The Peril of Immovable Roadmaps: Melissa Perri on Strategy vs. Reality

In a recent LinkedIn post, Melissa Perri discusses a recurring pattern she’s observed in Fortune 500 companies where externally created product roadmaps, despite being flawed, are rigidly adhered to, leading to wasted resources and missed goals. Perri, author of “Escaping the Build Trap,” highlights the disconnect that can form between strategic directives and the realities uncovered through customer discovery.

Perri frames the issue by describing a common scenario: prestigious consulting firms deliver impressive five-year strategic plans, which are then adopted by leadership. Product and engineering teams are incentivized to deliver these features on time, regardless of emerging evidence. As Perri states:

“The consultants delivered a five-year roadmap. The teams knew it was wrong. They built it anyway.”

This adherence, Perri argues, often stems from a misalignment of incentives. When performance reviews and bonuses are tied to the timely delivery of pre-determined features (output), rather than to achieving desired business outcomes (outcomes), teams are discouraged from acting on new information.

The Alignment Gap: Strategy, Incentives, and Evidence

Melissa Perri elaborates on this critical disconnect, which she terms the “alignment gap.” This gap occurs when a company’s strategy, its incentive structures, and the evidence gathered from the market stop pointing in the same direction. According to Perri:

“At the end of the year the company misses its goals, and everyone involved can honestly say they did exactly what they were asked to do.”

This situation, Perri explains, is a direct consequence of prioritizing execution of a fixed plan over genuine learning and adaptation. The very people tasked with building the product—product managers who speak directly with customers—are often prevented from leveraging their insights to course-correct.

When Discovery Becomes Paperwork

A core point Perri makes is the devaluation of customer discovery when it cannot influence the established roadmap. She emphasizes that external consultants, while potentially useful for framing problems, cannot substitute for the continuous engagement teams should have with their customers. Perri writes:

“External consultants can help you frame a problem. They cannot replace a team’s ongoing contact with customers, and they should never be the reason a roadmap becomes immovable. If your discovery work can’t change the plan, it isn’t discovery. It’s paperwork.”

This perspective challenges the traditional top-down approach to strategy, suggesting that true product development requires flexibility and a willingness to pivot based on real-world feedback. The implication is that rigid, long-term roadmaps can become a hindrance rather than a guide when they prevent teams from responding to market needs.

Closing the Build Trap

Perri’s insights, detailed further in her book “Escaping the Build Trap,” offer a critique of management practices that inadvertently stifle innovation. She advocates for a system where teams are empowered to adapt their plans based on evidence, thereby ensuring that development efforts remain aligned with strategic goals and customer value.

The central question Melissa Perri poses to her audience reflects the heart of her argument:

“When was the last time your team was allowed to change course because the evidence said so?”

This question underscores the need for organizational cultures that embrace learning and iteration, moving away from a purely output-driven mindset towards one focused on achieving meaningful outcomes through a more adaptive, evidence-informed process.