Now-Next-Later Roadmap
#second-brain
Build a Now, Next, Later Roadmap for You
It gives us a high level view of the steps we will take to reach our destination, but there are no release dates, just now, next and later, which can be defined as follows:
- Now: Items that have been validated and are currently being (or just about to be) worked on. These are things that we are confident are technically feasible, commercially viable and desirable because of the work we did in our discovery phase.
- Next: Items that are in or pending discovery. We might still discard them if we don’t become confident that they are feasible, viable and desirable.
- Later: Long term items, where the scope and priority is still undefined. They might never be selected or they might be selected for discovery soon. It will depend on what we learn and how our priorities change as the project progresses.
The above example is focused on features, which can work for some teams, however feature based roadmaps can often become feature wishlists. An alternative approach is to structure the roadmap around themes. This has the advantage of focusing on the problems we’re solving ensuring we focus on delivering value.