What Is a Roadmap in Project Management?

Elements of a roadmap in project management

A project roadmap document should be simple and free of minutiae. For this reason, it is a useful tool for managing stakeholder expectations — as well as for communicating plans and coordinating resources with other teams in your organization.

A project roadmap should ideally contain the following elements:

• Project goals: The main objectives the project aims to achieve
  
• Important milestones: Significant points or events in the project’s timeline, such as the completion of major project phases or critical deliverables

(Also read: What is a milestone in project management?)

• Project deliverables: Specific outputs or products that the project will produce
  
• Timeline: A visual representation of the project schedule, showing when each milestone and deliverable is expected to be completed
  
• Dependencies: Relationships between tasks and milestones, indicating how one part of the project relies on the completion of another
  
• Resources: Information about the allocation of personnel, budget, and other resources necessary to complete the project
  
• Possible risks: Potential issues or obstacles that could impact the project’s success, along with mitigation strategies

These “swimlanes” help stakeholders quickly grasp the overall direction, major tasks, and timing of the project.

Why do you need a project roadmap?

When you start a project, the chances are that you have a lot of variables to keep track of at the same time. How do you manage all the content? How is the work divided between your project team members? Most importantly, how do you keep track of the many tasks, ideas, and resources without getting bogged down by the intricate details? 

A roadmap provides a bird’s-eye view of the project without getting into the tiny details. This makes it an extremely helpful tool for project managers who are tasked with keeping the stakeholders informed of a project’s scope and overall progress. 

In essence, a project roadmap is valuable for anyone who requires a macro-level view of the project. 

A project roadmap vs. other project management terms

Aside from project roadmaps, other organizational tools in project management include product roadmaps, project charters, project plans, and product backlogs. 

While there’s definite overlap between these things, it’s important to distinguish between them — because each tool serves distinct purposes in guiding the strategic direction, scope, and execution of projects and product planning.

Project roadmap vs. product roadmap

A product roadmap outlines the product strategy and product vision, detailing the development stages and prioritization of features and enhancements. Product teams use it to focus on overall product management, including features, enhancements, and market needs throughout the lifecycle. In contrast, a project roadmap highlights the milestones, timelines, and major deliverables of an entire project.

Project roadmap vs. project charter

A project charter establishes the foundational framework for a project by defining its objectives, scope, stakeholders, and formal authorization. This is different from a project roadmap, which gives a strategic overview of the project’s primary goals, timelines, and deliverables. It guides its execution without the detailed scope and formal initiation provided by a charter.

Project roadmap vs. project plan

A project roadmap offers a strategic overview with milestones and key activities, focusing on the project’s high-level goals and direction. A project plan is more granular, detailing specific tasks, resources, timelines, and dependencies necessary for day-to-day project management and execution. It offers the actionable steps needed to achieve the goals outlined in the roadmap.

Project roadmap vs. product backlog

A product backlog is a prioritized list of tasks, features, or requirements that need to be completed as part of a project. It is commonly used in Agile project management to organize and manage work items. While the product backlog focuses on the detailed tasks and requirements needed to achieve these goals, the project roadmap offers a broader strategic vision, helping the team and stakeholders understand the overall direction and key deliverables of the project. 

How can a project roadmap help you?

Here are six specific ways a project roadmap can help your project management processes:

1. Communicate goals to your team

A project roadmap is a highly visual document that clearly outlines the goals and objectives of your project. Once your team understands the project objectives, they can more easily focus on specific tasks. It also gives an overview of the project, which can help you and your team estimate the time frame required to complete each stage of the project. Additionally, it reminds your staff of the project’s baseline so they do not get sidetracked during the execution stage. 

2. Recognize priority tasks

A project management roadmap can help you identify the stages of your project that demand the most attention. It can also provide an estimated overview of the complexity and effort involved. 

3. Communicate better with key stakeholders 

A project management survey conducted by KPMG stated that only one in three organizations develop projects that are likely to satisfy their stakeholders. This dissatisfaction arises because project stakeholders often expect teams to make minor changes during the execution process. Consequently, this causes projects to deviate from their original goals, which leads to productivity loss. 

A project management roadmap helps avoid miscommunication between stakeholders and your team by ensuring everyone stays on the same track. It can also clarify to stakeholders the steps that were taken during the execution of the project.

4. Allocate resources effectively

A project roadmap helps in identifying the necessary resources for each phase of the project. By having a clear overview, you can allocate personnel, budget, and materials more efficiently. This way, all project parts are adequately supported, reducing the risk of resource shortages or overallocation and promoting smoother project execution.

