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name: strategic-narrative-generator description: "Generate the strategic story connecting a product roadmap to company goals in a form non-technical stakeholders can repeat. Use when asked to explain the roadmap, present strategy to leadership or the board, write the why behind the roadmap, create a narrative for all-hands, or make the roadmap tell a story. Produces a themed narrative with executive summary, progression arc, hard-question preparation, and what's-not-on-the-roadmap section."

Strategic Narrative Generator Skill

Turn a prioritised initiative list into a strategic narrative — the story that explains not just what you're building but why, why now, and why this sequence.

Required Inputs

Work from what is given. If any of these is missing, still produce the complete output: fill each gap with a reasonable assumption marked (assumed, confirm) and list those assumptions at the end. Ask a question first only when the core subject itself is missing (there is nothing to write about).

• Prioritised initiative list (with rough timelines)
• Current OKRs or strategic priorities (1-3)
• Audience (board, leadership team, all-hands, investors)
• Competitive or market context (optional but improves output significantly)

Process

1. Identify 2-3 natural strategic themes from the initiative list
2. For each theme: articulate the problem, the customer it serves, and the metric it moves
3. Build the progression narrative: how does Q1 set up Q2? How does H1 set up H2?
4. Write executive summary in under 100 words (the version someone can repeat)
5. Anticipate the 3 hardest questions a sceptical board member would ask — draft answers
6. Identify what's NOT on the roadmap and why
7. Validate — Confirm every initiative maps to a theme. If an initiative is orphaned, either create a theme for it or flag it as a narrative gap.

Output Structure

Product Strategy Narrative: [Period]

The One-Paragraph Context: [Market moment + key challenge + our response — for the CFO, not the engineer]

Strategic Theme 1: [Name]

• The problem: [customer pain in plain language]
• Our response: [initiatives in this theme]
• The metric it moves: [specific and measurable]
• Why now: [timing rationale]

Strategic Theme 2: [Name] [Same structure]

The Progression Story: [How each quarter sets up the next — this is the narrative arc]

Executive Summary (under 100 words — shareable): [Version someone can quote at a board meeting]

Questions to Prepare For:

1. [Hard question] → [Prepared answer]
2. [Hard question] → [Prepared answer]
3. [Hard question] → [Prepared answer]

What's Not on the Roadmap (and Why): [2-3 items — shows strategic discipline, not just prioritisation]

Tone

• Write for a CFO, not an engineer
• Lead with outcomes, not features
• Every sentence should answer "so what?"
• Avoid jargon — if you can't say it plainly, the strategy isn't clear enough yet

Quality Checks

• Executive summary is under 100 words and can stand alone
• Every initiative in the input maps to a strategic theme
• Each theme has a specific, measurable metric (not "improve engagement")
• Progression story shows causal links between quarters, not just chronological listing
• "Not on the roadmap" section includes at least 2 items with clear rationale

Anti-Patterns

• Do not produce a narrative that lists initiatives chronologically without showing causal progression — the story must show why each phase enables the next
• Do not use abstract strategic language that cannot be repeated by a non-technical listener — test whether someone could explain it back without the document
• Do not omit the "what's not on the roadmap" section — what you are choosing not to do is as important as what you are doing
• Do not set themes without measurable metrics — a theme without a metric cannot be tracked or held to account
• Do not skip the hard questions section — preparing for objections in advance is the purpose of the narrative exercise

Example Trigger Phrases

• "Explain the roadmap."
• "Write the why behind the roadmap."
• "Create a narrative for all-hands."
• "Make the roadmap tell a story."