VCs - How to Balance Now Versus Future?

When you're early in a market or trying to create a new market, how should you think about balancing now versus future? I haven't seen many frameworks on evaluating resource allocation for this scenario. You might be doing the hard work for future competitors to skip the hard work. There may be a tradeoff between revenue for foundational investments for future growth. Do one or the other could result in a very different company and customer than you thought.