Another important aspect would be to appreciate and reward the stakeholders! Such things always work out in a positive direction and outcome

Look, timelines are important—but 𝘄𝗲’𝗿𝗲 𝗻𝗼𝘁 𝗵𝗲𝗿𝗲 𝘁𝗼 𝗷𝘂𝘀𝘁 𝗵𝗶𝘁 𝗱𝗲𝗮𝗱𝗹𝗶𝗻𝗲𝘀; 𝘄𝗲’𝗿𝗲 𝗵𝗲𝗿𝗲 𝘁𝗼 𝗰𝗿𝗲𝗮𝘁𝗲 𝘀𝗼𝗺𝗲𝘁𝗵𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗲𝘅𝘁𝗿𝗮𝗼𝗿𝗱𝗶𝗻𝗮𝗿𝘆. Creative exploration is where the magic happens. 💫 It’s where you find the breakthroughs that no one saw coming. You can’t schedule genius. 𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗿𝗲𝗮𝗹 𝘃𝗮𝗹𝘂𝗲 𝗶𝘀 𝗶𝗻 𝗽𝘂𝘀𝗵𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗯𝗼𝘂𝗻𝗱𝗮𝗿𝗶𝗲𝘀, in exploring those crazy ideas that just might change everything. Sure, we’ll keep an eye on the clock, but if you want something truly revolutionary, you’ve got to 𝗴𝗶𝘃𝗲 𝗰𝗿𝗲𝗮𝘁𝗶𝘃𝗶𝘁𝘆 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗿𝗼𝗼𝗺 𝘁𝗼 𝗯𝗿𝗲𝗮𝘁𝗵𝗲.

When stakeholders are fixated on timelines, I emphasize that creative exploration is an investment in long-term innovation. I share stories where stepping outside rigid plans led to breakthrough ideas that surpassed expectations. By highlighting how creative thinking can solve problems faster and more effectively, I shift the focus from short-term speed to lasting impact. I also propose structured creativity within timelines—designating time for exploration but with clear milestones. This way, we maintain momentum while allowing space for innovation. The future belongs to those willing to explore beyond the obvious, and I’m committed to delivering both timely results and transformative solutions.

When stakeholders are focused on timelines, I emphasize that creative exploration can lead to more innovative, successful outcomes. By highlighting past successes where creativity improved results and using data to show its long-term value, I make a strong case. Additionally, setting flexible milestones allows for both structured progress and room for ideation, balancing the need for timely delivery with the creative process.

Creative exploration is important and valuable effort spend upfront to inform the right solution design, identify the dependencies and edge scenarios to be handled. This valuable time spend upfront should be baked into sprint planning and epics total story points to minimize bugs during QA, A/B testing and to avoid poor user experience. Think about the balance between spending some well deserved effort upfront vs avoidable effort for patches, overhead of last min releases, and more importantly there is no recovery from negative user sentiment for our product/ platform.