Opportunity Solution Tree Template
Visualise your opportunities and the decisions you're making along the way
About the Opportunity Solution Tree template
The Opportunity Solution Tree template helps product teams to improve the way they solve problems and reach their desired outcomes. Designed by Teresa Torres, a product discovery coach, this tree aims to methodically move teams through the steps needed to reach a final solution. Teresa Torres's opportunity solution tree breaks down a desired outcome into opportunities for the product to meet user needs and then suggests potential solutions to meet these needs.
Why use an opportunity solution tree?
Product teams may find this template useful if they are able to produce a lot of ideas, but can’t prioritize which ideas are actually of quality. An opportunity solution tree is a tool that product teams can use to assess if they are considering all potential solutions to reach their desired end. It then provides clear solutions at the end of the exercise that can be compared and contrasted for most value.
What is an opportunity in the opportunity solution tree?
Brainstorms tend to lead to a lot of solutions off the bat without any clear logic to whether the solution is a valuable one. Opportunities are a way for product teams to add in the layer of customer needs in order to better connect solutions to what will really help a user. By adding in the step of identifying opportunities, the ideas your team generates will be based on identified needs rather than an arbitrary solution.
What is product discovery?
Product discovery is a framework to help teams create useful, usable products that don’t overlook true user need. Using the Opportunity Solution Tree template is one way to start improving your product discovery.
How do I build an Opportunity Solution Tree?
Creating an opportunity solution tree is easy with Miro's tree diagram maker or ready-made template. Simply follow these steps.
Step 1: Define your outcome or measurable result
Simply put, what does success look like? If you use OKRs, then you can use one of your Key Results to answer this question. If you don’t, then you’ll need to pick a metric that you’d like to improve. Of course, many teams are striving to achieve many goals each quarter, but it helps to create a separate tree for each goal.
It’s important for your team to agree on this goal before you proceed to the next step. If you’re misaligned from the beginning, then it’s going to be harder to build the rest of the tree.
Step 2: Identify possible opportunities
For goal-oriented people, the temptation to jump from “problem” to “solution” is sizable. But resist that temptation. Instead, it’s time to pause and do some research.
Building an Opportunity Solution Tree is all about identifying key opportunities in your market. That means learning: about customers, about what they need, about the problems that they are trying to solve. Focus on answering these questions before you fill out this portion of the tree.
Armed with insights about your customers, you can begin to find opportunities. Use your research to fill out this second branch of the tree. Don’t be fooled: although this branch isn’t about your solutions, it’s still vitally important. Each branch of the tree builds on the previous, so if your research isn’t robust, your opportunities and solutions won’t be robust either.
Step 3: Generate solutions
Now it’s time to think of solutions. This is where the Opportunity Solution Tree template really comes to life for your team. When you go around the room to share ideas during a meeting, myriad dynamics are in play. People might be more or less likely to share based on their rank, role, or who’s in the room. The Opportunity Solutions Tree is an unbiased, agreed-upon source of truth that everyone can own and contribute to.
Invite cross-functional partners to contribute to this part of the tree. Let the ideas flow! However, be wary of including anything that doesn’t fit in the tree. It’s important to stay focused so you don’t end up with more ideas than resources. Write down those extraneous ideas and save them for later. If your team gets lost or stuck, return to the tree to ground you.
Step 4: Iterate and experiment
Choose one solution and once you have some ideas, you can start testing them out. Build a row on the tree specifically for experiments. Start brainstorming experiments that will enable you to test the chosen solution.
How do you use a solution tree?
The opportunity solution tree helps you to visualize the best path to your desired outcome. Use the solution tree to map out the possible opportunities to solve your problem and keep track of the actionable experiments that will lead to your desired outcome.
Get started with this template right now.
Bar Chart / Diagram Combined
Works best for:
Diagramming
The Bar Chart / Diagram Combined template offers a versatile tool for creating visualizations that combine bar charts with other diagrammatic elements. It provides elements for representing data trends, relationships, and comparisons effectively. This template enables teams to create customized visualizations that communicate complex information in a clear and compelling manner. By promoting visual clarity and insight, the Bar Chart / Diagram Combined template empowers teams to make data-driven decisions and communicate findings with impact.
UML Class E-Commerce System Template
Works best for:
UML
The UML Class E-Commerce System Template streamlines the process of creating and visualizing the class structure of an e-commerce system. It provides a comprehensive framework that includes typical online shop features such as product listings, inventory management, shopping carts, orders, payments, and shipping details. This template facilitates a clear understanding of how these elements interact during an online sales transaction, making it an invaluable tool for teams working on e-commerce projects. By using this template, teams can save time, enhance collaboration, and ensure that their system architecture is robust and efficient, ready to adapt to their business's evolving needs.
Lotus Diagram Template
Works best for:
UX Design, Ideation, Diagrams
Even creative thinkers occasionally need help getting their creative juices flowing. That's where a lotus diagram comes in. It'll empower you to run smoother, more effective brainstorming sessions. This creative-thinking technique explores ideas by putting the main idea at the diagram center and ancillary concepts in the surrounding boxes. This template gives you an easy way to create Lotus Diagrams for brainstorms, as well as an infinite canvas for the endless ideas generated.
Mental Model Template
Works best for:
Business Management, Mind Mapping, Diagrams
Smart solutions and strong, strategic decisions. The best organizations make both, and a mental model is designed to help them do it. We give you a fast and easy way to try it out — just fill out our ready-made, flexible template and add sticky notes, shapes, and arrows to create a powerful map.
Phylogenetic Tree Template
Works best for:
Diagramming
The Phylogenetic Tree Template is a powerful tool that allows scientists and researchers to visualize evolutionary relationships between species. It is a visual representation of the history of the evolution of life on Earth and helps users identify the relationships between other organisms and their ancestors. The key benefit of this template is that it organizes complex data and makes it more understandable to everyone. Additionally, it offers an efficient way to collect and analyze data, saving time and effort and enabling users to identify significant patterns and relationships in the data.
AWS Git to S3 Webhooks Template
Works best for:
Software Development, Diagrams
The AWS Git to S3 Webhooks Template is a visual representation of Git webhooks with AWS services Quick Start architecture. You can now have an overview of your AWS architecture with Miro’s AWS Git to S3 Webhooks Template, track your cloud solutions easily, and optimize processes like never before.