Capstone: Build a Product Strategy Document

Strategy: The Document You’re Always Meaning to Write

Every PM knows they should have a clear product strategy document. Most don’t. Instead, the strategy lives in the PM’s head, revealed piecemeal in meetings, Slack threads, and sprint planning sessions.

The problem: when strategy lives in your head, nobody else can use it to make decisions. Your team asks you about everything because they don’t know the framework for answering questions themselves. And when you’re not available, decisions either stall or go sideways.

A good product strategy document is a force multiplier. Write it once, and it guides hundreds of decisions you’d otherwise have to make personally.

This capstone walks you through creating one, using every skill from this course.

The Product Strategy Document Structure

1. Vision (where we're going)
2. Current Position (where we are)
3. Target User (who we serve)
4. Problem Space (what we solve)
5. Strategic Priorities (what we focus on)
6. Competitive Position (how we win)
7. Key Metrics (how we measure)
8. Roadmap (when we execute)
9. What We Won't Do (where we don't play)
10. Key Risks (what could go wrong)
11. Review Cadence (when we reassess)

Section 1: Vision

Your vision is the destination – where the product goes if everything works.

Help me articulate a product vision:

Product: [name and description]
Market: [the space we operate in]
Our unique value: [what we do differently]
Time horizon: [2-3 years from now]

Write a vision statement that:
1. Is inspiring but achievable (not sci-fi, not incremental)
2. Paints a picture of what life looks like for our users when we succeed
3. Is specific enough to guide decisions ("should we build X?" -> does it
   serve the vision?)
4. Is brief enough to remember (2-3 sentences max)

Then test it: If I told this vision to our engineering team, would they
feel motivated? If I told it to our investors, would they feel confident?
If I told it to a potential customer, would they be interested?

Section 2-4: Position, User, and Problem Space

These sections draw on your research synthesis skills from Lesson 2:

Help me define the strategic foundation for my product strategy:

CURRENT POSITION:
Product: [current state]
Revenue: [if applicable]
Users: [count and growth]
Market position: [leader/challenger/niche/new entrant]
Key strengths: [top 3]
Key weaknesses: [top 3]

TARGET USER:
Based on our research, describe:
1. Primary persona (who we're building for first)
2. Secondary persona (who benefits but isn't our primary focus)
3. Anti-persona (who we're explicitly NOT building for)

For each persona: goals, pain points, current solutions, what would
make them choose us.

PROBLEM SPACE:
1. What are the top 3 problems our users face?
2. How are they solving these problems today?
3. What's inadequate about current solutions?
4. How big is each problem? (Frequency, severity, willingness to pay)
5. Which problems are we uniquely positioned to solve?

Be specific. "Users need a better experience" is not a problem statement.
"Project leads spend 2+ hours per week manually compiling status updates
from 5+ tools" is a problem statement.

Section 5-6: Strategic Priorities and Competitive Position

These sections use your prioritization and competitive analysis skills from Lessons 4-5:

Help me define strategic priorities and competitive positioning:

Based on my product's current position, target users, and problem space:
[paste or summarize from previous sections]

STRATEGIC PRIORITIES:
1. What are the 3-5 things we must focus on in the next 12 months?
2. For each priority, why is it important and how does it serve the vision?
3. How do these priorities connect (does one enable another)?
4. What's the sequencing -- what must come first?

Frame priorities as strategic themes, not feature names. "Reduce time-to-
value for new users" is a strategic priority. "Build onboarding wizard"
is a feature.

COMPETITIVE POSITIONING:
1. How do we position against our top 3 competitors?
2. What's our primary differentiator? (The one thing we do that nobody
   else does as well)
3. Where do we not compete? (Areas where competitors are stronger and
   we shouldn't try to match)
4. What's our competitive moat? (What makes our advantage sustainable)

Create a positioning statement:
For [target user] who [need], [product] is a [category] that [key benefit].
Unlike [competitors], we [primary differentiator].

Section 7: Key Metrics

Define how you’ll know if the strategy is working:

Define a metrics framework for my product strategy:

Strategic priorities: [list from section 5]
Business goals: [revenue, growth, retention targets]
User goals: [what success looks like for users]

For each strategic priority, define:
1. Primary metric (the one number that matters most)
2. Input metrics (leading indicators that predict the primary metric)
3. Counter-metrics (things to watch to ensure we're not gaming the
   primary metric at the expense of something important)
4. Targets (specific numbers with timeframes)

Also define:
- North Star Metric: The single metric that best captures the value
  we deliver to users
- Health Metrics: Ongoing indicators that the business is functioning
  (churn, NPS, performance, reliability)

Make sure metrics are measurable with our current data infrastructure.
Flag any that would require new tracking.

Section 8: Roadmap Summary

Translate your strategy into a high-level execution plan:

Create a strategic roadmap based on these priorities:

Strategic priorities: [list with sequencing]
Engineering capacity: [team size and quarterly capacity]
Key dependencies: [technical, partnership, hiring]
Hard deadlines: [any date-driven commitments]

Create a 12-month roadmap:

Q1: [Now - what we're building and shipping]
Q2: [Next - what we're planning]
Q3-Q4: [Later - directional themes]

For each quarter:
1. Strategic theme (the "why")
2. Key initiatives (2-3 specific efforts)
3. Expected outcomes (what changes if we succeed)
4. Milestones for tracking progress
5. Key risk for this quarter

Keep Q1 specific. Q2 can have some flexibility. Q3-Q4 should be
thematic rather than feature-specific.

