According to a survey conducted by the PMI (Project Management Institute), neglecting project management can lead to a 67% failure rate in Brazilian companies’ products.

These failures have serious consequences for the business, which lose important resources for the future, in addition to competitiveness against competitors. So, it is essential to bet on the tools, even the most basic, to succeed in competitive markets.

In this sense, the roadmap is one of the tools that generate the most value on a day-to-day basis. From there, it is possible to use business resources in an intelligent and responsible way. But you need to know how to use it correctly to extract its benefits.

So, if you want to know what it is and how to make a project roadmap in 7 simple and effective steps, keep reading this content until the end.

What is a project roadmap?

The roadmap is a visual and detailed plan of a project within a company. It serves as a strategic tool to show, in a macro way, how the tasks will progress in a time interval.

Although it is a macro view, it is possible to have some micro definitions in some stages of the roadmap. These definitions can even be changed as needed, as flexibility plays an important role in the success of the project.

So, now that you know what a project roadmap is, let’s get to know 7 simple and effective steps on how to do it:

1. Determine the project objective

The first step when making a project roadmap is to determine its objective, although not definitive. This step is important so that those involved in the project have a macro view of where they will need to go.

Even if it is an ongoing project, as is the case with many SaaS software, which never stops evolving, it is essential to map all deliverables on a timeline. Thus, it is possible to know the “checkpoints” that will be reached as the work progresses.

2. Validate the market need

New projects need to be validated by the market, even if you know you have a brief idea of ​​what your future customers want. Therefore, at this stage it is important to carry out many interviews, collect quantitative and qualitative data to make the work more assertive.

Even if you are experienced in the field, let the customer say what he wants from your solution.

It is also important to check what competitors are doing and how their customers perceive them. Creating a map of strengths and weaknesses will make it possible to understand the market scenario and, consequently, allow us to act on opportunities.

3. Choose features

Given the previous step, the third step in the guide on how to make a project roadmap is to create a list of possible features of the solution. With the strategic objective defined and the pains of the persona known, it will be easier to carry out this step.

Here, the tip is to work in a lean way, delivering a solid base of features to customers, as the objective is to open a path in the market. With a good audience response, you will be able to plan and move forward with further improvements.

4. Test the first prototype

The solution is taking shape, but it is still important to validate that everything that has been decided so far makes any sense. And at this point there’s not much of a secret: you have to “go outside” to validate your MVP.

The main purpose of MVP is to validate functionality and collect feedback. Although the previous steps have been well done, it is the response of using the product that will show if it really has potential and will be accepted by the public.

5. Define investments for the future

Now that we have advanced in our guide on how to make a project roadmap, we have a critical step that cannot be neglected: the definition of investments for the future of the product.

Even though it is complex to predict all the resources you will need, it is essential to have a base value to work with. This item can even include a “rate of change” of 15% or 20%, up or down, in the final values, but it is essential that the value is known.

Also remember that this step will be affected by the sales results. That is, if the product is successful and gains space in the market, it may be necessary to recalculate the initial investment plan to receive more budget and, thus, maximize results.

6. Establish a realistic delivery time

In our penultimate step on how to make a project roadmap, we have the definition of project delivery deadlines. If in the first step we defined the objectives in a timeline, here we want to know when each functionality should be delivered.

A crucial point of this step is to set realistic deadlines for each entry.