Making the unstarted real

The ideas worth building arrive early

Early is the whole problem. A thing with no name has nothing to be measured against, no line waiting in a budget, and nobody whose job it is to want it.

and early loses to whatever is already funded

The safer version is further along by definition. It has a champion, a slot and a number beside it, and it wins every argument held in a room.

so the argument leaves the room

A working thing does not argue. Switch it on and nobody is deciding whether it could exist any more. They are deciding what to do with it.