:fa_apple: Apple is an excellent example of a company that publishes forward looking roadmaps



  • Interviewed a Product Manager candidate today and one of the questions was about "what makes a useful roadmap, to us (the vendor) and the customer?"

    He leaped straight in with Apple; "Everyone knows what Apple is going to produce and their published roadmap hypes the products before launch - that is how we should manage a roadmap!"

    "Eh?" I responded? "Apple don't publish any roadmap and all of the excitement is based on hype around rumors - it's an example of being successful despite having no roadmap whatsoever"

    He argued and argued that Apple's "roadmap" was public, inclusive and successful.
    Am I being TRWTF here? Apple should be presented as the anti-roadmap company. right?

    (it's clearly been a successful approach for them - I'm not arguing that, simply that Apple are not a great example of a company with a coherent published roadmap)


  • area_can

    If by "roadmap" he meant "get ready to buy a new iPhone next year", sure...



  • @bb36e said:

    If by "roadmap" he meant "get ready to buy a new iPhonei-Whatever next year", sure...

    FTFY



  • I believe their roadmap is "your iDevice is obsolete as soon as we get the next version out"



  • @skotl said:

    Am I being TRWTF here? Apple should be presented as the anti-roadmap company. right?

    That's exactly the thought I had reading the topic title! I'm sure there is an internal roadmap but it sure isn't public!



  • A quick resolution to that argument would have been asking him to demonstrate what he's talking about. I'm pretty sure he'd come up empty handed.



  • @cartman82 said:

    I'm pretty sure he'd come up empty handed.

    Nah, he'd have come up with something. It just wouldn't be anything remotely describable as a roadmap in any commonly accepted definition of the word - but he would insist utterly that it was and you would not be able to convince him otherwise.

    Probably best not to bother, really.



  • @Scarlet_Manuka said:

    Probably best not to bother, really.

    Which is what we did. Or didn't do, depending on which one is syntactically correct.


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