The document presents an approach to product roadmapping for small software product companies. It includes:
1) A product roadmap model that visually depicts releases, components, platforms, services, and resource requirements over time on different layers.
2) A four-step process for creating and updating roadmaps, including defining strategic vision, environmental scanning, revising visions as roadmaps, and estimating product lifecycles.
3) Experiences applying the model in three small software companies, focusing on planning releases, components, and balancing resources and development efforts.
Understanding Customer Voice of Project Portfolio Management SoftwarePeachy Essay
Abstract—Project Portfolio Management (PPM) has gained
success in many projects due to its large number of features that covers effective scheduling, risk management, collaboration, and third-party software integrations to mention a few. A broad range of PPM software is available; however, it is essential to select the PPM with minimum usage issues over time. While many companies use surveys and market research to get users feedback, the PPM product software reviews carry the voice of users; the positive and negative sentiments of the PPM software reviews. This paper collected 4,775 reviews of ten PPM software from Capttera.com. Our approach has these phases- text preprocessing, sentiment analysis, summarization, and categorizations. The software reviews are filtered and cleaned, then negative sentiments of user reviews are summarized into a set of factors that identify issues of adopted PPM software. We report the most important issues of PPM software which were related to missing technological features and lack of training.
Results using Latent Dirichlet Allocation (LDA) model showed
that the top ten common issues are related to software complexity and lack of required features.
Enterprise Agile release planning is complicated when multiple agile teams work together to deliver combined capabilities, and the scope for a release span across multiple business functions, processes, and systems. This paper presents agile release planning models for large global organizations delivering business capabilities using IT projects.
DevOps shifting software engineering strategy Value based perspectiveiosrjce
IOSR Journal of Computer Engineering (IOSR-JCE) is a double blind peer reviewed International Journal that provides rapid publication (within a month) of articles in all areas of computer engineering and its applications. The journal welcomes publications of high quality papers on theoretical developments and practical applications in computer technology. Original research papers, state-of-the-art reviews, and high quality technical notes are invited for publications.
Custom Software Development Cost, Process and Time (2).pdfJPLoft Solutions
The process of software development can often be complex and time-consuming. However, there are several ways to simplify the process and make it more efficient. Custom software development services offer unparalleled opportunities for bringing your ideas to life. With custom software development, you have the freedom to determine the appearance, functionality, and features of your software. You are in complete control of how your software looks and performs, ensuring that it aligns perfectly with your vision and meets your specific requirements.
Accelerate Innovation & Productivity With Rapid Prototyping & Development - ...Attivio
Today, development teams typically need hundreds of person hours to develop an application or to fully
integrate a new platform. Prototypes and Proofs of Concept (PoC) also take many weeks (or even months)
to develop. If you could significantly reduce these timeframes, you would accelerate time to market and
expedite PoCs and rollouts. This advantage saves money and reduces the risk of missing features, late deliveries or inadequate testing.
Understanding Customer Voice of Project Portfolio Management SoftwarePeachy Essay
Abstract—Project Portfolio Management (PPM) has gained
success in many projects due to its large number of features that covers effective scheduling, risk management, collaboration, and third-party software integrations to mention a few. A broad range of PPM software is available; however, it is essential to select the PPM with minimum usage issues over time. While many companies use surveys and market research to get users feedback, the PPM product software reviews carry the voice of users; the positive and negative sentiments of the PPM software reviews. This paper collected 4,775 reviews of ten PPM software from Capttera.com. Our approach has these phases- text preprocessing, sentiment analysis, summarization, and categorizations. The software reviews are filtered and cleaned, then negative sentiments of user reviews are summarized into a set of factors that identify issues of adopted PPM software. We report the most important issues of PPM software which were related to missing technological features and lack of training.
Results using Latent Dirichlet Allocation (LDA) model showed
that the top ten common issues are related to software complexity and lack of required features.
Enterprise Agile release planning is complicated when multiple agile teams work together to deliver combined capabilities, and the scope for a release span across multiple business functions, processes, and systems. This paper presents agile release planning models for large global organizations delivering business capabilities using IT projects.
DevOps shifting software engineering strategy Value based perspectiveiosrjce
IOSR Journal of Computer Engineering (IOSR-JCE) is a double blind peer reviewed International Journal that provides rapid publication (within a month) of articles in all areas of computer engineering and its applications. The journal welcomes publications of high quality papers on theoretical developments and practical applications in computer technology. Original research papers, state-of-the-art reviews, and high quality technical notes are invited for publications.
Custom Software Development Cost, Process and Time (2).pdfJPLoft Solutions
The process of software development can often be complex and time-consuming. However, there are several ways to simplify the process and make it more efficient. Custom software development services offer unparalleled opportunities for bringing your ideas to life. With custom software development, you have the freedom to determine the appearance, functionality, and features of your software. You are in complete control of how your software looks and performs, ensuring that it aligns perfectly with your vision and meets your specific requirements.
Accelerate Innovation & Productivity With Rapid Prototyping & Development - ...Attivio
Today, development teams typically need hundreds of person hours to develop an application or to fully
integrate a new platform. Prototypes and Proofs of Concept (PoC) also take many weeks (or even months)
to develop. If you could significantly reduce these timeframes, you would accelerate time to market and
expedite PoCs and rollouts. This advantage saves money and reduces the risk of missing features, late deliveries or inadequate testing.
Management model for exploratory investment in IT WGroup
The ability to evaluate these new technologies in a practical environment where their technological value and impact on business and IT operations can be assessed is extremely important. Exploratory efforts should be structured and controlled similarly to other major projects and in addition should be evaluated for use in the production environment. In addition to evaluating the technical capabilities and practical application of the new technology, IT must evaluate the “fit” of the new technology in the existing service portfolio or catalog. In this article, WGroup has developed a new class of IT investment, referred to as “Exploratory,” along with a supporting management model to guide the effort through the evaluation phases and ensure a tight fit within the service catalog.
The Top 5 Benefits of Engaging a Dedicated Development Team for Your Upcoming...Techtic Solutions
Maximize project success with a dedicated development team. Explore the top 5 benefits of their expertise. Elevate your upcoming project today with Techtic Solutions!
