Anchor a value chain map on a specific, verifiable user need rather than an internal capability.
Leadership & Management
Wardley Mapping for Strategy and Situational Awareness
Trains managers to build Wardley Maps that anchor strategy on user needs and component evolution, so investment, build-or-buy and disruption decisions rest on situational awareness rather than opinion.
🗓️Duration5 training days
📚Content4 modules · 8 sessions
🎓On completionAccredited attendance certificate
About the programme
Course Overview
Most strategy discussions run on opinion because there is no shared picture of the landscape being discussed, and disagreements about priorities are often disagreements about a map nobody has drawn. This course teaches Wardley Mapping as a practical tool for building that shared picture: anchoring a value chain on a genuine user need, positioning each component by its visibility to the user and its evolutionary stage from genesis through to commodity, and reading the movement created as components industrialise over time. Participants learn to recognise climatic patterns such as commoditisation and inertia, apply Wardley's doctrine of universally useful practices before reaching for competitive gameplay, and use a completed map to make specific decisions about what to build in-house, what to buy as a product, and what to treat as a utility. The course includes hands-on mapping exercises based on real organisational landscapes and practical guidance on facilitating a mapping workshop with a leadership team, including the common mistakes that make early maps useless. Participants leave able to build, defend and iterate a map for a live strategic question in their own organisation.
Expected Learning Outcomes
Position components on the evolution axis from genesis through to commodity and utility.
Recognise climatic patterns such as commoditisation, co-evolution and organisational inertia on a map.
Apply universal doctrine, including common language and transparency, before selecting gameplay.
Use a completed map to inform build, buy, outsource or disrupt decisions for specific components.
Facilitate a mapping workshop with a leadership team using a shared, anchored value chain.
Iterate a map over time to track how components evolve and where strategy should adjust.
Who Should Attend
Senior managers and directors responsible for technology or operational strategy.
Strategy and transformation leads facilitating landscape and portfolio discussions.
Product and platform leaders deciding what to build, buy or treat as commodity.
Enterprise architects supporting investment and sourcing decisions.
Leadership teams seeking a shared, visual basis for strategic disagreement.
Consultants and internal strategists introducing mapping techniques to client teams.
Course Modules
Select any module to see its sessions and points.
01Foundations of Wardley Mapping
2 sessions · 8 points
Session 1Anchoring the Map on a Genuine User Need
- Define a specific user need precise enough to anchor a value chain without drifting to abstraction.
- Build a value chain that traces visible components down to the invisible dependencies beneath them.
- Position each component on the visibility axis according to distance from the anchoring user need.
- Test whether a proposed component actually serves the anchor need or has quietly substituted another.
Session 2Mapping Evolution from Genesis to Commodity
- Place each component on the evolution axis from genesis through custom-built to product and commodity.
- Use characteristics such as certainty, ubiquity and market data to judge a component's evolutionary stage.
- Distinguish a genuinely novel component from a mature one that is simply unfamiliar to the team.
- Recognise the common error of placing every component in the same evolutionary stage by default.
02Reading Movement and Applying Doctrine
2 sessions · 8 points
Session 1Recognising Climatic Patterns and Inertia
- Identify commoditisation pressure moving a component from product towards utility over time.
- Spot organisational inertia that resists evolving a component even after the market has moved.
- Trace co-evolution effects where a new practice changes the user needs built on top of it.
- Anticipate how a competitor's evolutionary move could reshape the map's landscape.
Session 2Applying Doctrine Before Strategic Gameplay
- Apply universal doctrine, such as knowing your users and using a common language across teams.
- Check basic hygiene, including removing bias and using appropriate methods, before acting on the map.
- Sequence doctrine implementation before layering competitive gameplay on top of it.
- Identify doctrine failures that would undermine any gameplay chosen later regardless of skill.
03Using Maps for Strategic Decisions
2 sessions · 8 points
Session 1Choosing Gameplay: Build, Buy, Outsource or Disrupt
- Match a component's evolutionary stage to a sourcing decision of build, buy, rent or utility.
- Select competitive gameplay, such as exploiting network effects, appropriate to a commodity component.
- Identify components worth disrupting through open approaches rather than defending as proprietary.
- Avoid applying innovation-stage investment to a component that has already become a commodity.
Session 2Prioritising Investment from the Map
- Rank investment priorities by combining a component's evolutionary stage with its strategic value.
- Identify components consuming disproportionate investment relative to their commodity status.
- Use the map to justify reallocating budget from mature components towards genesis-stage bets.
- Present a mapped investment case to stakeholders who have not seen the underlying landscape.
04Facilitating Mapping in Practice
2 sessions · 8 points
Session 1Running a Mapping Workshop with a Leadership Team
- Facilitate a mapping session that keeps a leadership team anchored on one user need throughout.
- Manage disagreement about a component's position using evidence rather than seniority.
- Avoid the common failure of producing a map too abstract to inform any real decision.
- Close a workshop with at least one concrete decision the map has directly informed.
Session 2Iterating Maps and Embedding Situational Awareness
- Schedule a fixed interval to revisit and update the map as components evolve.
- Compare a current map against a previous version to track the landscape's actual movement.
- Introduce mapping as a recurring input to planning cycles rather than a one-off exercise.
- Train a second facilitator so mapping capability does not depend on a single person.
What the participant receives
4 course modules
A structured syllabus
8 training sessions
across 5 days
32 detailed points
Applied, detailed content
Accredited attendance certificate
On completing the programme
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