Continuous discovery is an ongoing product-development practice of engaging customers regularly, learning about their needs, and evaluating ideas throughout delivery. Frequent contact keeps user needs visible and enables rapid feedback on proposed improvements. section 8.2.6
Use the practice as an empowered, team-level activity:
- Talk with customers weekly rather than treating research as a one-off project phase. section 8.2.6
- Adopt co-creation by testing ideas or sketches early, before completed features or mock-ups limit the ability to change direction. section 8.2.6
- Give the team authority to act on insights, using product, design, and technology representatives for important decisions. section 8.2.6
Modernizing the Energy Performance of Buildings Register
A UK government department replaced an expensive external-supplier arrangement with an in-house, user-centric team. Within two years, the service was live, improving through multiple daily deployments; satisfaction increased and costs halved. User research and feedback supported the evolutionary modernization approach. section 8.2.10
During modernization, combine conversations with real users with evidence from existing features, logs, and metrics. This reveals unnecessary, inefficient, or unusable features and helps establish requirements before technology decisions. section 8.6