HP Project and Portfolio Management Center is an integral part of managing the complete application lifecycle.
Gain visibility and insight into all your application investments.
Custom Software Development Cost, Process and Time.pdfJPLoft Solutions
Custom software development services provide unparalleled opportunities to realize your ideas. You get to decide how your software looks and acts; what functions it should perform. Furthermore, custom apps offer unsurpassed data security as only you can access its code; additionally, you can incorporate business expansion plans into its architecture for easier expansion of functionality over time.
You need to submit the term project you had selected in Module 1. .docxjeffevans62972
You need to submit the term project you had selected in Module 1. The purpose of the project is to give you an opportunity to apply what you have learned in the course.
A project management plan is a document that is used to guide and control a project. It includes a project overview, structure, processes, requirements, risk, schedule, deliverables and budget.
Use the headings provided in textbook Chapter 4, Section Project Management Plan Contents (Pages 161-164) to create a project management plan for the term project you have chosen.
Include the Project Charter and Project Scope Statement in the Appendix.
Your work should be submitted in a Word document, 8-12 pages in length (including the appendices), typed in double-space, in 10- or 12-point Arial or Times New Roman font. The page margins on the top, bottom, left side, and right side should be 1 inch each. You should use the APA guidelines for writing and citations
Choose a topic from ‘http://behaviouralfinance.net/’.
A. Write a 6 to 8 page paper on the subject.
B. Construct a 10-minute presentation and present your topic to the class.
C. All assignments are due on the last day of the course.
Outline of a ‘research project’:
Section 1: Theory
In section 1 of your document, you should examine where, when, and by who your particular research topic was conceived and what it ‘looked’ like at that time. Your research should include the seminal work that laid the foundation for your topic.
Section 2: Present
In section 2 of your document, you should examine how the theoretical base of your topic has evolved over time. The objective here is to bring your topic to the present and engage in research related to recent articles published on this topic.
Section 3: Application
In section 3 of your document, you should find some way to apply this theoretical base to a business case / scenario. How does this topic affect us, influence us? How can we leverage our knowledge of this topic to make better business decisions? Is your topic ‘empirical’, can you construct an analysis to test it?
Running head: M7A1 - PROJECT MANAGEMENT PLAN
1
M7A1 - PROJECT MANAGEMENT PLAN
2
M7A1 - Project Management Plan
[Student Name]
IT 390
Professor Charles Snead
[Current Date]
Project Management Plan
Project Name: [name of project]
Project Description: [one paragraph description of the project]
Business Justification: [one paragraph describing the business need for the project]
Project Manager and Key Stakeholders
Name
Role
Position
Contact Information
Required Deliverables:
· [the deliverables, in bullet form]
Key Definitions and Acronyms
· [project-specific definitions of terms and acronyms, in bullet form]
Project Staffing:
· [staffing requirements for the team]
Organizational Charts
· [org chart of stakeholders and team members]
Project Responsibilities:
· [responsibilities of key stakeholders, in bullet form]
Management Objectives:
· [management objective.
17 Must-Do's to Create a Product-Centric IT OrganizationCognizant
Tightening IT-business alignment and embracing Agile, DevOps and Lean Startup principles, while transcending traditional project management disciplines by incorporating product engineering rigor, are critical to creating an effective, digitally enhanced business.
International Journal of Engineering Research and Development (IJERD)IJERD Editor
journal publishing, how to publish research paper, Call For research paper, international journal, publishing a paper, IJERD, journal of science and technology, how to get a research paper published, publishing a paper, publishing of journal, publishing of research paper, reserach and review articles, IJERD Journal, How to publish your research paper, publish research paper, open access engineering journal, Engineering journal, Mathemetics journal, Physics journal, Chemistry journal, Computer Engineering, Computer Science journal, how to submit your paper, peer reviw journal, indexed journal, reserach and review articles, engineering journal, www.ijerd.com, research journals,
yahoo journals, bing journals, International Journal of Engineering Research and Development, google journals, hard copy of journal
The development of software is planned in stages and steps that culminate in the construction of functional applications of software. As a start-up, you are a new bug in this competitive industry.
This presentation provides a high-level overview of BPM and where it is today.
It also touches on some of the core technologies and standards.
Its focus is on the four specific “Challenges” facing BPM and they are aligned to the four phases of the typical application development life cycle.
1. Discovery
2. Design
3. Development
4. Deployment
Nowadays the technological progress allows us to have highly flexible solutions, easily accessible with
lower levels of investment, which leads to many companies adopting SaaS (Software-as-a-Service) to
support their business processes. Associated with this movement and considering the advantages of SaaS, it
is important to understand whether work is being developed that is underutilized because companies are
not taking advantage of it, and in this case it is necessary to understand the reasons thereof. This
knowledge is important even for people who do not use or do not develop/provide SaaS, since sooner or
later it will be unavoidable due to current trends. In the near future, nearly all decision-makers of IT
strategies will be forced to consider adopting SaaS as an IT solution for the convenience benefits
associated with technology or market competition. At that time they will have to know how to evaluate
impacts and decide. What are the real needs in the Portuguese market? What fears and what is being done
to mitigate them? What are the implications of the adoption of SaaS? Where should we focus attention on
SaaS offerings in order to create greater value? These are questions we must answer to actually be able to
assess and decide. Often, decision-makers of business strategies consider only the attractive incentives of
using SaaS ignoring the impacts associated with new technologies. The need for tools and processes to
assess these impacts before adopting a SaaS solution is crucial to ensure the sustainability of the
information system, reduce uncertainty and facilitate decision making. This article presents a framework
for evaluating impacts of SaaS called SIE (SaaS Impact Evaluation) which in addition to guidance for the
present research, aims to provide guidelines for the collection, data analysis, impact assessment and
decision making about including SaaS on the organizations strategic plans.
Cosmetic shop management system project report.pdfKamal Acharya
Buying new cosmetic products is difficult. It can even be scary for those who have sensitive skin and are prone to skin trouble. The information needed to alleviate this problem is on the back of each product, but it's thought to interpret those ingredient lists unless you have a background in chemistry.
