Framework: Use 'Opportunity Solution Trees' for Stakeholder Alignment
To turn stakeholder meetings from battles into partnerships, product expert Teresa Torres recommends using Opportunity Solution Trees. The framework starts with shared outcomes and invites collaboration by asking "did we miss anything?" — a tactic to present engineering roadmaps without combative "big reveals."
Product discovery coach Teresa Torres introduced the Opportunity Solution Tree in 2016, grounding it in a broader philosophy of "Continuous Discovery Habits." This approach advocates for, at a minimum, weekly touchpoints with customers by the team that is building the product to inform their decisions. The framework is a visual model with four core components: a measurable desired outcome at the top, customer opportunities (unmet needs or pain points), multiple potential solutions for each opportunity, and the specific experiments designed to test the assumptions of those solutions.
