TL;DR:
After analyzing your personality and positioning yourself in the right role based on your strengths, it’s time to focus on what needs to happen before you start planning or building your product.
One of the biggest pain points you’ll hear in software development is about estimation issues. You’ve likely heard horror stories of inaccurate timelines, missed deadlines, and projects that spiral out of control.
Here’s the truth: there’s a reason for these challenges. And believe me, it’s not because your development team isn’t working hard.
Software development and successful product delivery are incredibly challenging. For entrepreneurs without product experience, this often leads to frustration because the process doesn’t match their expectations.
The problem? You don’t understand how delivering software really works.
Most entrepreneurs approach development by trying to define all three key components—Money, Time, and Scope—on their own. You might hear things like:
Sound familiar?
Here’s the problem: You can’t define all three yourself. It’s impossible to balance these components without proper collaboration, and trying to do so leads to failure in 99.9% of cases.
Instead, define one priority (e.g., your budget or a hard deadline) and collaborate with your Product Trio—the Lead Engineer, Product Designer, and Product Manager—to define the rest. This team will conduct a Discovery Workshop, analyze your idea, and connect all the dots to create a feasible plan tailored to your business needs and team strengths.
Transparency is key.
Hiding your actual budget may seem like a smart negotiating tactic, but it often leads to poor planning and wasted resources.
If you’re not upfront about your budget, here’s what could happen:
Example: If your budget is $100K but you only disclose $30K, the scope and approach will differ drastically. You may end up with a product that can’t scale or meet your goals. Fixing it later becomes far more expensive and disruptive, as more roles (engineering, QA, marketing, customer support) get involved.
Bottom line: Be transparent about your budget from the start. It helps the team craft the best possible plan within your constraints.
One of the most common mistakes entrepreneurs make is asking:
“How long will it take to build this?”
This question puts the team in a corner, focusing only on time while ignoring scope and quality.
Instead, reframe the conversation:
“We need to improve the user onboarding flow and introduce new steps. My goal is to complete this in two weeks. This is my rough idea, but I trust you to deliver the best possible solution in this timeframe. What do you think?”
This approach sets a collaborative tone, allowing the Product Trio to align time, scope, and resources while ensuring the best possible outcome.
We use Shape Up at MVP Masters, and it’s all about delivering meaningful work fast. Developed by the creators of Basecamp, Shape Up helps us stay focused on what truly matters.
Defining the scope yourself and handing over Figma screens to developers while asking how much time and money it will take is one of the worst ways to start.
In 99% of the cases, this approach fails because estimates will be inaccurate. Software development is full of unknowns, and the team may focus solely on your scope, trying to please you, rather than thinking about the product's success or the final outcome.
Without their involvement, it’s harder for them to fully understand the problem, contribute ideas, and brainstorm solutions.
Instead, include them early on to collaboratively scope better and set your project up for success.
By letting your Product Trio take the lead, you ensure the scope is achievable, aligned with your goals, and realistic within the constraints of time and money.
A lot of entrepreneurs don’t fully understand how software product development works.
They’re often unaware of the product development lifecycle (a topic I’ll dive into in an upcoming article) and tend to focus solely on finding engineers or developers, without considering the bigger picture.
But building a successful product is about much more than just writing code. It requires the right strategy, clear planning, and a strong team.
My advice? Ask the experts. Get a skilled product person on your side—someone who can guide you through the process and help you plan effectively before you even start building.
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Thanks for reading this second article in the Entrepreneur’s Guide to Working with Dev Teams and Steering Your Product in the Right Direction series. Stay tuned for the next post, where I’ll dive deeper into the Product Trio and how their collaboration can make or break your product.
Let me know your thoughts in the comments—what’s your biggest struggle when it comes to defining Money, Time, and Scope?