Instead of buying and hoping for the best, we can use data science to help us predict which products may be good fits for us. It includes various function programs to do the above mentioned tasks.
Data file handling has been effectively used in the program.
The automated cosmetic shop management system should deal with the automation of general workflow and administration process of the shop. The main processes of the system focus on customer's request where the system is able to search the most appropriate products and deliver it to the customers. It should help the employees to quickly identify the list of cosmetic product that have reached the minimum quantity and also keep a track of expired date for each cosmetic product. It should help the employees to find the rack number in which the product is placed.It is also Faster and more efficient way.
Management model for exploratory investment in IT WGroup
The ability to evaluate these new technologies in a practical environment where their technological value and impact on business and IT operations can be assessed is extremely important. Exploratory efforts should be structured and controlled similarly to other major projects and in addition should be evaluated for use in the production environment. In addition to evaluating the technical capabilities and practical application of the new technology, IT must evaluate the “fit” of the new technology in the existing service portfolio or catalog. In this article, WGroup has developed a new class of IT investment, referred to as “Exploratory,” along with a supporting management model to guide the effort through the evaluation phases and ensure a tight fit within the service catalog.
The Top 5 Benefits of Engaging a Dedicated Development Team for Your Upcoming...Techtic Solutions
Maximize project success with a dedicated development team. Explore the top 5 benefits of their expertise. Elevate your upcoming project today with Techtic Solutions!
HP Project and Portfolio Management Center is an integral part of managing the complete application lifecycle.
Gain visibility and insight into all your application investments.
Custom Software Development Cost, Process and Time.pdfJPLoft Solutions
Custom software development services provide unparalleled opportunities to realize your ideas. You get to decide how your software looks and acts; what functions it should perform. Furthermore, custom apps offer unsurpassed data security as only you can access its code; additionally, you can incorporate business expansion plans into its architecture for easier expansion of functionality over time.
You need to submit the term project you had selected in Module 1. .docxjeffevans62972
You need to submit the term project you had selected in Module 1. The purpose of the project is to give you an opportunity to apply what you have learned in the course.
A project management plan is a document that is used to guide and control a project. It includes a project overview, structure, processes, requirements, risk, schedule, deliverables and budget.
Use the headings provided in textbook Chapter 4, Section Project Management Plan Contents (Pages 161-164) to create a project management plan for the term project you have chosen.
Include the Project Charter and Project Scope Statement in the Appendix.
Your work should be submitted in a Word document, 8-12 pages in length (including the appendices), typed in double-space, in 10- or 12-point Arial or Times New Roman font. The page margins on the top, bottom, left side, and right side should be 1 inch each. You should use the APA guidelines for writing and citations
Choose a topic from ‘http://behaviouralfinance.net/’.
A. Write a 6 to 8 page paper on the subject.
B. Construct a 10-minute presentation and present your topic to the class.
C. All assignments are due on the last day of the course.
Outline of a ‘research project’:
Section 1: Theory
In section 1 of your document, you should examine where, when, and by who your particular research topic was conceived and what it ‘looked’ like at that time. Your research should include the seminal work that laid the foundation for your topic.
Section 2: Present
In section 2 of your document, you should examine how the theoretical base of your topic has evolved over time. The objective here is to bring your topic to the present and engage in research related to recent articles published on this topic.
Section 3: Application
In section 3 of your document, you should find some way to apply this theoretical base to a business case / scenario. How does this topic affect us, influence us? How can we leverage our knowledge of this topic to make better business decisions? Is your topic ‘empirical’, can you construct an analysis to test it?
Running head: M7A1 - PROJECT MANAGEMENT PLAN
1
M7A1 - PROJECT MANAGEMENT PLAN
2
M7A1 - Project Management Plan
[Student Name]
IT 390
Professor Charles Snead
[Current Date]
Project Management Plan
Project Name: [name of project]
Project Description: [one paragraph description of the project]
Business Justification: [one paragraph describing the business need for the project]
Project Manager and Key Stakeholders
Name
Role
Position
Contact Information
Required Deliverables:
· [the deliverables, in bullet form]
Key Definitions and Acronyms
· [project-specific definitions of terms and acronyms, in bullet form]
Project Staffing:
· [staffing requirements for the team]
Organizational Charts
· [org chart of stakeholders and team members]
Project Responsibilities:
· [responsibilities of key stakeholders, in bullet form]
Management Objectives:
· [management objective.
17 Must-Do's to Create a Product-Centric IT OrganizationCognizant
Tightening IT-business alignment and embracing Agile, DevOps and Lean Startup principles, while transcending traditional project management disciplines by incorporating product engineering rigor, are critical to creating an effective, digitally enhanced business.
International Journal of Engineering Research and Development (IJERD)IJERD Editor
journal publishing, how to publish research paper, Call For research paper, international journal, publishing a paper, IJERD, journal of science and technology, how to get a research paper published, publishing a paper, publishing of journal, publishing of research paper, reserach and review articles, IJERD Journal, How to publish your research paper, publish research paper, open access engineering journal, Engineering journal, Mathemetics journal, Physics journal, Chemistry journal, Computer Engineering, Computer Science journal, how to submit your paper, peer reviw journal, indexed journal, reserach and review articles, engineering journal, www.ijerd.com, research journals,
yahoo journals, bing journals, International Journal of Engineering Research and Development, google journals, hard copy of journal
The development of software is planned in stages and steps that culminate in the construction of functional applications of software. As a start-up, you are a new bug in this competitive industry.
This presentation provides a high-level overview of BPM and where it is today.
It also touches on some of the core technologies and standards.
Its focus is on the four specific “Challenges” facing BPM and they are aligned to the four phases of the typical application development life cycle.
