Generate the strategic story connecting a product roadmap

Strategic Narrative Generator Skill

Turn a prioritised initiative list into a strategic narrative — the story that explains not just what you're building but why, why now, and why this sequence.

Required Inputs

Ask the user for these if not provided:

• Prioritised initiative list (with rough timelines)
• Current OKRs or strategic priorities (1-3)
• Audience (board, leadership team, all-hands, investors)
• Competitive or market context (optional but improves output significantly)

Process

1. Identify 2-3 natural strategic themes from the initiative list
2. For each theme: articulate the problem, the customer it serves, and the metric it moves
3. Build the progression narrative: how does Q1 set up Q2? How does H1 set up H2?
4. Write executive summary in under 100 words (the version someone can repeat)
5. Anticipate the 3 hardest questions a sceptical board member would ask — draft answers
6. Identify what's NOT on the roadmap and why
7. Validate — Confirm every initiative maps to a theme. If an initiative is orphaned, either create a theme for it or flag it as a narrative gap.

Output Structure

Product Strategy Narrative: [Period]

The One-Paragraph Context: [Market moment + key challenge + our response — for the CFO, not the engineer]

Strategic Theme 1: [Name]

• The problem: [customer pain in plain language]
• Our response: [initiatives in this theme]
• The metric it moves: [specific and measurable]
• Why now: [timing rationale]

Strategic Theme 2: [Name] [Same structure]

The Progression Story: [How each quarter sets up the next — this is the narrative arc]

Executive Summary (under 100 words — shareable): [Version someone can quote at a board meeting]

Questions to Prepare For:

1. [Hard question] → [Prepared answer]
2. [Hard question] → [Prepared answer]
3. [Hard question] → [Prepared answer]

What's Not on the Roadmap (and Why): [2-3 items — shows strategic discipline, not just prioritisation]

Tone

• Write for a CFO, not an engineer
• Lead with outcomes, not features
• Every sentence should answer "so what?"
• Avoid jargon — if you can't say it plainly, the strategy isn't clear enough yet

Quality Checks

• Executive summary is under 100 words and can stand alone
• Every initiative in the input maps to a strategic theme
• Each theme has a specific, measurable metric (not "improve engagement")
• Progression story shows causal links between quarters, not just chronological listing
• "Not on the roadmap" section includes at least 2 items with clear rationale

Anti-Patterns

• Do not produce a narrative that lists initiatives chronologically without showing causal progression — the story must show why each phase enables the next
• Do not use abstract strategic language that cannot be repeated by a non-technical listener — test whether someone could explain it back without the document
• Do not omit the "what's not on the roadmap" section — what you are choosing not to do is as important as what you are doing
• Do not set themes without measurable metrics — a theme without a metric cannot be tracked or held to account
• Do not skip the hard questions section — preparing for objections in advance is the purpose of the narrative exercise