[MatthewPhillips]

What should a technical person look for in a business guy? Connections? What else? I've worked with "idea guys" who don't seem to bring much to table and that has (probably unfairly) biased my perception on the value of an idea. I'd love to know what other skills to look at from the business side.

[tylerhwillis]

Both technical folks and business folks both have value that exist on a slider, and their value increases with experience. Judge anyone you want to work with on what you think they can do now, how much / how fast they can grow, and how in sync with you they are.

Keeping that in mind, look for tangible skills that could help push the company forward. Experience in Design, Product Management, Marketing/Sales, or some other useful skill is great. Experience with running companies, recruiting, fundraising are all positives. Some ability to generate PR (through fame or connections) is a positive. If those were successful ventures, even better.

Here's two good posts on it: - http://www.quora.com/Startup-Advice-Strategy/What-is-the-per... - http://onstartups.com/tabid/3339/bid/13808/The-Magical-Found...