1. Discovery
2. Design
3. Development
4. Deployment
Nowadays the technological progress allows us to have highly flexible solutions, easily accessible with
lower levels of investment, which leads to many companies adopting SaaS (Software-as-a-Service) to
support their business processes. Associated with this movement and considering the advantages of SaaS, it
is important to understand whether work is being developed that is underutilized because companies are
not taking advantage of it, and in this case it is necessary to understand the reasons thereof. This
knowledge is important even for people who do not use or do not develop/provide SaaS, since sooner or
later it will be unavoidable due to current trends. In the near future, nearly all decision-makers of IT
strategies will be forced to consider adopting SaaS as an IT solution for the convenience benefits
associated with technology or market competition. At that time they will have to know how to evaluate
impacts and decide. What are the real needs in the Portuguese market? What fears and what is being done
to mitigate them? What are the implications of the adoption of SaaS? Where should we focus attention on
SaaS offerings in order to create greater value? These are questions we must answer to actually be able to
assess and decide. Often, decision-makers of business strategies consider only the attractive incentives of
using SaaS ignoring the impacts associated with new technologies. The need for tools and processes to
assess these impacts before adopting a SaaS solution is crucial to ensure the sustainability of the
information system, reduce uncertainty and facilitate decision making. This article presents a framework
for evaluating impacts of SaaS called SIE (SaaS Impact Evaluation) which in addition to guidance for the
present research, aims to provide guidelines for the collection, data analysis, impact assessment and
decision making about including SaaS on the organizations strategic plans.
Cosmetic shop management system project report.pdfKamal Acharya
Buying new cosmetic products is difficult. It can even be scary for those who have sensitive skin and are prone to skin trouble. The information needed to alleviate this problem is on the back of each product, but it's thought to interpret those ingredient lists unless you have a background in chemistry.
Instead of buying and hoping for the best, we can use data science to help us predict which products may be good fits for us. It includes various function programs to do the above mentioned tasks.
Data file handling has been effectively used in the program.
The automated cosmetic shop management system should deal with the automation of general workflow and administration process of the shop. The main processes of the system focus on customer's request where the system is able to search the most appropriate products and deliver it to the customers. It should help the employees to quickly identify the list of cosmetic product that have reached the minimum quantity and also keep a track of expired date for each cosmetic product. It should help the employees to find the rack number in which the product is placed.It is also Faster and more efficient way.
Similar to An Approach To Product Roadmapping In Small Software Product Businesses (20)
The Roman Empire A Historical Colossus.pdfkaushalkr1407
The Roman Empire, a vast and enduring power, stands as one of history's most remarkable civilizations, leaving an indelible imprint on the world. It emerged from the Roman Republic, transitioning into an imperial powerhouse under the leadership of Augustus Caesar in 27 BCE. This transformation marked the beginning of an era defined by unprecedented territorial expansion, architectural marvels, and profound cultural influence.
The empire's roots lie in the city of Rome, founded, according to legend, by Romulus in 753 BCE. Over centuries, Rome evolved from a small settlement to a formidable republic, characterized by a complex political system with elected officials and checks on power. However, internal strife, class conflicts, and military ambitions paved the way for the end of the Republic. Julius Caesar’s dictatorship and subsequent assassination in 44 BCE created a power vacuum, leading to a civil war. Octavian, later Augustus, emerged victorious, heralding the Roman Empire’s birth.
Under Augustus, the empire experienced the Pax Romana, a 200-year period of relative peace and stability. Augustus reformed the military, established efficient administrative systems, and initiated grand construction projects. The empire's borders expanded, encompassing territories from Britain to Egypt and from Spain to the Euphrates. Roman legions, renowned for their discipline and engineering prowess, secured and maintained these vast territories, building roads, fortifications, and cities that facilitated control and integration.
The Roman Empire’s society was hierarchical, with a rigid class system. At the top were the patricians, wealthy elites who held significant political power. Below them were the plebeians, free citizens with limited political influence, and the vast numbers of slaves who formed the backbone of the economy. The family unit was central, governed by the paterfamilias, the male head who held absolute authority.
Culturally, the Romans were eclectic, absorbing and adapting elements from the civilizations they encountered, particularly the Greeks. Roman art, literature, and philosophy reflected this synthesis, creating a rich cultural tapestry. Latin, the Roman language, became the lingua franca of the Western world, influencing numerous modern languages.
Roman architecture and engineering achievements were monumental. They perfected the arch, vault, and dome, constructing enduring structures like the Colosseum, Pantheon, and aqueducts. These engineering marvels not only showcased Roman ingenuity but also served practical purposes, from public entertainment to water supply.
Unit 8 - Information and Communication Technology (Paper I).pdfThiyagu K
This slides describes the basic concepts of ICT, basics of Email, Emerging Technology and Digital Initiatives in Education. This presentations aligns with the UGC Paper I syllabus.
This is a presentation by Dada Robert in a Your Skill Boost masterclass organised by the Excellence Foundation for South Sudan (EFSS) on Saturday, the 25th and Sunday, the 26th of May 2024.
He discussed the concept of quality improvement, emphasizing its applicability to various aspects of life, including personal, project, and program improvements. He defined quality as doing the right thing at the right time in the right way to achieve the best possible results and discussed the concept of the "gap" between what we know and what we do, and how this gap represents the areas we need to improve. He explained the scientific approach to quality improvement, which involves systematic performance analysis, testing and learning, and implementing change ideas. He also highlighted the importance of client focus and a team approach to quality improvement.
Read| The latest issue of The Challenger is here! We are thrilled to announce that our school paper has qualified for the NATIONAL SCHOOLS PRESS CONFERENCE (NSPC) 2024. Thank you for your unwavering support and trust. Dive into the stories that made us stand out!
Students, digital devices and success - Andreas Schleicher - 27 May 2024..pptxEduSkills OECD
Andreas Schleicher presents at the OECD webinar ‘Digital devices in schools: detrimental distraction or secret to success?’ on 27 May 2024. The presentation was based on findings from PISA 2022 results and the webinar helped launch the PISA in Focus ‘Managing screen time: How to protect and equip students against distraction’ https://www.oecd-ilibrary.org/education/managing-screen-time_7c225af4-en and the OECD Education Policy Perspective ‘Students, digital devices and success’ can be found here - https://oe.cd/il/5yV
Operation “Blue Star” is the only event in the history of Independent India where the state went into war with its own people. Even after about 40 years it is not clear if it was culmination of states anger over people of the region, a political game of power or start of dictatorial chapter in the democratic setup.
