Whether you're selling a business, buying one, or building one from scratch, do you have someone in your corner who's done this before and can give you advice early enough for it to matter?

I started my first software company in 1997, one of those early SaaS businesses before anyone called it that. I was in my twenties with no business building a tech company alone. Fortunately, I got introduced to two people who'd already done things I couldn't imagine yet.

Ed Fredkin, the MIT and Carnegie Mellon computer scientist, agreed to chair our board. The second was Victor Brjabrin. Years earlier, working with Ed at the MIT AI lab, Victor had helped a young researcher named Alexey Pajitnov get his invention, a game called Tetris, out of the Soviet Union. Ed told me to bring Victor on as our CTO. I did. Ed and Victor had the same instinct: spot something worth building, question the thinking behind it, and know exactly who needs to say yes next.

The lesson never left me. In my career as an M&A Advisor that means finding the person who's already solved the problem you're about to run into, and let them tell you the truth before a buyer, a bank, or an investor has to tell you instead.

As a founder of IQExit, a new company that builds data intelligence for the business-transition economy,  I had to relearn the founder side of this lesson in real time. I knew that I needed someone else's judgment to help get it off the ground.

Before IQExit even thought seriously about a seed round, Jim Roberts, who founded the Network for Entrepreneurs in Wilmington (NEW), and Heather McWhorter, Executive Director of UNCW's Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship, gave us guidance and encouragement early. Both have spent years advising founders to build companies, mess up, adjust, and keep going.

Sometimes what a founder needs isn't someone telling them the idea is good. It's someone experienced enough to say where it isn't good enough yet, or who to talk to next. Jim and Heather did both, more than once, pointing us to the right person at the moment we needed them.

And Wilmington has provided the advantage of a dynamic start-up ecosystem: a community where founders get in rooms with people who've built companies, raised money, made mistakes, and learned from them. NEW, WALE and UNCW's CIE help make those rooms easier to find. It’s an advantage that I benefited from. The next founders can too.

On September 10, NEW is hosting the fourth annual Investor Buzz In at Cape Fear Community College as part of Wilmington's 910 Day - it’s a unique mix of guest speakers, panels and reverse pitches that has sold out four years running.

I'll be on the Technology Panel, moderated by Michelle Calton, CEO of the North Carolina Technology Association, alongside Robin Cowie, Matt Cimino and Jenn Summe. I’ll be sharing what I have learned over my career but I will also be there listening and learning from others, because no matter where you are in the process, there is always something to take away from other’s experiences and perspectives.

So whether you are starting a new company, expanding a business or planning your exit, don’t go it alone. Find advisors who have faced similar challenges and can identify problems and either offer a solution or connect you to the right person.

Read more at carolinabusinessbroker.com.

Tully Ryan is CEO of IQExit and a Managing Director at Murphy Business, where he advises on lower middle market M&A transactions from $1M–$50M.