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Discovery Interview Prep vs Strategic Roadmap Planning

Two product management skills. Which one fits your job? Side-by-side below.

The short version

Discovery Interview Prep

By Dean Peters (PM)

Plan customer interviews that uncover real problems instead of confirming your assumptions.

Strategic Roadmap Planning

By Dean Peters (PM)

Turn scattered ideas into a strategic roadmap that aligns teams and wins stakeholder buy-in.

What each one does

Discovery Interview Prep

  • Asks adaptive questions about your research goals, target customers, and constraints
  • Recommends the right interview methodology based on your product stage and what you need to learn
  • Generates a tailored question framework with bias warnings and success criteria
  • Helps you avoid leading questions and confirmation bias during customer interviews
  • Outputs a ready-to-use interview guide for qualitative customer research

Strategic Roadmap Planning

  • Organizes scattered feature requests and ideas into a cohesive strategic plan
  • Helps you prioritize initiatives based on customer impact, business goals, and effort
  • Defines clear success metrics and hypotheses for each initiative
  • Sequences work across quarters with logical dependencies
  • Creates a stakeholder-ready roadmap presentation with strategic narrative

When to pick each one

Reach for Discovery Interview Prep when…

  • You're validating a new product idea and need to confirm the problem is real
  • You're investigating why customers are churning or not activating on key features
  • You need to prepare for customer development interviews but aren't sure where to start
  • You want to understand what jobs customers are trying to get done before building features

Reach for Strategic Roadmap Planning when…

  • You're planning your quarterly or annual product roadmap
  • You have competing initiatives and need to decide what to build next
  • Stakeholders are asking for a roadmap that shows strategic direction
  • You're moving from reactive feature requests to outcome-driven planning

Quick facts

Discovery Interview PrepStrategic Roadmap Planning
Made byDean Peters (PM)Dean Peters (PM)
CategoryProduct ManagementProduct Management
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