The people of Punjab felt alienated from main stream due to denial of their just demands during a long democratic struggle since independence. As it happen all over the word, it led to militant struggle with great loss of lives of military, police and civilian personnel. Killing of Indira Gandhi and massacre of innocent Sikhs in Delhi and other India cities was also associated with this movement.
An Approach To Product Roadmapping In Small Software Product Businesses
1. An Approach to Product Roadmapping in Small
Software Product Businesses
Jarno Vähäniitty, Casper Lassenius and Kristian Rautiainen
Helsinki University of Technology, Software Business and Engineering Institute,
POB 9600, FIN-02015 HUT, Finland
{jvahanii, cls, kqr}@soberit.hut.fi
http://www.soberit.hut.fi/sems/english/index.html
Abstract. Success in software product business requires the release of new
products and product upgrades with the right amount of features and quality
within an open market window. For this, a systematic approach for managing
the contents, timing and roles of future product releases as well as the product
architecture is needed. In practice, such an approach is often missing, espe-
cially in small companies, due to inexperience, unclear priorities, time-to-
market pressures, or the lack of suitable process infrastructure. In this paper,
we present an approach based on product roadmapping that can aid such com-
panies in their product planning. We also discuss initial experiences from us-
ing the approach in three small software companies. The product roadmap ex-
presses the release and development schedules, composition of individual re-
leases, changes to the underlying technology, services requiring attention from
product development and the planned resource usage.
1 Introduction
In addition to the capability to invent new solutions and realise them as software,
success in the software product business requires delivering the right kind of prod-
ucts to the market at the right time. Managing contents, timing and roles for future
product releases based on the market information available is a prerequisite for
timely delivery of good-enough quality [16]. Contents refer to linking product fea-
tures to business requirements and market opportunities, and deciding which features
to include in which release. Timing is about identifying and exploiting a window of
opportunity, making necessary trade-offs between functionality, quality and time-to-
market based on assessing the product against its competitors and market needs.
Roles refer to the releases’type (major, minor, patch etc.), intended business impli-
cations for the company and the planned audience for the release. Successful ap-
proaches to software product development, for example those described in [6] and
[7], often involve evolving both the individual products and the technologies they are
based on at the same time. Thus, planning the product architecture together with
future releases is crucial for success.
2. Especially small1
companies in the product business risk extensive rework and
market failure due to shortcomings in product and release planning. A systematic
approach is often missing because of inexperience, time-to-market pressures [2], or
the lack of process infrastructure such as requirements management [11]. In our
experience from working with several small software product companies, key per-
sonnel often have truly cross-functional roles, ranging from architecting to installing
the system, systems integration, consulting and sales. Combined with unclear priori-
ties caused by lack of long-range planning, overbooking of resources is common
while some important activities do not receive enough attention. Also, survival pres-
sures make “hacking” the product to satisfy the needs of initial customers a tempting
idea, usually to the detriment of the product architecture [5]. A solution, release
management, has been discussed from various perspectives, such as those of the
development process [1], architecture and reuse [2], [15] and product requirements
[3], [4]. There is little context-specific guidance available for connecting feature and
release cycle planning to business planning for small software product companies.
These, however, are in our experience often the most pressing issue for small com-
panies. Also, they also face the challenge of coherently expressing and communicat-
ing such plans both internally and to various stakeholders such as venture capitalists
and potential customers.
In this paper we present an approach to planning and communicating release
contents, timing and roles together with product architecture for small software
product businesses. We also present our experiences from applying the model in
three such companies. First, we discuss the role of roadmapping in managing prod-
uct releases. Second, we present an approach consisting of a product roadmap and a
process outline for creating and maintaining such maps. Third, we present our ex-
periences from the approach from three case companies. Finally, we round up with
discussion and implications for further work.
2 Product Roadmapping in Software Product Business
Roadmapping is a popular metaphor for planning and portraying the use of scientific
and technological resources, elements and their structural relationships over a period
of time. The process of roadmapping identifies, evaluates and selects strategic alter-
natives that can be used to achieve desired objectives [12], and the resulting road-
maps summarise and communicate the results of key business decisions [8]. Product
roadmapping is a ”disciplined, focused, multiyear approach to product planning”,
with the roadmap’
s implementability viewed as important as its strategic value [12].
Software products typically evolve in releases, with each release including new
and improved functionality intended for keeping the vendor ahead of the competitors
[16]. Planning the contents and roles for future releases in product roadmapping
consists of defining business requirements, prioritising them and then responding
with features. Wiegers uses the notion of business requirements to represent the
needs customers have for the product [20]. Bosch defines software requirements as
1
By small companies we mean those having less than 50 developers
3. consisting of functional requirements and quality attributes, with the term feature
referring to a group of related software requirements [2]. Thus, business require-
ments are addressed in the product as features, with many-to-many –relationships
possible. As a release gets closer, its content is elaborated from the level of business
requirements and features to functional requirements and quality attributes. When
product roadmapping is used in time-to-market -driven development, moving fea-
tures and their parts between releases should be based on the relative importance of
the business requirements in question. It must be noted here that in practice it is not
possible to specify a system using features only because they depend on each other in
complex ways [3], [4].
In software product business, the software itself is not the only component – it is
often combined with services. Moore’
s concept of whole product [13] implies that
the delivery of the core benefit the customer is buying can be enhanced by either
modifying the way it is packaged, or by complementing it with services. For the
product vendor, however, incorporating and managing services can be challenging.
Nambisan has identified three significant issues product vendors face when introduc-
ing services to their portfolios: the trade-off between process flexibility and newly
required efficiency at the customer interface, changes in the nature of customer rela-
tionships, and the observation that synergies between the product and the services do
not realise automatically [14]. Hoch et. al provide an example in [10] where prob-
lems in balancing development resources between product development and provid-
ing services caused serious delays in product development schedules, contributing to
the downfall of the company.
