Before you build: How discovery sets a project up for success

​The discovery phase is where you make sure you’re building the right thing. Before you commission work or commit to a solution, there's a process of listening (to your organisation, your users, and the evidence) that makes everything that follows more focused, more useful, and less expensive.

​In this 35-minute session, Richard Rowley (Discovery Lead at Agile Collective) walks through how we approach that process in practice.

​What we'll cover

​The organisation. How to surface and align around what you're actually trying to achieve — before competing priorities and unclear success criteria derail a project from the inside.

​The user. Why genuine user empathy isn't a UX nicety but a basic quality-control mechanism — and how even a small amount of real listening can change things.

​The problem. How to take what you've learned and define the right challenge: not the one in the original brief, but the one that's actually worth solving.

​We'll look at a real project where discovery reshaped the direction entirely, and at the practical outputs a good discovery process produces, from agreed priorities to a roadmap you can actually deliver.

​Who it's for

​Anyone who has ever been part of a project that grew, drifted, or didn't quite land, and wants to understand what a better start looks like. That includes project managers, designers, developers, and the clients and stakeholders who commission and shape digital work.

​Format

​35 minutes including interactive moments, followed by open Q&A.

​Speaker

​Richard Rowley — Discovery Lead, Agile Collective

​Richard leads discovery work across a range of projects, helping organisations move from ambiguous briefs to clear, actionable plans. He brings together user research, stakeholder alignment, and strategic thinking to set projects up for success.