A Wardley Map is a visual tool used to understand and analyze the various components of a business, project, or system in terms of their value to the user and their maturity or evolution. Developed by Simon Wardley, the map helps decision-makers identify opportunities, risks, and strategic options more effectively. It's often used in business strategy, project planning, and technology adoption.

To explain the Wardley Map in layman's terms, let's use a simple example:

Imagine you're the owner of a small bakery. You want to analyze your business and make strategic decisions to stay competitive and grow.

A Wardley Map will help you do this by breaking down your business into its core components and placing them on a grid. The grid has two axes:

1. The horizontal axis represents the evolution of components, ranging from custom-made (Genesis) on the left to standardized or commoditized (Commodity) on the right.

2. The vertical axis represents the value chain, with components closer to the user at the top and those further away (supporting infrastructure) at the bottom.

In the bakery example, you would list components like the following:

• Bread recipes (custom-made or in the Genesis stage)
• Baking equipment (more mature or in the Commodity stage)
• Customer service (closer to the user)
• Supplier management (further from the user)

By placing these components on the Wardley Map, you can visualize their value and maturity, which helps you identify strategic options. For instance, you may decide to:

• Focus on innovative bread recipes to differentiate your bakery
• Invest in more efficient baking equipment to reduce costs
• Improve customer service to enhance the user experience

In summary, a Wardley Map is a visual tool that helps you understand your business, project, or system components, assess their value and maturity, and make informed strategic decisions. By using this map, you can identify areas of opportunity and risk, allocate resources effectively, and stay competitive in your market.

A Wardley Map is a strategic visualization tool created by Simon Wardley to analyze the positioning and evolution of components within a business, project, or system. It enables decision-makers to understand the landscape, identify opportunities, and make informed strategic choices. Wardley Maps are based on principles from various fields, including value chain analysis, situational awareness, and diffusion of innovations.

The Wardley Map is related to other principles and scientific topics as follows:

1. Value Chain Analysis: The vertical axis of a Wardley Map represents the value chain, inspired by Michael Porter's (1985) concept of the value chain, which breaks down the activities within an organization that create value for the end-user. The top of the axis represents user needs, while the bottom represents the supporting infrastructure.

2. Situational Awareness: The Wardley Map aids in understanding the context and landscape of a business or project. It draws from principles of situational awareness, a concept in decision-making and risk management that emphasizes the importance of understanding one's environment and its dynamics (Endsley, 1995).

3. Diffusion of Innovations: The horizontal axis of a Wardley Map represents the evolution of components, which is influenced by the diffusion of innovations theory developed by Everett Rogers (1962). This theory explains how innovations spread through populations and become more standardized or commoditized over time.

4. Clayton Christensen's Disruptive Innovation: Wardley Maps can be used to identify potential disruptive innovations, which are new products or services that initially cater to a niche market but eventually displace established market leaders (Christensen, 1997). The maps can reveal opportunities for disruption by highlighting components that are ripe for innovation and differentiation.

In summary, Wardley Maps are a strategic visualization tool that combines principles from various fields, such as value chain analysis, situational awareness, and diffusion of innovations, to help decision-makers understand their business or project landscape and make informed choices. The maps can reveal opportunities for growth, innovation, and disruption, and they have applications in diverse industries and contexts.

References

• Christensen, C. M. (1997). The Innovator's Dilemma: When New Technologies Cause Great Firms to Fail. Harvard Business Review Press.
• Endsley, M. R. (1995). Toward a theory of situation awareness in dynamic systems. Human Factors, 37(1), 32-64.
• Porter, M. E. (1985). Competitive Advantage: Creating and Sustaining Superior Performance. Free Press.
• Rogers, E. M. (1962). Diffusion of Innovations. Free Press.
• Wardley, S. (2015). An Introduction to Wardley (Value Chain) Mapping. Bits or pieces? [Blog post]. Retrieved from https://blog.gardeviance.org/2015/02/an-introduction-to-wardley-value-chain.html