Restricting product and release planning to product features only limits the view
on what has to be achieved in order to put together a compelling offer. For small
companies in the product business, failure to recognise the resource implications of
new services is likely to lead to a crisis. We therefore think that product roadmap-
ping must cover the whole product, not only the software component of it. Seen this
way, whole product roadmapping is essentially about defining and managing the
competitive advantage of the company through positioning in the customer value
hierarchy.
3 A Model for Product Roadmapping
Our approach to practicing product roadmapping in small software businesses con-
sists of a model for visualising product roadmaps, and a process outline for creating
and updating such roadmaps based on the strategic mission and vision of the com-
pany. The roadmap visualisation communicates the plans intuitively, as well as en-
forces a degree of accuracy through the use of formal notation. The aim of the proc-
ess is to define and concretise the company’
s plans for technology and product de-
velopment. Using the process should result in an understanding of the current and
future situation and an overview of the objectives and needs for new product releases
and directions for extending and further developing the technological basis.
4. 3.1 Product Roadmap Visualisation
The product roadmap visualisation, shown in Fig. 1 expresses the release and devel-
opment schedules for the product(s), the composition of individual releases, changes
to the underlying technology, services requiring attention from product development
and planned resource usage. The roadmap consists of five layers, with the four top-
most depicting the development of various parts of the whole product as activities,
and the bottom layer showing the estimate of human resources required at a given
moment.
Q1 Q2 Q3 Q4 Q1 Q2 Q3 Q4 Q1 Q2 Q3 Q4
Services
Basic training UI, Sales (Sales takes over here)
Releases
GUI-Tool
3.0 UI, Core
4.0 UI, Core
5.0 UI, Core
Product components
UI, Core
Patches
WebUI Dev kit UI UI
WAP UI Dev kit UI
Mobile (G3) UI Dev kit UI
PDA UI Dev kit UI
DigiTV UI Dev kit
Documentation UI, Writ.
Training material Writ., Core
Platforms
GUI-Tool engine
Generation 1 Core
Generation 2 Core
Resource requirements
8
7 UI UI
6 UI UI
5
4
3 UI UI UI UI, Writ. UI, Writ UI UI
2 UI, Writ. UI, Core UI, Core Core Sales, CoreSales, CoreSales, Core
1 Core Core Writ, Core Core Core Core Core Core Core Core Core
2001 2002 2003
3.8.2001 21.1.2002 3/2002
Fig. 1. A product roadmap.
Activities and their planned schedules and effort estimates are presented as
horizontal bars in the product roadmap. Possible activity types are performing
services, preparing releases and developing product components and platforms. A
product platform in this context is a core software asset on top of which the product
is built and expanded on, and may be generic enough to be used in other products as
well. The definition is in line with the one given by Clements and Northrop in [5]
and was also thought of as most descriptive by the case companies even though they
do not practice a product-line approach in the strict sense.
Product components are business requirements translated as software, meaning
relatively independent (groups of) features. The related business requirements, as
well as more detailed information on the functionality should be kept in the require-
5. ments management system. Documentation, whether internal or intended for the
end-user, is depicted as product components when necessary. This is a logical choice,
since associated documentation is usually defined ‘
software’as well [18].
Preparing a product release consists of integrating the related product compo-
nents and platform(s), doing system testing and error correction, as well as perform-
ing other product release activities. In the notation there are three kinds of possible
releases: major releases, minor releases and patches. The first diamond in a new
release activity denotes a major release, and subsequent diamonds and circles mark
minor and patch releases, respectively. Only releases on the release layer are visible
to customers.
The services a company offers are classified and dealt with based on the kind of
attention they need from product development. The classification consists of product
accessories, customer-specific development services and other services. Product
accessories are a one-time effort requiring product development resources to fulfil a
need common to many customers. Typically, they are initially developed for a spe-
cific customer, but are to be included as part of the standard offering. Product acces-
sories are expressed in the product roadmap as regular product components inte-
grated into a future release of the product. Customer-specific development services
require resources from product development, but their outcome is limited to the cus-
tomer receiving the service. They are depicted on the service layer. Other services
refer to services that at the moment do not appear to require attention from product
development. We currently think that it is not necessary to include these kinds of
services into the product roadmap.
The thicker an activity is in the visualisation, the more resources are allocated for
the period indicated. In our case companies, different people or teams work on the
platform and product components. To help in balancing resources, textual notation is
used inside the activities to denote the allocated resource type(s). Resource informa-
tion is also summed to the bottom layer of the visualisation.
Arrows going from one activity to another denote composition and timing for in-
tegrating the activities’ outputs and may, depending on the context, imply reuse.
Thus, the product roadmap visualisation contains information of the product archi-
tecture over time, specifically, the relationships between product releases, compo-
nents and platforms, and how and when they are composed of each other. As no
exhaustive rules exist for discriminating between ‘
plain’technologies, product plat-
forms and product components for roadmapping purposes, a reasonable conceptual
structure must be resolved case-by-case.
The example roadmap of Fig. 1 shows the plans regarding a toolkit for rapid crea-
tion of web-based user interfaces. The only service currently identified to require
product development attention is the one-day basic training per license sold, pro-
vided starting from the major release 5.0 in 8/2002. Preparing materials for the
training is depicted as a product component. The other product components are add-
in modules for various terminal devices, and end-user documentation to be shipped
with the product starting from a minor release in 8/2001. On the platform layer, the
roadmap shows two generations of the toolkit ‘
engine’
, with the second generation to
be used starting from 5.0.
6. 3.2 A Process Outline for Product Roadmapping
We used a four-step process for creating and updating product roadmaps. The proc-
ess can also be thought as a checklist for what practitioners should take into consid-
eration when conducting long-term release planning. The steps in the process should
be performed periodically to adjust the roadmap to new information and changing
market situations, and smaller updates should be done to ensure the roadmaps always
hold current information. Tabrizi and Walleigh present an example in [19] in which
senior management of a technology-intensive company updates the company’
s prod-
uct roadmaps bimonthly, and redraws them completely every six months. Our proc-
ess is summarised in Table 1.
