# Can you help us choose what to build and what to stop building?

Canonical URL: https://newphysician.org/can-you-do-this/prioritize-a-product-backlog/

Yes. A backlog is not a strategy, and a long list of reasonable requests can prevent the most important work from finishing. Prioritization should connect each proposed build to an outcome, a constraint, and the cost of not doing it.

What a solution might involve

Separate commitments, risk reduction, customer needs, and speculative ideas. Identify dependencies and the scarce resource that limits throughput. Make a small number of explicit choices, define what will not proceed, and set review triggers for new evidence.

What needs care

Scoring frameworks can disguise political decisions as mathematics. An item with uncertain value should not gain false precision from a weighted score. Leaders must own tradeoffs, especially when stopping work affects a customer promise or an internal sponsor.

How we would judge whether it works

The active plan fits actual capacity, every priority has an owner and outcome, and deferred work has a stated reason. The team can explain why the next item matters without reciting a scoring formula.

Likely engagement

Embedded Problem Solver: $5,000 to $20,000+ / month. This is a likely starting tier, not a quote. Scope, access, dependencies, and responsibility for operation need agreement first.

Discuss Embedded Problem SolverWhat to send first

Bring the current backlog, existing commitments, capacity constraints, and the outcomes leadership considers most important.

Send me the messy version.

Experience and scope

Selected builds documents the currently authorized public proof. This page describes a proposed approach, not a claim of a completed client engagement in this exact workflow.

Related problems

Can you provide product and technology leadership without a full-time hire?

Can you build a prototype before we commit to a full product?



[Send me the problem](https://newphysician.org/send-me-the-problem/)