Hello folks,

I have a few very basic questions around product discovery and how initiatives are planned in big companies (or startups as well)

So, lets assume during a quarterly planning exercise there are three initiatives and a PM picks one initiative to test. Lets also assume that the said intiative was picked with discussion about the impact, the reach and so on.

My questions are:

1) The initiative is picked to test, test for riskiest assumptions and so on. The clock is ticking while this is happening. What happens when the result of the test is that it is not viable for the company to build the product due to technical or viability or any other constraint?

2) Since the testing of assumptions itself takes lets say 2 weeks or 4 weeks in the worst case scenario; does the PM now pick up the 2nd ranked initiative and begin the testing again? If yes, then what gets delviered at the end of the quarter? Wouldn't there be a key result that the PM has to deliver for?

I am sure that I am missing some key pieces of how initatives are planned, discovered and executed.

Can anyone who is quite experienced give me a detailed breakdown of the flow of events along with example timelines? I am struggling understanding these concepts (and translating them into how a business would respond and what is the right kind of response!)

Thanks