Are We Still Doing Discovery - or Just Validating Decisions?
by•
A slightly uncomfortable question:
Are we still doing product discovery - or mostly validating decisions we already made?
As teams grow, processes get heavier, but it sometimes feels like real exploration gets lost.
We’ve been thinking about how Athena could push teams
back toward actual discovery - not just confirmation.
How honest do you think discovery really is today?
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Replies
From a UX Researcher & GTM lens- hard to say and I don’t think we’ll ever know
But the guardrails we can put in place for more authentic responses is to:
• Do research in the company/person and act like a consultant to empathize with who you’re doing discovery with
• continuously ship and continually put in front of users > gather user feedback
• product will always change so it’s never perfect so keep on shipping!
Athena
@rvalenz I really relate to what you’re saying, especially the idea that we probably never fully know what’s “truth” and what isn’t.
What I do feel can be improved is not trying to make discovery overly “precise,” but keeping it a bit more like a real exploration process with friction - less validation and more real-time testing of assumptions.
And the continuous shipping + feedback loop is probably the only thing that actually keeps it alive today.
mostly validating honestly. the language of discovery is there but the outcome is usually predetermined. someone senior has a strong intuition, discovery gets run to confirm it, and anything that contradicts gets deprioritised.
Unless a discovery or validation you are trying to do cannot disprove some preconceived notions, you either need more discovery or rethink what you want to build.
Athena
@varun_dhamija1 I completely agree, this is exactly the most common issue - you start with a “direction” and then run discovery and find the right data to prove it’s right.
And at that point, it’s no longer really discovery, it’s validation with a nicer name.
If discovery can’t actually disprove what you already believe - then it’s probably not real discovery anymore, or you need to pause and rethink what you’re actually trying to build.
And this is also exactly the space we tried to solve with Athena - bringing that stage back to being less about confirming decisions and more about creating a space that can actually surprise you.
Athena
@luo_he This is accurate, especially the part about “I just want someone to tell me my idea is good.”
I think it’s one of the most human parts of building, especially when you’re solo, trying to turn uncertainty into reassurance as fast as possible.
But real growth really comes from exactly what you’re describing - staying with the possibility that it might not be right, and actually sitting with that instead of jumping straight into “it is right.”