

Find a partner - gilb

I have been a co-founder of a few company (some even very successful) as the tech partner. My issue here is that in the last two companies, although the other partner/s seems nice, in the end he has issues. (Not reliable, liar or just passive-aggressive personality which I didn't want to deal with).
I had a few proposal to partner up. However, I become really skeptical about partners, and I try to find out about people who work with them. I know that usually friends are the best people to partner up with, but my friends are from other fields. What do you think is the best way to partner up with some or to know him (I guess time is the only way to know a person, but it also something you don't have in a startup)?
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michael_dorfman
My hard-earned advice: no matter who you partner with, no matter how aligned
you and your partner are and how certain you are that you two are a good fit,
make sure you have the proper legal protections in place. You never know when
somebody will wake up one day and decide to screw you with your pants on.

~~~
bigtoga
To expand on that a bit, you need to have 90 day and one year milestones at a
_minimum_. You also need a strong Buy/Sell that includes what happens to
your/partner's stock when you/he die/divorce/quit-working-for-the-company/etc.
Lawyers are needed here for sure.

If you can't afford a lawyer, try to convince one to work for equity. There
are plenty of lawyers who will do your work for a percentage point.

If you can't afford a lawyer and you can't convince one to work for equity,
give it up for the time begin because otherwise it will cause you more grief
in the long term. Come back to the idea when you can afford to hire an atty.

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babul
IMHO best are as follows...

1). People you have worked with. You both know what you can do and have
already spent time together finding where your skillsets
compliment/overlap/mismatch.

2). Friends ...but if you have never worked together, _try first_ before
jumping in as good friends don't always my good partners and a bad working
realtionship can ruin the friendship.

3). People in your network who share the vision. You will have already met
them at events/conferences/etc. Again, try something simple together first.

4). People on your internet circles. OK maybe unrealisitic if you live across
the planet from each other but it can be done.

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babul
Make the time to get to know the person. As in _any_ serious relationship or
endeavour time well spent now will save you headaches later :)

