The WHY in your product has to be really obvious.
What this means is that you have an idea, you need to herd a whole bunch of people to support that idea – suppliers, staff, and customers – and you all have a much better chance of success if the reason WHY the product is (in an existential sense) and WHY the product does what it does is very clear.
And in founders there is this spectrum of on the one side the idea can be very clear to them and the why very clear to them, but unlocking it is very hard. On the other side, the why is just writ large.
You need the WHY to be obvious because it keys into leadership, and at the early stage of the business you’re trying to lead people into believing your vision. “Them believing in you” only works with existing relationships – it doesn’t work with suppliers, and it’s the supplier part where it goes very wrong because you need them to fill in the gaps with what you’re doing, because that’s part of the advice that you’re buying is them steering you based on what vision you have.