We often start product conversations with: “What should we build?”

I’m starting to think the better question is:
“What do we actually need to learn?”
Because an MVP can become surprisingly large.
Login.
Payments.
Admin dashboard.
Notifications.
Analytics.
Multiple user roles.
Before you know it, the “MVP” has turned into a full product roadmap.
But if the purpose of an MVP is to validate an idea, shouldn't the first version focus on answering the biggest unanswered question?
From a product/business perspective, I’ve started looking at development differently:
Not everything needs to be custom-built.
Some parts of an application are already well-understood engineering problems.
The interesting engineering work is often in the parts that are specific to the product:
— the workflow
— the business logic
— the user experience
— the integrations
— the thing that actually makes the product different
That doesn't mean “never build from scratch.”
It means being intentional about where you spend development time.
Working around Founder’s Office conversations has made me realise that development speed isn't only about how fast engineers write code.
Sometimes, it starts much earlier:
with deciding what doesn't need to be built yet.
Curious to hear from developers and product people here:
What's one thing you think teams overbuild in their first version?