Section 9-10: What We Won’t Do and Key Risks

These sections are often the most valuable:

Based on my product strategy:
[paste or summarize vision, priorities, positioning]

WHAT WE WON'T DO:
List 5-7 things we're explicitly choosing not to pursue, with brief
reasoning for each. Include:
- Feature categories we're avoiding
- User segments we're not targeting
- Markets we're not entering
- Technical approaches we're not taking

This section should prevent "but what about..." conversations by
addressing them preemptively.

KEY RISKS:
For each strategic priority, identify:
1. The biggest risk to achieving it
2. Likelihood (high/medium/low)
3. Impact if it materializes (high/medium/low)
4. Mitigation plan (what we're doing to reduce the risk)
5. Trigger for escalation (when we need to change course)

Also identify:
- Market risks (what could change in the market)
- Execution risks (what could go wrong internally)
- Technical risks (what's uncertain in our approach)

Putting It All Together

Now assemble the complete document:

I've drafted all sections of my product strategy. Help me review the
complete document for coherence:

[paste all sections]

Check for:
1. ALIGNMENT: Does every section support the vision? Are there
   contradictions?
2. SPECIFICITY: Is each section specific enough to guide decisions?
   Flag vague areas.
3. COMPLETENESS: Is anything missing that a team member would need
   to make decisions?
4. TESTABILITY: Could an engineer read this and correctly predict
   which features to prioritize?
5. COMMUNICATION: Is this clear enough for a new team member to
   understand our direction?

For each issue, suggest the specific fix. Then give me an overall
assessment: is this strategy document ready to share with the team?

The Strategy Review Cycle

Your strategy document isn’t a monument. It’s a living document:

Monthly: Quick check – are we executing against priorities? Any new information that changes assumptions?

Quarterly: Formal review with the team. Update metrics, reassess priorities, adjust roadmap.

Annually: Full strategic refresh. Revisit vision, competitive position, and market dynamics.

It's time for my quarterly strategy review:

Original strategy: [summarize key elements]
Results this quarter: [metrics vs. targets]
New information: [market changes, competitive moves, research findings]
Execution assessment: [what we shipped vs. planned]

Help me:
1. Assess which strategic assumptions still hold and which have changed
2. Evaluate whether our priorities are still the right ones
3. Identify any needed course corrections
4. Update the roadmap for next quarter
5. Flag one thing we should explore that isn't currently on our radar

Course Summary

Over eight lessons, you’ve built a complete AI-augmented PM toolkit:

The AI-Augmented PM – Where AI accelerates your work and where judgment still reigns
Research Synthesis – Turning raw data into patterns, insights, and action
PRDs and Specs – Clear documents that engineers actually use
Prioritization – Frameworks that make trade-offs explicit and defensible
Competitive Analysis – Systematic intelligence that informs strategy
Stakeholder Communication – Messages adapted for every audience
Launch Planning – Coordinated execution across every team
Product Strategy – The document that ties it all together

Your PM Prompt Library

Save these for ongoing use:

Prompt	Use Case	Lesson
Research Synthesis	After user interviews or surveys	2
JTBD Extraction	Identifying user jobs from research	2
PRD Generator	Starting any new feature spec	3
Acceptance Criteria	Making requirements testable	3
RICE Scoring	Quarterly prioritization	4
Roadmap Builder	Quarterly planning	4
Competitor Brief	Quarterly competitive update	5
SWOT Analysis	Strategic assessment	5
Message Adapter	Any stakeholder communication	6
Product Narrative	Pitching initiatives	6
Launch Plan	Any feature release	7
Sales Enablement	Preparing sales for launches	7
Strategy Document	Annual/quarterly strategy	8
Strategy Review	Quarterly check-ins	8

Exercise: Write Your Strategy Document

Take a product you’re currently working on and write the full strategy document:

Draft each section using the prompts in this lesson
Review the complete document for coherence
Share it with one trusted colleague and ask: “Could you make product decisions using this?”
Refine based on their feedback
Set a calendar reminder for your first quarterly review

The time you invest in this document will save you countless hours of ad-hoc explanations, misaligned priorities, and repeated strategy discussions.

Key Takeaways

A product strategy document is a decision-making tool: if team members can use it to make correct prioritization decisions without asking you, it’s working
The structure: vision, position, user, problems, priorities, competitive position, metrics, roadmap, won’t-do, risks
Strategic priorities should be themes (“reduce time-to-value”) not features (“build onboarding wizard”)
The “won’t do” section prevents scope creep and “but what about” conversations
Review quarterly and update when assumptions change – strategy should be stable but not rigid
Your complete PM prompt library covers research, specs, prioritization, competition, communication, and launches
The strategy document ties every other PM skill together into a coherent system

You’ve completed the Product Management with AI course. Go write your strategy document and share it with your team.