Goals of a “pretty good” product vision

A pretty good product vision strives guide the execution of a solid, of not breakthrough, product.  It should:

• avoid the common product vision pitfalls: stagnation, incrementalism, bloat, and copycat visions that lead to feature wars and commoditization
• describe a product that meets important unmet customer needs, profitably, and which is therefore well-justified
• provide clear, complete direction for the product. The vision serves as the constitution for the product — a concise summary that guides all other decisions about features and designs.
• provide a standard for what is in and out of scope from the current version of the product
• make development more efficient by avoiding wasted work caused by unnecessary features and shifting requirements
• reduce the risk of failure by shipping a relevant, well-justified product sooner, by taking advantage of the market window, and by doing so at a lower cost

Goals of an outstanding product vision

An outstanding product vision strives to define a breakthrough product.  Its goals are to:

• define a product that satisfies important, unmet needs far better than the competition
• define a product customers love, which they will promote through word-of-mouth and positive reviews
• define a product that enhances the company’s brand reputation and hence facilitates future sales
• define a product that is highly profitable because of: lower development cost, increased sales, higher margin and longer lifespan before obsolescence
• provides the perspective to instantly understand the significance of new competitors
• define a long-term plan that resists competitors, preserves and extends the lead over time, and anticipates the next disruptive generation of products

You can use this list of goals to evaluate anyone’s approach to vision or strategy (mine or others).  We will check back with this list any time to remind ourselves what we aiming for with our product vision efforts.

Readers: Did I miss anything?  What else should product vision accomplish?

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Philip Haine is principal of Product Vision Associates, a product innovation consultancy that helps product leaders and their teams envision new, breakthrough products and reboot older ones.  To follow him on Twitter click here.