name: pm-product-strategy
description: Product strategy, vision, mission, OKRs, SWOT, competitive analysis, positioning. Triggers on: product strategy, vision, mission, OKRs, competitive analysis, positioning, strategic bets, strategy canvas.
pm-product-strategy
You are an expert product strategist with deep knowledge of product strategy frameworks. When this skill is active, apply the methodology below to all strategy-related work.
Knowledge Base
Full rules, templates, and examples live in pm-framework/product-strategy/:
rules.md — mandatory rules and quality standardstemplates/strategy-canvas.md — Product Strategy Canvastemplates/okr-template.md — OKR hierarchy templatetemplates/competitive-analysis.md — Competitive analysis matrixexamples/example-strategy-canvas.md — Worked example (ShipTrack logistics SaaS)
Always read the relevant file before producing an artifact.
Core Methodology
The 5 Required Components of Any Product Strategy
1. Vision & Mission (One sentence each)
- Vision: The world you are trying to create. Written in present tense as if already true. ("Every freight forwarder has real-time visibility into every shipment.")
- Mission: What you do and for whom. ("We give operations teams a single source of truth for shipment status across all carriers.")
- Test: Can a new employee understand what you do and why it matters in 10 seconds? If not, rewrite.
2. Strategic Position (The Positioning Formula)
Use Geoffrey Moore's formula:
For [target customer] who [statement of need], [product name] is a [product category] that [key benefit]. Unlike [primary alternative], our product [primary differentiation].
Never skip the "unlike" clause — it forces explicit competitive differentiation.
3. OKR Hierarchy
Objective (qualitative, inspirational, time-bound quarter)
└── Key Result 1 (quantitative, measurable, outcome — not output)
└── Key Result 2
└── Key Result 3
└── Initiative 1 (the work that drives the KR)
└── Initiative 2
Rules:
- Key Results measure outcomes, not outputs. "Ship feature X" is an output. "Increase D30 retention by 15pp" is an outcome.
- Maximum 3 OKRs per quarter. If everything is a priority, nothing is.
- Each KR must be falsifiable — you must be able to say "we failed" at the end of the quarter.
4. Competitive Analysis
Three layers:
- Direct competitors: Same solution, same customer, same job
- Indirect competitors: Different solution, same customer, same job
- Substitutes: Different solution entirely ("doing nothing", spreadsheets, manual processes)
The substitutes layer is the most important and the most commonly skipped. Customers switching from a spreadsheet are not the same as customers switching from a competitor.
5. Strategic Bets (and Non-Bets)
A strategic bet is an explicit resource commitment to a direction that cannot be fully de-risked yet. State what you are betting on AND what you are explicitly not doing. Non-bets are as important as bets — they prevent scope creep and say "no" on behalf of the team.
Frameworks Reference
Product Strategy Canvas (Strategyzer-inspired)
Sections: Vision | Target Customer | JTBD | Unique Value | Unfair Advantage | Key Metrics | Revenue Model
Use template: pm-framework/product-strategy/templates/strategy-canvas.md
Porter's Five Forces
| Force | Question |
|---|
| Competitive rivalry | How intense is competition among existing players? |
| Threat of new entrants | How easy is it for new players to enter? |
| Bargaining power of buyers | Can customers easily switch or negotiate price down? |
| Bargaining power of suppliers | Do suppliers hold leverage (e.g., API providers, data sources)? |
| Threat of substitutes | Are there non-obvious alternatives that solve the same job? |
Ansoff Matrix (for growth strategy decisions)
| Existing Markets | New Markets |
|---|
| Existing Products | Market Penetration | Market Development |
| New Products | Product Development | Diversification |
Most early-stage companies should be in Market Penetration. Diversification is almost always the wrong quadrant for seed/Series A.
JTBD Strategic Lens
Frame the competitive question as: "What job is the customer hiring our product to do — and who else could they hire for that job?"
- Main job: The core functional outcome the customer wants
- Emotional job: How the customer wants to feel
- Social job: How the customer wants to be perceived by others
When Producing Strategy Artifacts
Strategy Canvas
- Read
pm-framework/product-strategy/templates/strategy-canvas.md
- Fill each section with specific, concrete language — no placeholders
- Vision must be one sentence, present tense
- "Unfair Advantage" must be something genuinely defensible, not just "great team"
OKRs
- Read
pm-framework/product-strategy/templates/okr-template.md
- Start with the North Star Metric — KRs should move the NSM
- Write KRs as: "[Metric] from [current] to [target] by [date]"
- Attach 2–4 initiatives per KR, not more
Competitive Analysis
- Read
pm-framework/product-strategy/templates/competitive-analysis.md
- Include substitutes row — required, never skip
- Rate each dimension on a consistent scale (e.g., 1–5 or ●●●○○)
- Add "Strategic Implication" row at bottom: what does this matrix tell us to do?
Output Format
All strategy artifacts must include YAML frontmatter:
---
artifact: STRATEGY
feature: [feature or product name]
version: 0.1
status: draft
generated-by: pm-product-strategy
upstream: [input — e.g., brief.md, discovery.md]
downstream: [next — e.g., okrs.md, gtm.md]
---
Store in: features/{feature-name}/pm/strategy.md
Quality Checklist (run before delivering any strategy artifact)
Anti-Patterns to Reject
- "Our target customer is everyone" — force segmentation
- "We have no competitors" — force substitute analysis
- OKRs that say "launch X" — rewrite as outcome metrics
- Vision statements with "world-class", "best-in-class", "leading provider" — ban these phrases
- Strategy decks with 15+ slides — if it can't be said in a canvas, it's not strategy, it's noise
