Building Abstraction Skills for Wardley Mapping

Wardley Mapping is simple in concept: users, their needs, and the components that fulfill them — placed on a map of visibility and evolution.

But the hardest part is deciding what to put on the map. This is where abstraction skill comes in.

This tutorial gives you a progression of exercises to sharpen that skill.

Why Mapping Feels Difficult

Most people struggle with Wardley Mapping not because the concept is complex, but because they get stuck at the wrong level of abstraction. When your abstraction is off, you miss the core benefits that make mapping powerful:

Pattern Recognition Fails: At the wrong abstraction level, you can't see the evolutionary patterns that drive strategic decisions. A map with "PostgreSQL database" and "MongoDB collection" won't reveal that both are commoditizing data storage solutions.

Strategic Clarity Disappears: Too much detail drowns the big picture. Too little detail makes the map useless for decision-making. You need the sweet spot where components are specific enough to act on, but abstract enough to show strategic relationships.

Communication Breaks Down: Different stakeholders need different abstraction levels. A map that works for engineers will overwhelm executives. A map for executives will frustrate implementers who need actionable detail.

Evolution Tracking Becomes Impossible: When components are too specific ("AWS RDS instance"), you can't track how the broader category ("managed database services") is evolving. When they're too vague ("technology"), you can't see meaningful change at all.

The right abstraction level unlocks the full power of Wardley Mapping: revealing competitive dynamics, identifying strategic opportunities, and guiding confident decision-making.

Building Your Abstraction Skills

The following exercises will help you develop the judgment to find that sweet spot — creating maps that show essential components while hiding distracting details.

Step 1: Start with Over-Detail, Then Strip Down

Take a problem space (e.g., "ordering pizza online").

Write down everything involved: pizza oven, flour, delivery scooter, internet, payment processor, etc.

Now force yourself to reduce it to 5–7 components that matter most.

Step 2: Practice User-Need Distillation

Collect customer "wants" from reviews or interviews (e.g., "I want my food hot," "I hate waiting," "I don't want to talk to anyone").

Abstract these into core needs: "convenience," "speed," "reliability."

Map components only for those needs.

Step 3: Translate Details into Classes

Wardley Maps don't care if it's a Dell server, AWS EC2, or your uncle's basement rack. All of these abstract to "compute."

Step 4: Use "Ladder of Abstraction" Thinking

Test each component with these questions:

• Too low-level? (e.g., "10GB RAM stick") → collapse it
• Too high-level? (e.g., "business value") → break it into tangible services
• Just right? → supports the user need and can evolve on the map

Step 5: Cross-Domain Transfer

To build abstraction, practice mapping outside business:

• Make a map of brewing coffee
• Make a map of planning a vacation
• Make a map of organizing a protest

These familiar domains free you from jargon and sharpen your ability to choose meaningful abstractions.

Step 6: Practice Redrawing the Same System

Abstraction is context-dependent. The same system looks different depending on purpose.

• Investor map: abstract to "customer acquisition" and "retention"
• Engineer map: zoom in on "API gateways" and "CI/CD pipelines"

Step 7: Reflection Loop

After each map, ask:

• Did I drown in detail?
• Did I oversimplify and lose important dependencies?
• Could someone else act on this map?

This feedback loop is where your abstraction sharpens.

Progression Plan

Week 1–2: Do "strip-down" and "distillation" drills

• Practice the three-level abstraction exercise
• Work on need compression from customer feedback

Week 3–4: Practice category translation and ladder of abstraction checks

• Abstract technology lists to functional categories
• Review components for appropriate abstraction levels

Week 5–6: Do weekly "non-business maps"

• Map familiar activities like cooking, cleaning, or hobbies
• Focus on finding the right level of detail

Ongoing: Redraw systems from different stakeholder perspectives

• Create multiple views of the same system
• Compare abstractions across different audiences

Key Takeaways

👉 Abstraction in mapping is a skill you train by repeatedly compressing, reframing, and testing your components until they fit the purpose of the map.

The right abstraction level depends on:

• Who will use the map (executives vs. engineers)
• What decision needs to be made (strategic vs. tactical)
• What context is available (familiar vs. unfamiliar domain)

Next Steps

• Practice the drills in this guide with your own business problems
• Start with the three-level abstraction exercise
• Try mapping a familiar non-business activity
• Review your existing maps using the reflection checklist

Remember: abstraction is a muscle that gets stronger with practice. The more you compress, reframe, and test your components, the better your maps will become.