Product Roadmap vs Product Backlog: Different Tools, Different Jobs

Here’s a statement that will get me in trouble: teams that try to use Jira for their roadmap are doomed to fail.

Not because Jira is bad software. It’s excellent at what it does. But what it does is manage backlogs—tactical lists of work to be done. A roadmap is something entirely different: a strategic document that explains how you’ll allocate your most valuable resource (engineering capacity) to achieve business outcomes.

The confusion between roadmaps and backlogs is so pervasive that I encounter it in nearly every product organisation I advise. Teams either have no roadmap (just a backlog with dates), or they have both but can’t explain how they connect, or they’ve tried to jam strategic planning into a tool built for tactical execution.

Let me clear this up.

The Core Distinction

A roadmap answers: “What outcomes are we pursuing, who is pursuing them, and when?”

A backlog answers: “What specific work items do we need to complete, in what order?”

These questions sound similar but operate at completely different levels:

A roadmap without a backlog is strategy without execution. A backlog without a roadmap is activity without direction. You need both.

What a Roadmap Should Contain

A product roadmap should show:

1. Objectives (Outcomes to Achieve)

Not features. Outcomes . “Increase conversion from 15% to 25%” not “Build new checkout flow.”

This keeps the roadmap at the right altitude. Features are hypotheses for achieving outcomes—they belong in discovery and eventually the backlog, not on the roadmap.

2. Ownership (Who Is Pursuing Each Objective)

Which squad or team owns each objective? This is critical for accountability and capacity planning.

Without ownership, roadmap items are wishes. With ownership, they’re commitments.

3. Timing (When Work Happens)

Not specific dates—time periods. Q1, Q2, Sprint 1-3. Enough precision to understand sequencing and capacity allocation, without false precision that will be wrong anyway.

4. Strategic Context

Why these objectives? How do they connect to company goals? What trade-offs have been made?

The roadmap should be legible to someone who wasn’t in the planning sessions.

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What a Backlog Should Contain

A product backlog should show:

1. Work Items (Stories, Tasks, Bugs)

Specific, implementable pieces of work. “As a user, I can reset my password” or “Refactor payment processing module.”

2. Prioritisation

What’s next? The backlog should be ordered so the team knows what to pull when capacity frees up.

3. Acceptance Criteria

How do we know when this item is done? What must be true for it to be complete?

4. Context and Dependencies

Why is this item important? What does it depend on? What depends on it?

Why Jira Can’t Be Your Roadmap

I’m not anti-Jira. We have an excellent integration with Jira at RoadmapOne . But Jira’s job is backlog management, not strategic planning.

Here’s why using Jira as your roadmap fails:

1. Wrong Granularity

Jira is built for stories and tasks. When you try to do strategic planning in Jira, you either:

• Create “epic” items that are really objectives (but then you have epics containing epics, and the hierarchy becomes confusing)
• Keep objectives vague to fit the format (but then they’re not measurable or actionable)

The tool pulls you toward tactical granularity. Fighting it is exhausting.

2. Wrong Audience

Jira is designed for engineers and delivery teams. The interface, the terminology, the workflows—all optimised for tracking work items.

When you ask leadership or the board to review the roadmap in Jira, you’re asking them to learn a tool built for someone else. They won’t do it. They’ll ask for a PowerPoint export, defeating the purpose.

3. No Capacity View

Jira shows you what’s in the backlog. It doesn’t show you:

• How much capacity each team has
• Whether the backlog fits in available capacity
• What you’d have to cut if capacity decreases

Roadmaps need capacity visibility . Jira doesn’t provide it natively (though some add-ons try).

4. Wrong Planning Rhythm

Backlogs are groomed continuously—weekly or more often. Roadmaps are planned periodically—quarterly or annually.

When the roadmap lives in the same tool as the backlog, it gets pulled into the backlog rhythm. It becomes a list of features that changes weekly, not a strategic commitment that changes quarterly.

How They Connect

Roadmaps and backlogs should be separate but connected:

Roadmap (RoadmapOne)
├── Objective: Increase conversion to 25%
│   ├── Owner: Growth Squad
│   ├── Timing: Q1
│   └── Key Results: Activation rate, time-to-value
│
↓ (Links to)
│
Backlog (Jira)
├── Epic: Onboarding Improvements
│   ├── Story: Add progress indicator to signup
│   ├── Story: Send welcome email sequence
│   ├── Story: Simplify account setup flow
│   └── Story: Add contextual help tooltips

The roadmap shows WHAT outcomes are being pursued and by whom. The backlog shows WHAT specific work is being done to achieve those outcomes.

