purpose.


While in the past, simple Excel or Powerpoint functions were enough for these purposes, today's product managers can really benefit and enjoy working with quality roadmapping tools.

Why is a roadmap needed?

The purpose of the roadmap, as the main document of a product manager, is to convey the main ideas and progress in tasks to team members and external stakeholders (shareholders, customers, partners).

The product roadmap consists of a global level initiative and all of its planned steps. It doesn't have to include every feature of the product and detailed lists of bugs. This strategy document is for separate planning.
Be sure to update the product roadmap throughout its life cycle. Included features, initiatives and requirements must be created and initiated by many parties: management, customers, sales managers, partners, support, developers, financiers and, of course, product people.

Roadmaps are not limited to products: their goals are similar to different types(for example, marketing and IT roadmaps).

Any roadmap focused on its audience has its own characteristics.

  • Roadmaps for Developers typically focus on features, sprints, releases, and milestones. They are quite short and, as a rule, larger.
  • Roadmaps for sellers focused on combining features and benefits for customers.
  • External roadmaps(for customers or partners) focused on the main benefits of the product for them. Like any external document, this kind of product roadmap needs to be attractive, visually understandable, and accessible.

Also, roadmaps differ in different teams. For example, a roadmap in an Agile team will be different from a typical roadmap in Waterfall.

Differences roadmaps in Agile and Waterfall

  • Waterfall teams are usually business oriented, based on financial metrics. In Agile, goals are customer-centric (such as user growth and customer satisfaction).
  • Roadmaps in Waterfall show completions within a year or two, while Agile roadmaps usually show quarterly completions. Planning in Waterfall and Agile companies also differs depending on the timing.
  • Differences are also related to the principle of interaction. Interactions in Waterfall teams are sequential, and Agile team members work according to cross-functionality and simultaneity.
  • Finally, Waterfall roadmaps have limited flexibility, while Agile roadmaps are much more flexible, as is the methodology itself.

There is no perfect way to visually create a roadmap; you can use different templates to display basic data:

  • Global strategic initiatives
  • Releases by periods (quarters)
  • Detailed Features
  • Information about the bug fixing

How to create the perfect roadmap?

Spreadsheets

One of the easiest ways to create a roadmap is to use spreadsheets. For example, using Excel, you can compile product ideas, initiatives, set deadlines and deadlines. They are easy enough to update.

However, roadmaps in tables have significant drawbacks. The tables do not have sufficient visualization and they are not enough to present a strategic plan. In addition, the same Excel is a static document, which, after sharing, is difficult to control and synchronize versions with all team members.

Presentations

It's much easier to visualize a roadmap in presentation software. Here, the product manager has more options and freedom of action.
But even in this case, the presentation is a static document that requires manual updates, just like a spreadsheet, which can confuse version control. Ideally, the roadmap should be updated synchronously for all team members. That is why today it is becoming more and more popular with the functionality for creating roadmaps.

Why are dedicated services better than simple ways to create a roadmap?

Product managers today have the ability to visualize roadmaps with the best management tools that help:
  • Visualize a product roadmap
  • Link global strategy to roadmap processes
  • Identify and evaluate ideas
  • Collaborate with all stakeholders (including clients and non-technical colleagues)
  • Integrate with third party systems
Which service to choose? Here TOP 7 Platforms for Product Managers, which care about high-quality visualization of the roadmap:

Once the product management service is defined, you can start creating a roadmap. Where to begin? How to create an understandable roadmap for everyone?

The main stages of creating a roadmap

There is probably no need to remind once again about the key business goals that are directly related to the creation of roadmaps. By clearly understanding these, as well as the initiatives you intend to invest in, you can determine which features to add to your roadmap (thinking about what will have the biggest impact on your business). Here is a 4-step strategy that everyone will benefit from:

1. Definition of strategy

Usually global strategies are based on key goals. This overall vision of the goals determines your forecast for the entire product. A strong product vision is supported by details related to your customers and their needs.
It captures the essence of what you want to get. Make sure your team understands everything at this stage in order to develop their future masterpiece.

2. Release customization

This is where you select the features to highlight and decide whether internal or external data should be presented in each release or not. Dates of external and internal releases may be different.

3. Feature prioritization

Remember that customer requests should always be evaluated according to your strategy.
There are various metrics that help evaluate your strategy. It's easy to create your own scorecard for your kind of product, as each product is something unique. With your scorecard in place, you can objectively prioritize your roadmaps. Don't forget about general rules on prioritization and known prioritization methodologies.

4. Sharing the roadmap

Creating great products is impossible without communication, feedback and transparency of relationships. You can't do without them in your strategy.

As a conclusion

It seems that roadmaps are becoming an indispensable and effective tool for management purposes. They help manage the team's schedule, discussions, break down tasks into subtasks, complete work on time, measure performance, and achieve successful outcomes.

Well designed roadmap software is a powerful strategic tool in product management.

What is your experience with roadmaps? Share your ideas and success stories.