Fall in love with the problem, not the solution: lessons from Uri Levine

Executive overview

Most founders fixate on their solution before validating whether enough people share the problem. Uri Levine — co-founder of Waze and Moovit, both exceeding a billion users — built his framework around the opposite approach.

Start with a problem that frustrates you. Then ask: who else has this problem? If the answer is almost no one, the startup is not worth building. If many people echo the problem back to you, that problem becomes your north star — and your story becomes far more compelling to investors and users alike.

Defining the problem in human terms (avoid traffic jams, not "AI crowd-sourced navigation") is the single biggest lever for product adoption and fundraising.

Falling in love with the problem

• A problem worth solving must affect a large number of people — not just you.
• Speak directly with people who have the problem; if they echo it back, you have a powerful starting point.
• The problem as north star reduces deviation and makes the journey faster.
• Storytelling test: "I'll help you avoid traffic jams" beats "I'm building an AI mapping system" every time.
• Solving a real problem is how entrepreneurs create value — not by shipping features.

The Waze origin story

• Idea came in 2006: stuck at a family gathering, Levine called other drivers to compare route traffic.
• Insight: he needed someone ahead of him on the road to report conditions in real time.
• Co-founders Amir and Ehud joined in 2007; Ehud had already prototyped crowd-sourced map data.
• First version ran on PDAs and Nokia phones; first market launch in Israel, early 2009.
• 2010 global expansion failed — over a year of iterations before the product was good enough.
• Key insight on positioning: Waze users say "I use it every day"; Google Maps users say "when I need it." Daily commute is the core use case.
• Certainty — knowing exactly when you'll arrive — turned out to be the primary value, not just the fastest route.

The startup journey: three dimensions

• Roller coaster: frequency and amplitude of ups and downs far exceed normal business cycles.
• Long road to product-market fit: every startup that failed to find PMF simply died — no exceptions.
• Product-market fit is reached when you deliver real value to users or customers. Without it, survival is impossible.
• Iteration is the only path: speak with users, identify problems, build, repeat.

Finding product-market fit

• Founders assume they are the typical user — they are a sample of one.
• Billions of users behave differently, capture value differently, use the product differently.
• The most important practice: watch users, then ask them why they did it that way.
• Observation + "why" questions surfaces the insights that drive product improvement.

Firing and hiring

• About half of failed startups cite "team not right" as the reason — specifically, keeping people who were not good enough.
• In every case Levine studied, the CEO knew within the first month the hire was wrong. The problem was inaction, not the hire itself.
• In a small team of 10–40 people, everyone knows when someone shouldn't be there. If the CEO doesn't act, top performers leave.
• Losing top performers is the beginning of the end.

The 30-day rule: After any new hire, mark your calendar 30 days out and ask: Knowing what I know today, would I hire this person?

• Answer is no → fire immediately. You're doing the team, the organisation, and the person a favour.
• Answer is yes → tell them they've exceeded expectations. Consider giving more equity. This is when loyalty is built.
• Delaying a firing makes it harder for everyone — acting at 30 days is far less painful than acting at six months.
• Keeping a poor fit creates a fake environment; the person won't succeed there and deserves to be somewhere they can.

Failure, parenting, and founder mindset

• Levine grew up in a household that encouraged discovery: his father would say "give it a try" knowing it might fail, without judgment.
• Learning to fail, get up, and move on is a skill that carries through an entire career.
• Society increasingly discourages failure — fear of failure is being reinforced, not reduced.
• The best thing parents can do is teach children to fail and expand their boundaries.
• Micro-failures in youth are foundational to professional resilience and success.

Writing the book

• Content originated from an MBA seminar on building startups that Levine ran in 2016.
• COVID provided the time; a co-editor managed the project over roughly a year.
• Motivation: Levine feels equally rewarded mentoring founders as building companies himself.
• Publishing is just one phase — getting the book read at scale requires the same promotion effort as launching a product.