The link between them is bidirectional:

• Roadmap → Backlog: “This objective drives these epics/stories”
• Backlog → Roadmap: “This work contributes to this objective”

The Two-Document Test

Here’s a quick diagnostic. Can you answer these questions?

Roadmap questions (strategic):

• What are our top 3 objectives this quarter?
• Who owns each objective?
• How do these objectives connect to company goals?
• If we have to cut 20% of scope, what goes?

Backlog questions (tactical):

• What stories are we working on this sprint?
• What’s the definition of done for each?
• What’s blocked and why?
• What’s ready to pull when capacity frees?

If you can’t answer both sets, you have a gap. If you’re using one document to answer both, that document is probably confused.

The Handoff Problem

The trickiest part of roadmap/backlog separation is the handoff: how does a roadmap Objective become backlog items?

Bad Handoff: Direct Translation

Roadmap says “Build recommendation engine.” Backlog immediately contains stories for building a recommendation engine.

This skips discovery. It assumes the solution before validating the problem. It’s feature factory behaviour.

Good Handoff: Discovery Layer

Roadmap says “Increase average order value by 15%.” Team runs discovery:

• User research on cross-selling behaviour
• Data analysis on purchase patterns
• Prototype testing of different approaches
• Validation that recommendations would actually work

THEN, if recommendations are validated, stories go into the backlog.

The roadmap commits to outcomes. Discovery validates solutions. The backlog contains validated work.

For more on this flow, see product discovery in roadmaps .

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What Goes Where: A Practical Guide

The grey area is tech debt. Small tech debt items go in the backlog. Large tech debt initiatives (platform migrations, architecture overhauls) might warrant roadmap-level objectives.

The Altitude Rule

A helpful mental model: roadmap items should be recognisable to your CEO. Backlog items should be actionable by your engineers.

If you’re putting things on your roadmap that your CEO wouldn’t understand (“Refactor the notification service”), it’s probably too tactical.

If you’re putting things in your backlog that your engineers can’t act on (“Improve customer experience”), it’s probably too strategic.

Common Patterns That Indicate Confusion

“Our roadmap IS our Jira board”

You don’t have a roadmap. You have a backlog that you’re showing to stakeholders. They’re probably confused.

“We maintain roadmap and backlog separately but they don’t connect”

You have strategy and execution that aren’t linked. Work is happening that doesn’t connect to objectives. Objectives exist that nobody is pursuing.

“Our roadmap has 200 items”

That’s a backlog. A roadmap should have 10-30 objectives. If you have 200, you’ve collapsed the levels.

“Our epics are our roadmap items”

This can work if epics are truly outcomes (“Improve retention”) not features (“Build churn prediction”). But Jira’s epic concept often drifts toward features.

“We use Jira Advanced Roadmaps for strategic planning”

Advanced Roadmaps helps with timeline views and dependencies but still operates at backlog granularity. You’re visualising your backlog better, not doing strategic planning.

Making the Separation Work

Step 1: Create a Real Roadmap

Use a tool designed for roadmaps (like RoadmapOne, Productboard, or even a well-structured Notion page). Put outcomes on it, not features.

Step 2: Link Roadmap Objectives to Backlog Epics

When an objective drives specific work, link them. The roadmap objective “Improve conversion” connects to the Jira epic “Onboarding improvements.”

Step 3: Maintain Both at Different Cadences

Roadmap: quarterly planning, monthly check-ins. Backlog: weekly grooming, sprint planning.

Don’t mix the rhythms.

Step 4: Present the Right Document to the Right Audience

Board meeting: roadmap. Sprint planning: backlog. Stakeholder update: roadmap. Engineering standup: backlog.

The Two-Way Integrity Check

Periodically ask:

Roadmap → Backlog: “For each roadmap objective, what backlog work is connected to it?”

If an objective has no connected work, either:

• Work is happening but not linked (fix the link)
• Nobody is actually pursuing this objective (cut it or assign it)

Backlog → Roadmap: “For each major backlog epic, what roadmap objective does it serve?”

If an epic doesn’t serve an objective, either:

• It serves an implicit objective (make it explicit)
• It’s work without strategic purpose (reconsider it)

Conclusion

Product roadmaps and backlogs are both essential—but they’re not interchangeable.

Roadmaps are strategic documents that show what outcomes you’re pursuing, who owns them, and when. They’re for leadership and stakeholders.

Backlogs are tactical documents that show what specific work needs to be done. They’re for delivery teams.

Collapsing them into one document—or worse, using a backlog tool as your roadmap—creates confusion at both levels. Strategy becomes too granular. Tactics lose strategic context.

Keep them separate. Link them clearly. Present each to its intended audience.

And please, stop using Jira as your roadmap.