The Why of the Impact Map

[Benjamin Brachert]

Hi,

I just don't get it.

Referring to the book example "Online gaming" the map illustrates an milestone where the business goal is to increase the number of active players to 1 million.

But why? In the previous chapter "Why?" is written that the center of the map should give an answer to the question "Why are we doing this?" or in other words goals should explain why sucha a thing would be useful.

Let's double check:

"Why are we doing this?" Answer: Active player up to 1 million.
For me that doesn't fit well.

Can anybody help me? Am I overthinking the impact mapping process?

Thanks,

Benjamin

[Gojko Adzic]

Hi Benjamin,

Generally, the most useful impact maps capture one milestone of product development, not the overall company vision/strategy. The map in the book is intended to show something that will be the next major achievement for the product, in this case gaining wider market share. you can of course keep popping the "why" stack all the way to long term vision and perhaps even societal value systems, but that level of abstraction is rarely actionable enough for product planning. 

I tend to use models such as the stages of growth from lean analytics to set out the overall direction, then choose a concrete measurable goal to put in the center of a map. 

The goal should capture what would make something successful, not just useful. the impact level of the map is to show why it would be useful.

gojko

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[Benjamin Brachert]

Hi Gojko,

thank you very much.

Let me try to find some examples for the impact level:

Recipients can create delivery requests on mobile app (sound like a deliverable, isn't it?)

Vehicle sens location information at least every minute via the notification (also a deliverable, isn't it?)

Significantly reduced planned downtime (this is an Impact, right?)

Improve quality of service due to faster and more reliable connectivity (this is an Impact, right?) or is Route optimization the Impact?

What do you think?

[Gojko Adzic]

> Recipients can create delivery requests on mobile app (sound like a deliverable, isn't it?)

This is a potential for recipients to do something, not an impact on their behaviour. I prefer to state impact as something that happens, rather than the potential for something to happen.

Here are some potential impacts for this 

- recipients create delivery requests when on the go (eg if they are now creating it only when in office). 

- recipients working with smaller screens create delivery requests more easily (eg doing it on a desktop is difficult due to overbloated UI)

- recipients working with smaller screens create delivery requests faster

> Vehicle sens location information at least every minute via the notification (also a deliverable, isn't it?)

Take this with some reservation, as some people I respect highly disagree with me on this, but I prefer to use humans as actors instead of systems. What changes for an actual person if a vehicle senses location more frequently? eg "route planners can avoid estimate time of delivery more accurately" or "drivers make higher percentage of deliveries on time" 

> Significantly reduced planned downtime (this is an Impact, right?)

I'm not sure, but for me this is a deliverable. It sounds like something you can control directly, not a behaviour change to someone else. "recipients can schedule deliveries during longer periods" might be an impact, for example - because the system is online for longer, people can use it.

> Improve quality of service due to faster and more reliable connectivity (this is an Impact, right?) or is Route optimization the Impact?

both sound like deliverables to me. some measurement of quality of service could also be around a business goal, but that's questionable (I'd need to know more about the context). Impacts in this case are usually around customer stickiness or retention (eg recipients schedule more deliveries in average, recipients return more frequently etc). goals in this case are usually around protecting marketshare or growing active user numbers.

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/impact-mapping/72a3dc07-1eea-4fb0-98d7-419c3e2b0edfn%40googlegroups.com.

[drob...@gmail.com]

IMHO

WHAT (deliverable): Recipients can create delivery requests on mobile app 

WHAT (deliverable): Vehicle sense location information at least every minute via the notification 

WHY ($$$ buissness goal) Significantly reduced planned downtime 

(although I would have asked WHY "Significantly reduced planned downtime" is important - one more time / it sounds like a platform so it would be e.g:

-IMPROVE RETENTION

-BUILD AN SUFFICIENT ACTIVE CONSUMER/PRODUCER USER BASE FOR THE FEEDBACK LOOP TO OCCUR

but could be something else like

-FULFILL REGULATOR'S REQUIREMENTS

WHAT (deliverable) Improve quality of service due to faster and more reliable connectivity

If you want to define an impact ask how will faster and more reliable connectivity change someone's behavior?

STORY a telecom operator have massively rebuild it's system architecture in order to reduce time to connect from seconds to miliseconds. But the end users didn't bother (so nothing changed in their behavior) so it was a waste of money 

[drob...@gmail.com]

" recipients create delivery requests when on the go (eg if they are now creating it only when in office). "

also it's nice to create a proto-persona in order to slice the impact (answer the questions for the recipients motivation)

Here is my somehow related article (maybe it helps Benjamin)

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/power-sprint-goal-examples-b%C5%82a%C5%BCej-drobniuch?trk=related_artice_The%20power%20of%20a%20Sprint%20Goal%20(examples)_article-card_title

[George Dinwiddie]

If I may, I'd like to float a different framing of this.

On 1/8/21 6:30 AM, Gojko Adzic wrote:
> > Significantly reduced planned downtime (this is an Impact, right?)
>
> I'm not sure, but for me this is a deliverable. It sounds like something
> you can control directly, not a behaviour change to someone else.
> "recipients can schedule deliveries during longer periods" might be an
> impact, for example - because the system is online for longer, people
> can use it.

