Tools of the Trade: Visualizing Discovery with Opportunity Solution Trees

Teresa Torres surveys how product teams build and maintain opportunity solution trees, the visual map linking a desired outcome to opportunities and candidate solutions. She interviewed six practitioners about the tools they use, including FigJam/Figma, Miro and Vistaly, and their favorite features and tips. The piece shows that tool choice is flexible: some tools are freeform and others opinionated, and each has trade-offs around manual data entry, clutter and stakeholder communication. Its main point is that the best tool is one the whole product trio can access and update, and that learning comes mostly from building and revising trees.

01Key takeaways

• Pick the tool your whole product trio can easily access and update, not just the most feature-rich option.
• Build a strong grounding in opportunity solution tree theory before choosing how freeform your tool should be.
• Share only the relevant branch of your tree with stakeholders to avoid overwhelming them.
• Use summaries or containers to keep large boards readable for people outside product.
• Expect to learn by making a rough tree, discarding it and rebuilding rather than aiming for perfection first.
• Consider where your team is in its continuous discovery journey when deciding between opinionated and flexible tools.

02Key sections

FigJam and Figma for trios

Two practitioners at different companies use FigJam for collaborative whiteboarding alongside Figma for design. They value templates and ease of use, but note manual data entry and messy boards over time.

Miro's freedom and its cost

Miro's freeform canvas and PDF export make it flexible, but practitioners say users need a solid grasp of the theory to avoid getting stuck on structural choices.

Vistaly as a purpose-built tool

Vistaly is built specifically for opportunity solution trees and guides users toward consistent behavior and linking discovery to outcomes and metrics. Its rigidity can frustrate teams that want more control.

Choosing and sharing trees

The best tool is the one the whole trio can easily use, and stakeholder updates should show only relevant parts of the tree to avoid overwhelm.

Learning by building

Nearly everyone learned to build trees through trial, error and course correction, regardless of tool.

03From the post

“The opportunity solution tree helps visualize all the work that goes into continuous discovery. Instead of relying on someone else (like a coach or leader) to tell them what to do next, product teams can use an opportunity solution tree to keep track of their desired outcome, the opportunities they’”

04Frameworks mentioned

Summary and takeaways written by PM Atlas; quotes are short excerpts. © the original author.