Product 2016

Opportunity Canvas

One page that makes a product idea defend itself before it becomes a roadmap line.

What it is

Patton's one-pager for a single product opportunity: users and customers, problems, solution ideas, how users use it today, business value, metrics, adoption strategy, and what happens if you don't build it. It looks like the Business Model Canvas; it interrogates one bet instead of the whole business.

Reach for it when

• A stakeholder arrives with a solution and no named problem
• The backlog has five big ideas and budget for one
• A discovery kickoff needs shared context in under an hour

Running it

1. Write the solution idea in the middle first. Everyone has it in their head anyway; putting it down disarms it.
2. Then force the walk backwards: whose problem, how they cope today, what the business gets.
3. Fill "if we don't build it" honestly. Sometimes the answer is "nothing happens", and that is the finding.
4. 60 to 90 minutes with the whole product trio plus one skeptic.