I'm envisioning "planned downtime" as an impediment to business success
caused by necessary maintenance activities. With that interpretation, I
think of the following:

Goal: Increase availability of the system to customers
for more profit due to more use
and greater happiness due to less frustration
Actor: Operations personnel
Impact: Operations that require planned downtime are shorter in duration
and/or less frequent
Deliverables: Changes to the system that make it easier to maintain
and operate

People often take a product viewpoint and focus on the impact to
customer behavior, but it's possible to apply the same principles to
stakeholders within the organization. Making life better for users of
internal IT applications has the same benefits as doing so for external
paying customers, if you squint a little bit.

- George

--
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* George Dinwiddie * http://blog.gdinwiddie.com
Software Development http://www.idiacomputing.com
Consultant and Coach https://pragprog.com/titles/gdestimate/
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[Gojko Adzic]

This is a very interesting perspective, and comes up frequently in product discussions. I'd like to just add another aspect to this, based on Dettmer's division of systems in The Logical Thinking Process. 

There are three contexts interesting to consider here:

- zone of control (things that you can magic up into existence just by wanting them)

- sphere of influence (things you can only nudge, and they might or might not happen even with the best of your efforts/intentions)

- outside your influence (things you can wish for, but so far removed from you that your actions have marginal or no effect on this).

Where this has an interesting overlap with the previous discussion is triaging if the "operations personnel" are within your control or only someone you can try to influence.

I tend to consider everything within the zone of control as a deliverable, and look for impacts in the sphere of influence. The reason for that is mostly to be able to visualise assumptions. Within the zone of control, there are no dangerous assumptions. If you want something, with enough effort you'll make it happen. Within the sphere of influence, there is an implicit assumption that some action might lead to some impact, but it might not happen (else this would be also in the zone of control). 

So if the operations people, and their work scheduling downtime, are within your zone of control - this is just another deliverable. It can break down into stories/features around system stability, but still a deliverable. There's an impact elsewhere, on someone else, and we should measure that to see if this was actually useful.

If the operations people are someone you can just try to influence, then features/tooling around system stability are the deliverables, and we measure the impact of those by actually checking if they are scheduling downtime differently than before.

gojko

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[Sean Killeen]

To build on George's example, I have used this in the past to help groups work toward a non-product goal of "achieving more diversity in conference line-ups". (personal politics / feelings on this may differ and I don't want to derail the conversation, but to point out how this tool helped in this case.)

I did this in response to a comment from someone I respect saying that the process itself was unbiased, but "people weren't applying".

Goal: Achieve greater diversity in the conference speaker line-up

• Actor: Potential speakers who have previously had unsafe experiences at conferences
• Impact: Apply to speak
• Deliverable: Clear code of conduct
• Deliverable: Clear CoC enforcement mechanism
• Deliverable: All conference staff trained on CoC enforcement mechanism
• Deliverable: CoC & Enforcement process clearly posted online
  
• Deliverable: CoC hotline during the conference for quick submission
  
• Actor: Speakers who are raising children
• Impact: Apply to speak
• Deliverable: Provide child care at the conference
• Deliverable: Provide travel accommodation for 1+ children in addition to the speaker
• Deliverable: Allow for some remote sessions even if the conference is in person (and hype them as special)
  
• Actor: Speakers who may not be of financial means
• Impact: Apply to speak
• Deliverable: Offer a speaking stipend
• Deliverable: Offer the ability to apply for a speaking stipend
• Deliverable: Specifically allow speaking stipends for under-represented speakers
  
• Actor: Speakers who have previously been asked to speak only on diversity, or who have felt "tokenized".
• Impact: Apply to speak
• Deliverable: Familiarize organizers with under-represented speaker lists
• Deliverable: Familiarize with talks given by under-represented speakers
• Deliverable: Outreach to under-represented speakers specifically based on their topics
• Deliverable: Ensure anyone on a panel about D&I is also afforded space to give a talk on a conference topic or conference-adjacent topic
  
• Selection Committee:
• Impact: Remove potential bias from selection
• Deliverable: Remove names and identifying features on conference submissions
• Deliverable: Remove language that could bias the committee.
• Deliverable: Specifically seek unique topics and perspectives and make space for them even if they don't fit the overall agenda
• NOTE: This might be at odds with some of the others. That's another nice thing about impact mapping. It's a brainstorming.

This list is a small example that I'm regurgitating off the top of my head. The person I presented it to at the time hadn't thought of most of what I suggested and began to brainstorm other personas and stakeholders. It connected them to thinking about who the actors could be in this scenario, and expanded the perspective beyond "under-represented people". It provided tangible things to try, many of which were seen as potential differentiators for the conference anyway. And lastly, it showed the additional work they could put in if they were committed to getting to the goal. They found it energizing.

Lots of different ways to use this tool effectively. I bet putting a gallery of examples out there might be useful.

--
Sean

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[Benjamin Brachert]

The proposed link is very helpful to see the differences. Thank you for that.