Roadmaps provide a complete overview of the upcoming events, stages, and milestones of a project. It includes several objectives, resources, and plans which makes it a useful tool for coming up with strategies. Project managers can use them to communicate the goals and present stakeholders with reference guides. They are more equipped to stay on target with the project’s progress and able to explain all the reasoning behind each decision and objective. This article compares Trello project management vs Jira project management and how they provide users with the tools to build a roadmap from scratch, which is incredibly useful when it comes to meeting deadlines and maintaining client satisfaction.
Difference Between Project Roadmap and Project Plan
The project plan handles all the details related to tasks and presents them in the form of a timeline and it is supposed to help project managers assign responsibilities and track the progress at a granular level. This document serves as an internal resource and helps project teams maintain an updated view of project progress.
The project roadmap, on the other hand, represents a high-level view of the strategy and only addresses the daily tasks. It shows the manager what everyone is working on and the roadmap design presents a quick view of the project status. It is mostly used by executive staff members, investors, marketing, and sales departments.
Trello software uses both of these tools and serves an important purpose in terms of project management. A great team is supposed to use both roadmaps and plans but the roadmap is developed first. The strategic overview can then be broken down into singular goals and milestones to come up with tasks. These details help come up with a project plan.
What Purpose Does a Roadmap Serve?
The project roadmap serves two main strategic purposes. The first one is that it is a constant reminder of the project objectives. This is important because when the teams are working on complex projects, they need help dealing with the day-to-day realities. The conditions are constantly changing, and employees need assistance working on high-priority tasks. Roadmaps help change budgets and execute actions when the priority level of a task suddenly changes.
When the teams are supposed to rearrange the details for tasks on their project plan, they need a quick overview of the high-level goals. The quick reminder means that teams are able to make more intelligent decisions. They can use high-level goals to decide where the team needs to go next.
The second strategic purpose is that it provides value in setting expectations, updating stakeholders, and attracting investors. They can provide executives with the required information and deliver quick updates on the project. These key players will not have the time to sit through a complete walk-through of the progress and they should be interested only at the strategic level.
There are specific aspects of the project that need to be completed on time and in terms of milestones both Trello project management vs Jira project management help achieve them. They can also analyze whether or not the project is still under budget.
Tips for Implementing a Successful Roadmap
Design the Roadmap Before the Project Plan
The team needs to deal with a well-planned set of objectives for their project to give everyone involved the direction and explain the reasoning behind it. Before the project can be broken down into details of roles and responsibilities, managers need a roadmap.
Kick Off the Project
Jira project management helps bring the entire team on the same platform which includes external stakeholders as well. It is easier to get quicker approvals and get started immediately when presenting on a roadmap. It can be a great way to ensure everyone knows the goals and is able to execute them according to project timelines.
Keep Roadmaps Up-to-Date
Since the projects are always undergoing dynamic change, it is important to keep all the resources updated to keep teams flexible. The roadmap should always be updated with the relevant information so teams have access to the current version of details whenever required. This helps stakeholders figure out the exact status of all tasks at any given time. Both Trello project management vs Jira project management makes it easier to change or edit the details and is a much more sophisticated solution than Excel spreadsheets.
How to Make a Project Roadmap
Making a roadmap is not a complicated task especially if you have the support of a project management platform like Trello software. There are some steps that managers need to take to ensure they are designing an efficient and useful resource.
Organize a Team Meeting Before Beginning
When you are planning a roadmap for your project the first step should be to discuss it with everyone involved. This includes all internal employees and stakeholders who will be involved in the project. This meeting will give everyone a chance to present ideas and define everything that will be included in the roadmap. The most important part is that all the ideas can be recorded on Jira software and can be forwarded to the executive members for final approval.
Collect All Information
It is important to collect and organize all the information that you will need to create the roadmap. This way it is easier to keep track of different project aspects. Some of the relevant details include the project scope and all deliverables required by the client, milestones associated with the project, risks involved, and all resources that will be required by the team. With all that in mind, it will be easier to come up with a roadmap because you only have to plug in the information on Trello project management vs Jira project management.
Conclusion
Once you have understood what a project roadmap is for and how you can create one, you can enjoy the benefits it offers. Planning is an important part of project management and the roadmap serves as a crucial resource during that stage. It helps answer some important questions and can be referenced at any point of development. This article addresses all the questions a new user might have about roadmaps on Trello project management vs Jira project management so they can make their plans much more efficiently.