(Also read: What is resource allocation in project management?)

5. Improve risk management

Incorporating potential risks into your project roadmap allows you to proactively identify and mitigate issues before they become critical. Visualizing risks alongside project milestones and deliverables means you can develop contingency plans and adjust timelines in real time, ensuring that your project stays on track despite unforeseen challenges.

6. Improve decision making

A project roadmap’s big-picture view allows you to clearly see how different tasks and milestones interconnect. As a result, project managers and stakeholders can make informed choices about prioritizing activities, adjusting schedules, and resource management. This holistic perspective helps to maintain project momentum and achieve goals efficiently.

Tips for producing a project roadmap

If done right, a project management roadmap will undoubtedly help you streamline your work process. Here are a few things you can do to make it as effective as possible:

• Your project roadmap should contain clear and precise information to assist in real stakeholder decision making (i.e., data and dates, and not just vague statements).
  
• Your project roadmap should only set realistic goals because unachievable deadlines will add to cost overruns and inevitably delay the project.
  
• Your team should regularly update each other about the project progress to maintain the ongoing integrity of the roadmap. (Note: This is where automated workflows help.)
  
• The roadmap should include contact information for stakeholders and project leads to facilitate easier communication and improve teamwork among those involved.
  
• You can use project management software to simplify the process of creating project roadmaps. These tools offer efficient tools for setting goals, tasks, dependencies, milestones, and more. (Note: Wrike is the ideal project roadmap tool — giving you a single source of truth for all your team’s work.) 

The challenges of a project roadmap

There are challenges you’ll encounter when putting together a project roadmap. These include: 

• Finding a balance between giving a general view of the project and mapping detailed information. The roadmap should be clear and easy to understand quickly, showing stakeholders where the project is going and when. If the level of detail includes technical jargon or complex descriptions, it’ll overwhelm those who just need an outline.
  
• Ensuring that the roadmap not only plans for initial phases, but also emphasizes the ongoing importance of testing and feedback throughout the project lifecycle. These processes help validate assumptions, identify potential issues early, and keep the project aligned with stakeholder expectations and ever-evolving needs.
  
• Agreement between teams and stakeholders. The success of a project roadmap depends on everyone being on the same page. If there’s disagreement about the roadmap’s goals, priorities, or timeline, it’ll cause conflicts, friction, or resistance during the project. 

Creating a roadmap for a project (using project management software)

Project management software streamlines the process of creating (and using) a project roadmap by automating task scheduling, facilitating real-time collaboration, and providing clear visibility into project progress and dependencies. To give you an idea of how to create a project roadmap on project management platforms, let’s look at two examples: Gantt charts and Kanban boards.

Project roadmap example on a Gantt chart

A Gantt chart is a digital project management tool with a wide range of functionality that can help you visually represent your project roadmap. It showcases tasks, dependencies, key milestones, task durations, and critical points through an interactive and dynamic timeline view. 

This allows you to zoom in on specific phases or view the entire project at a glance to easily track progress and make informed decisions.

Below you can see a Gantt chart in action, depicting a project roadmap for building a new website:

Also read: What’s the best Gantt chart maker? 3 types of tools

Project roadmap example on a Kanban board

A Kanban board is a visual tool using columns and cards to organize tasks. It integrates with project roadmaps by visualizing tasks, managing workflows, and prioritizing work to align with strategic goals. It also gives you real-time updates on task status, enhances transparency and accountability, and allows for quick adjustments as project priorities shift. 

The flexibility of Kanban boards can make them especially useful in Agile project management methodology, where they support continuous improvement and adaptation, keeping the project responsive to changes and aligned with stakeholder needs.

This Kanban board in action depicts a visual project manager roadmap for a new project, showing how you can simply drag and drop cards to automatically update their status.

(Also read: Kanban software for everyone: 6 workflow visualization tools)

Create a powerful project roadmap with Wrike 

If you’re ready to kick off your project roadmap planning and creation, you’ll find a vast range of tools and customizable templates on the Wrike platform. As you build a roadmap in Wrike, you have the freedom to add whatever custom fields suit your needs. This means you can adapt your roadmap to reflect your unique project phases, milestones, dependencies, and timelines. 

Whether you use the Gantt chart view to visualize your roadmap with milestones, or you prefer Kanban or other views, Wrike will allow you to easily update project due dates, streamline workflows, and build an accurate, live view of your project as it progresses. 

Start your free trial today.