Table 1. Steps in creating and updating product roadmaps
Step Objective
Define strategic mission and vision.
Outline product vision.
Clarify and communicate what business the company
is in
Scan the environment Choose position and focus, assess the realism of the
product vision and examine what technologies should
be used
Revise and distil the product vision as
product roadmaps.
Establish release cycle, objectives for releases and
allocate resources. Record decision rationale with
business requirements
Estimate product life cycle and evaluate
the mix of development efforts planned
Check sanity. Assess whether the planned develop-
ment is parallel to the product vision
The first step is to define (or revise) and analyse the strategic mission and vision
of the company. All companies, no matter how small, should have an idea of their
purpose and desired future clear enough to be written down before they plan their
operations in more detail. Often some kind of product vision exists even if the com-
pany’
s mission and vision are not explicitly defined. Mission and vision should act
as the guideline for shaping the product vision and choosing between strategic alter-
natives.
The second step is to identify major trends in the general environment. This en-
compasses looking at potential customers, competitors, the industry and develop-
ments in relevant technology. Many well-known models and techniques, such as
Porter’
s five forces, strategic group analysis and competitor profiling [9] can be used
to steer the management’
s attention. This should result in an understanding of the
desired focus and position for the company and its products as well as guide in tech-
nology selection.
The third step is to revise the product vision(s) based on the analysis conducted,
and distil these as product roadmaps taking internal factors of the company such as
human and financial resources, competencies and infrastructure into account. Con-
struction of the product roadmaps should start from defining the major and minor
release cycles and continue with defining the business requirements and expectations
for the upcoming releases. By including business requirements and their objectives
explicitly into the requirements repository and keeping track of their history, the
rationale behind roadmap evolution becomes visible.
7. The final step is to state expectations regarding the life cycles and financial impli-
cations of product releases, components and platforms, and consider the mix of
planned development activities from the business objectives’perspective [17]. This
acts as a financial sanity check and evaluates whether the planned development is
parallel to product and company vision.
4 Experiences from Applying the Model
We have developed and applied our model in co-operation with three small software
companies, which we call ToolCo, TeamCo and MobAppsCo. ToolCo specialises in
the development of applications and software development tools for Internet-, intra-
net- and extranet environments. TeamCo offers mobile operators, service providers
and enterprises solutions that facilitate group interaction. MobAppsCo provides
mobile business solutions and professional services for mobile operators and enter-
prises. At the start of this study in 6/2001, ToolCo had 14 employees, and both
TeamCo and MobAppsCo were standing at roughly 40. Some common denominators
for the three companies are the sizes of their product development organisations,
product-orientation in their current (or desired) business models, and relative inexpe-
rience in planning new product development. Below we summarise the experiences
and lessons learned from the cases.
4.1 Conducting Roadmapping at ToolCo
When we started working with ToolCo in the spring of 2001, the company had envi-
sioned a product concept based on its software toolkit for rapid creation of browser-
enabled user interfaces and managing the presentation of information to users. Put-
ting together a toolkit to help in performing the project work, the main source of
revenue at the time, had been a conscious effort since 1997, but its commercialisa-
tion stems from late 1999.
Roadmapping for the product was conducted in 4-7/2001. The work was mainly
carried out by the CEO, and required about one man-month of effort. The most im-
portant results of creating the initial roadmap were a clearer understanding of what
had to be achieved in order to launch the product, and realising the schedule and
timing implications of sales, marketing and other aspects not directly related to de-
velopment. This involved planning the release cycle, the schedules for the major
releases and their contents, and considering what whole-product issues needed to be
taken into account along the way. ToolCo got a more complete view on what they
had at the moment, what was missing, and what would be a realistic schedule for
launching and subsequently improving on the product. Especially schedules were
revised during the process. The CEO was positive he would use a similar approach
in the future for product and release planning.
Concerning the roadmapping process, estimating the life cycles and financial im-
plications of products, components and platforms was seen both important and chal-
lenging. Also, identifying and analysing the competition was found difficult. How-
8. ever, the moral of the exercise is in forcing the management to think ahead and
coercing them to state their current expectations, rather than in obtaining accurate
forecasts of future cash flow or competitors’strengths, weaknesses and plans.
The visualisation was found extremely helpful because it showed the development
of the product, its parts and the resource allocation over time in one picture. These
issues had previously been found difficult to express and communicate. The pilots’
feedback on the visualisation resulted in several changes, with the most important
ones being the introduction of the service layer, including explicit resource types,
and simplifying the notation for minor releases and release composition.
4.2 Discussing the Approach at TeamCo and MobAppsCo
At TeamCo, we used our notation and process to discuss product roadmapping as
applied to the company’
s products, but did not carry out the roadmapping process in
co-operation with company management. At the start of the study in 6/2001,
TeamCo had just released a major version of their product, GroupMaster, and the
exact schedule, content or role of the next release had not yet been planned. Based on
the discussions with TeamCo’
s managers, we prepared an example roadmap to dem-
onstrate the use of the model with TeamCo’
s own plans. However, neither these, nor
any other plans regarding future releases expressed at that point were followed. This
was partly due to the fact that key development resources were caught up servicing
the current customers, for example installing the system, doing systems integration,
customer-specific tailoring, consulting and training.
The most interesting finding of the TeamCo case was the need for product concep-
tualisation before the roadmap visualisation could be used. This means finding a
common language to refer to the components of the software and their relationship to
the envisioned product. This had taken place at ToolCo when the initial version of
our model was being developed. The two cases suggest that a common conceptual
view of the product required for product and release planning may be lacking even
when the organisation is small.
At MobAppsCo, our study was intentionally limited to discussing our model and
the company’
s practices in the area of release and product planning. MobAppsCo
usually launches product development projects based on the needs of some pilot
customer, and the end result is integrated back to the product. The platform is altered
according to the functional and non-functional requirements encountered in these
projects. As long as the correct focus in selecting the projects can be maintained, this
practice is a good example of utilising synergies between the product and services, in
this case, to share risk. However, this is not possible when developing a completely
new kind of solution because customer feedback is not available from the start.
