Impact Mapping is Gojko Adzic's collaborative planning technique, described in his 2012 book, that links what a team builds to a business goal across four levels: Goal, Actors, Impacts and Deliverables, answering Why, Who, How and What. Drawn as a mind map, it makes assumptions explicit, prevents scope creep by tying every deliverable to a goal, and serves as a goal-oriented alternative to feature roadmaps.

Impact Mapping

Details
Full Name

Impact Mapping according to Gojko Adzic

Core Concepts:

Four levels

Goal → Actors → Impacts → Deliverables

Goal

Business objective (Why?)

Actors

Who can produce or prevent desired impact? (Who?)

Impacts

How can actors' behavior change? (How?)

Deliverables

What can we build? (What?)

Visual mapping

Mind-map style collaborative diagram

Assumption testing

Make assumptions explicit

Scope management

Prevent scope creep by linking to goals

Roadmap alternative

Goal-oriented rather than feature-oriented

Key Proponent

Gojko Adzic ("Impact Mapping", 2012)

When to Use:

  • Strategic planning for products or projects

  • When stakeholders disagree on priorities

  • Aligning delivery with business outcomes

  • Avoiding building features that don’t serve business goals