Wardley Mapping

Wardley Mapping, created by Simon Wardley, is a strategic planning tool that visualizes the components needed to serve a user need, mapped against their evolutionary stage. It helps you see your competitive landscape, identify strategic opportunities, and make better build-vs-buy decisions.

1. Start with a user need — What need are you serving? Place it at the top of the map.
2. Map the value chain — List all the components needed to serve that need. Arrange them vertically by visibility (user-facing at top, infrastructure at bottom). Draw dependency lines.
3. Plot evolution — Place each component on the horizontal axis based on its evolutionary stage:

• Genesis — Novel, uncertain, changing rapidly
• Custom-Built — Understood but requires bespoke development
• Product (+Rental) — Available as products or services
• Commodity (+Utility) — Standardized, ubiquitous, often pay-per-use

1. Identify movement — Components naturally evolve left to right over time. Which components are about to shift?
2. Make strategic decisions:

• Build what's in Genesis (competitive advantage)
• Buy or rent what's a Commodity (don't reinvent the wheel)
• Watch for components about to become commoditized

• User Need: Project management (top, visible)
• → Custom UI/UX (Custom-Built) — your differentiator
• → Task management engine (Product) — well-understood problem
• → User authentication (Commodity) — use Auth0 or similar
• → Compute infrastructure (Utility) — use AWS/GCP
• → Electricity (Utility) — fully commoditized

Wardley Mapping helps you see the strategic landscape clearly and make informed decisions about where to invest, what to build vs. buy, and how the market will evolve. It prevents wasting resources on components that should be commoditized.