[gnicholas]

Absolutely true. Of course, a non-technical cofounder probably knows more than just marketing. He may add a lot of value in terms of fundraising, product management, and other areas. Teaching all of these things to an engineer wouldn't be trivial.

[sebmellen]

Nonetheless, I think most business functions are more societally established, and for that reason they can be more easily outsourced.

You can find a "pre-packaged" MBA, attorney, etc. because society is very good at churning out those roles. Just go the most recently graduated Wharton batch and hire the top grad for $300k, and you have someone who can do your legal, fundraising, operations, etc.

It's much harder to find someone with unique technical insight and the ability to deliver, which is the true value of a good "engineer".

[WJW]

This is like saying you can go hire the top graduate of your local bootcamp and they can be a decent tech lead. Experience matters for legal and business roles just as much for engineering, much as we devs like to pretend otherwise.

[gnicholas]

Sounds like a chicken-and-egg problem: how do you get the $300k to pay this Wharton grad? (And BTW, trusting a Wharton grad with legal work is a very bad idea — bschool teaches networking, not legal skills. Even a law school graduate would not be prepared to be the lawyer at a startup — 2+ years of relevant legal experience would be required.)