# Discovery & planning before development

What does your discovery process look like before we start?

##### Post Metadata
- Posted at: 3 months ago
- Net upvotes: 7


## Comments
### Comment 1

Why to Ask:
Discovery is the foundational work that happens before anyone writes a single line of code. This is the phase where the team defines what the software needs to accomplish for your business and makes all of the decisions that set the path forward.
Inexperienced agencies, although they mean well, often mishandle this phase. A junior developer may listen to your idea, but may lack enough experience to see the many technical details required to get it right. Seasoned agencies, on the other hand, have completed enough builds to know intuitively what must be considered in discovery to protect you from expensive surprises once the build starts.
Another part of this detailed prework is cleaning the underlying data so the system can be trusted. If a chatbot is running on messy data, it may confidently produce wrong or dangerous answers. That risk becomes especially serious in legal, medical, or financial settings.
Rush this step and you will end up with a fragile prototype that breaks once real people start using it. If an inexperienced vendor does not plan a strong underlying architecture for you, each new feature you try to add to the codebase later becomes harder to ship than the last one.

##### Comment Metadata
- Posted at: 3 months ago
- Author title: President @ Valere |  Top 1% AI Enterprise on Upwork | Ex-Booz Allen | Building AI-First Organizations with Agentic AI & UX 🚀
- Net upvotes: 12


### Comment 2

Discovery done properly takes time. Watch out for proposals that treat it like something you can knock out in one meeting or a quick kickoff. A qualified vendor should be able to give you a clear timeframe, often two to eight weeks, and explain what happens during that period.

They should be able to show that discovery covers:
Defining business goals and testing feasibility. Mapping integrations with your CRM, ERP, and internal databases. Making early decisions around architecture, security, and scale. Identifying which parts require a custom build, where off the shelf tools can save you money, and where an orchestration layer can offer a hybrid approach. Turning your idea into concrete deliverables you can review before development begins (e.g., blueprints, wireframes, user flows, technical architecture plan). Breaking the project into phases and mapping each one to clear milestones you can track

If they cannot describe that process clearly, it may be a sign they lack the technical footing to scope and plan the system properly from the start.

##### Comment Metadata
- Posted at: 3 months ago
- Author title: President @ Valere |  Top 1% AI Enterprise on Upwork | Ex-Booz Allen | Building AI-First Organizations with Agentic AI & UX 🚀
- Net upvotes: 11



## Related Product
[Valere Labs](https://www.g2.com/products/valere-labs/reviews)

## Related Category
[AI Development Services](https://www.g2.com/categories/ai-development-services)

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