Roadmap Feature Analysis: Viewing ‘Roadmaps’ as Maps

Roadmapping, a versatile strategy development and planning method, produces visual outputs known as ‘roadmaps’. As the roadmapping approach gains popularity, the diversity of roadmap designs grows. This exploratory study examines how roadmap visuals can be analyzed and classified based on their features. In order to analyze hundreds of roadmap visuals, this study proposes a new integrative method that is grounded in qualitative content analysis and analytical approaches used in geographical visualizations. The proposed method treats roadmaps as geographical maps, focusing on noticing, comparing, and interpreting the shapes, lines, arrows, and other features of the representations. The application of the new method in this study has resulted in the proposal of a feature-based four-level classification hierarchy for roadmaps. The classification hierarchy contributes to the understanding of the forms that roadmaps can take, supporting design choices for roadmap development in different contexts. This study has opened up new research directions for communities interested in roadmapping and visual representation for strategy communications in general.