During the summer of 2000, MobAppsCo’
s management practiced roadmapping
by writing a document that described as closely as possible the platform, the set of
applications and their features as a function of time. However, the approach felt too
cumbersome, and the document was not kept up-to-date. Since then, the practice has
been scaled down to having one or two bulleted pages with basically the same infor-
mation but with less detail and a shorter time range. While our approach does not yet
9. provide any specifics beyond the roadmap visualisation for the format of an actual
roadmap document, such issues have to be considered in the future.
We believe our approach could be used at MobAppsCo to co-ordinate the more
traditional R&D-type work with prioritising, selecting and planning customer-
initiated development projects. We think that depicting ongoing and planned activi-
ties with a product roadmap communicates especially the schedule and resource
implications better.
4.3 Summary
The most important lesson learned from the three cases was that product roadmap-
ping can play an important role in bridging the gap between management, marketing
and product development by forcing management to consider both product position-
ing and development aspects at the same time. We also learned that it is important to
account for services in the product roadmap, and that a common conceptual view of
the product may be lacking even when the development organisation is small. Fur-
thermore, the roadmap helps in making resource allocation trade-offs between prod-
uct and service development. Because a sense of urgency is always present when
dealing with small companies, an incremental and systematic process for roadmap-
ping seems necessary.
5 Conclusion and Directions for Further Work
In this paper we have presented an approach to whole product roadmapping for
small software product companies, and discussed experiences from three cases. We
propose that by providing a long-term view into release management, product road-
mapping can help bring together the perspectives of business management and soft-
ware development. The product roadmap expresses the release and development
schedules for the product, composition of individual releases, changes to the underly-
ing technology, services requiring attention from product development and planned
resource usage, while project management tracks how successfully the roadmap is
being acted on. By addressing these elements, product roadmapping concretises and
communicates the plans so that they can be acted on – or refuted – when necessary.
We believe tracking service development and actual servicing jointly with product
and release planning helps exploit potential synergies between the product and the
services offered.
Currently, we are interested in getting more empirical experience from using our
approach. Specifically, we want to assess the cost and potential payoff of doing prod-
uct roadmapping, in terms of the amount of effort spent versus the kinds of insights
and results gained from the exercise. Toward this end, we are outlining a repeatable
launch and an incremental rollout plan for establishing product roadmapping in
small companies and identifying prerequisites (such as product conceptualisation) for
practicing product roadmapping. Also, the roadmapping process is to be further
10. tailored to the small business context through identifying and characterising essen-
tial product development decisions in such companies.
References
1. Bays, M., E.: Software Release Methodology. Prentice-Hall (1999)
2. Bosch, J.: Design and Use of Software Architectures: Adopting and Evolving a Product-
Line Approach. Addison-Wesley (2000)
3. Carlshamre, P., Sandahl, K., Lindvall, M., Regnell, B., Natt och Dag, J.: An Industrial
Study of Requirements Interdependencies in Software Product Release Planning. Proc.
5th IEEE Int’
l. Symp. on Requirements Engineering (RE'01) 84–91
4. Carlshamre, P., Regnell, B.: Requirements Lifecycle Management and Release Planning
in Market-Driven Requirements Engineering Processes. Proc. 11th Int’
l. Conference on
Database and Expert Systems Applications (DEXA 2000) 961–965
5. Clements, P., Northrop, L.: Software Product Lines: Practices and Patterns, Addison-
Wesley (2001)
6. Cusumano, M., Selby, R.: Microsoft Secrets: How the World’
s Most Powerful Software
Company Creates Technology, Shapes Markets and Manages People. The Free Press
(1995)
7. Cusumano, M., Yoffie, D.: Competing on Internet Time: Lessons from Netscape and its
Battle with Microsoft. The Free Press (1998)
8. DeGregorio, G.: Technology management via a Set of Dynamically Linked Roadmaps.
Motorola, Inc., Motorola Labs Software and System Engineering Research Laboratory
(2000)
9. Hitt, M., Ireland, D., Hoskisson, R.: Strategic Management: Competitiveness and Global-
ization: Concepts, 2nd edition. West Publishing Company (1997)
10. Hoch, D., Roeding, C., Purkert, G., Lindner, S., Müller, R.: Secrets of Software Success:
Management Insights from 100 Software Firms Around the World. McKinsey & Co.
(2000)
11. Kamsties, E., Hörmann, K., Schilch, M.: Requirements Engineering in Small and Me-
dium Enterprises. Requirements Engineering, Vol. 3, No. 2. Springer-Verlag (1998) 85–
86
12. Kostoff, R. N., Schaller, R. R.: Science and Technology Roadmaps, IEEE Transactions on
Engineering Management, Vol. 48 No. 2. IEEE (2001) 132–143
13. Moore, G.: Crossing the Chasm: Marketing and Selling High-Tech Products to Main-
stream Customers. HarperCollins Publishers (1991)
14. Nambisan, S.: Why Service Businesses are not Product Businesses. MIT Sloan Manage-
ment Review, Summer 2001. Massachusetts Institute of Technology (2001) 72–80
15. van Ommering, R.: Roadmapping a Product Population Architecture. Proc. 4th
Int’
l.
Workshop on Product Family Engineering. European Software Institute (2001)
16. Rautiainen, K., Lassenius, C., Vähäniitty, J., Vanhanen, J., Pyhäjärvi, M.: A Tentative
Framework for Managing Software Product Development in Small Companies. Proc.
35th Hawaii Int’
l. Conference on System Sciences (HICSS-35)
17. Smith, E., Wheelwright, S.: The New Product Development Imperative. 9-699-152.
Harvard Business School Publishing (1999)
18. Sommerville, I.: Software Engineering, 6th edition. Addison-Wesley / Pearson (2001)
19. Tabrizi, B., Walleigh, R.: Defining Next-Generation Products: An Inside Look. Harvard
Business Review. Nov-Dec (1997) 116–124
20. Wiegers, K.: Software Requirements. Microsoft Press (1999)