Table of Contents

Map the Future is over 80,000 words long. That's the length of a typical novel, and is longer than the usual business book. It's structured a bit like a cookbook, with some sections that talk about broad concepts and others that dive deep into how-to instructions. The book is organized in sub-chapters, and hyperlinked so you can easily jump to the information that's most relevant to you.

Contents

Preface: How to Use this Book

Introduction: We Are Astoundingly Bad at Predicting the Future
Our schizophrenic view of the future
How analytical and visionary companies both failed in smartphones
A better approach: Anticipate possibilities
Building the future roadmap
Organization and culture prevent companies from mapping the future
This is what works for me

Part I. How to Build the Foundations of a Future Roadmap

1. Competitive Analysis: Peeking Inside Your Competitor's Brain
1.1 The rise and fall of competitive intelligence
1.2 How to organize a competitive analysis team
1.3 What makes a good competitive analyst
1.4 How to spot a good competitive analyst
1.5 How to recruit and hire competitive analysts
1.6 How to collect competitive information
1.7 How to figure out what it means
1.8 Competitive analysis deliverables
1.9 How to communicate competitive information

2. Market Research: Peeking Inside your Customer's Brain
2.1 The basics of market research
2.2 Uses of qualitative research
2.3 Uses of quantitative research
2.4 Customer tracking
2.5 How to work with market researchers
2.6 How to organize a market research team
2.7 What to look for in a market researcher
2.8 How to communicate market research findings
2.9 The online revolution in market research
2.10 Applying market research to product strategy
2.11 How to segment the market for a new product
2.12 Lies, damned lies, statistics, and proof studies
2.13 Market forecasting
2.14 Sales and share tracking

3. Secondary Research: Insight vs. Influence
3.1 Understanding the secondary research companies
3.2 How to manage the secondary research companies
3.3 Tips for working with the research companies
3.4 Beware the third party forecast

4. Future Technology: Don't Tell Me What, Tell Me When
4.1 Trends in advanced technology research
4.2 You can’t simply plug advanced technology information into your roadmap
4.3 What to do

Part II. How to Map the Future

5. The Future Roadmap: Mixing Oil, Water, and Sand
5.1 Picturing the roadmap
5.2 Barriers to building a roadmap
5.3 “Hold on, does this mean we have to do a re-org?”
5.4 Building the futures team
5.5 Culture: Bringing the people together
5.6 How to produce the roadmap
5.7 Linking the roadmap and the strategic plan
5.8 Following up afterwards

6. Mapping the Future in a Small Company
 

Part III. Advanced Topics and Special Situations

7. “Are We There Yet?” Knowing When You’ve Crossed the Chasm
7.1 What shape is the adoption curve?
7.2 Selling to enterprise buyers
7.3 Selling to consumers: Are your early adopters actually mainstream buyers?
7.4 Which demand curve are you on?
7.5 Lessons

8. Preventing Third Act Problems

9. Influencing Decisions and Managing Conflict
9.1 Adapting the roadmap process to your company’s culture
9.2 Dealing with company politics
9.3 What to do if people won’t listen
9.4 Managing conflict

10. Ten Principles of Future Roadmapping

Conclusion: It’s Time to Stop Flying Blind


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