Don't Let Bias Derail Your Next Big Initiative
Discovery is where great initiatives are born or where they quietly begin to fail.
When you’re planning a product launch, enterprise transformation, or strategic initiative, the discovery phase should uncover unknowns and surface truths that lead to meaningful solutions.
But the problem is biases don’t announce themselves. They slip into conversations during planning sessions, hide in assumptions your team accepts as fact, and quietly distort the very foundation your project is built on.
Why Bias Awareness Isn’t Optional
As a project or product leader, working with facts as they exist right now isn’t just good practice, it’s your primary responsibility during discovery. I’ve seen too many well intentioned teams pour months (or in one case years) into initiatives that were doomed from the start. It was not because they lacked talent or resources, but because early planning sessions were built on biased assumptions no one questioned.
We all make biased decisions. It’s human nature. Your executives do it, your stakeholders do it, your team does it, and you will even catch yourself doing it too.
But what separates effective leaders from the rest is the ability to step back, recognize when bias is creeping in, and pull everyone back to reality. When you’re leading any kind of initiative, you’re not just responsible for your own clear-headed decision making. You’re the guardrail for everyone involved. During those critical planning sessions, your job is to notice when the room starts drifting into wishful thinking, convenient assumptions, or comfortable patterns that don’t reflect the real world you’re operating in.
The Cost of Biased Discovery
Launch a project built on biased assumptions, and you’re essentially setting it up to collide with reality later, when it’s more expensive to course correct. Features get built for personas that don’t actually exist. Timelines get set based on how we wish things worked rather than how they actually work. Budgets get approved based on optimistic projections that crumble under real-world conditions.
Once you know what to look for, biases become easier to spot and counter. Below are the most common cognitive biases that infiltrate discovery, regardless of organization size, and how to recognize when they’re steering your initiative off course. In my experience, really watching out for these can dictate the tone and overall effectiveness of what it is you’re trying to build.
Common Biases That Sabotage Discovery
Confirmation Bias
This is when we favor information that supports our existing beliefs, even when the evidence is weak. In the discovery stage, this can lead to prematurely justifying a solution without thoroughly validating the problem. You end up seeking data that confirms what you already think rather than testing whether you’re actually right.
The fix: Actively seek out diverse perspectives and challenge your own assumptions. Ask yourself what evidence would prove you wrong, then go look for it.
Escalation of Commitment
The more resources (time, money, or effort) we invest in an idea, the harder it becomes to let go, even when it shows signs of failure. Doubling down on a struggling initiative doesn’t recover previous losses; it often makes things worse.
The fix: Regularly step back and ask whether continued investment is still aligned with your goals and what the evidence is actually telling you. Be willing to pull the plug.
Sunk Cost Fallacy
Past decisions can weigh so heavily that pivoting feels impossible, even when evidence shows that you should change direction. The time and money you’ve already spent becomes an anchor that keeps you committed to the wrong path.
The fix: Approach prioritization with an iterative mindset. Product and project decisions are bets. The faster you learn what’s not working, the quicker you can adapt to what does.
Bandwagon Effect
Jumping on trends or mimicking competitors without fully understanding their relevance to your customers can result in wasted effort. Just because a competitor is pursuing a specific strategy doesn’t guarantee it will provide value for your audience.
The fix: Focus on what resonates with your actual customers instead of chasing what others are doing. Let your customers’ needs drive your decisions, not your competitors’ moves.
Your Role: Chief Reality Officer
Awareness alone isn’t enough, you need to actively create an environment where questioning assumptions is rewarded, not penalized.
In your next planning session, try this: When someone presents an idea or recommendation, ask “What would need to be true for this to fail?” or “What evidence would make us abandon this approach?” These questions feel uncomfortable because they force the room to confront potential blind spots. But that discomfort is exactly where better decisions live.
The best product and project leaders I’ve worked with share one characteristic. They’re relentlessly honest about what they don’t know and what might be wrong. They treat discovery as an ongoing discipline, not a phase that ends when planning begins. Additionally, they build teams that feel safe challenging the status quo, including challenging their leaders.
At the end of the day, your initiative’s success isn’t determined by how confident everyone felt during planning. It’s determined by how closely your decisions aligned with reality.