Outcomes-Based Planning

Use this skill when the planning problem is uncertainty: the team knows the result it wants, but not yet the right solution.

Boundaries

• Use outcome-thinking when the task is to define what a good outcome is, distinguish it from output, or choose leading indicators.
• Use organizing-for-outcomes when the issue is structural rather than roadmap-oriented.
• Use outcomes-driven-transformation when the audience whose behavior must change is internal to the organization.

Default procedure

1. Treat the business goal as impact, not as the roadmap itself.
2. Map the current user or customer journey from left to right.
3. Identify boosters and blockers at each step:
   • behaviors that predict success
   • behaviors that predict failure
4. Turn the roadmap from a list of promised features into questions or hypotheses about behavior change.
5. Define how each hypothesis will be tested and measured before committing to a large build.