If I could pick one thing to get right, it would be the people I create the new business with. When choosing people, I think you have the following factors to think about . . .
- Skills mix: ie trying to make sure that you have at least one person with each of the major skills. While obviously this is important, I personally think that skills selection is often over prioritised in selection. I say that because skills are easier to acquire than a different personality!
- Personality: ie. Trying to make sure that the people can work together and that you have different types of people. For example, I hate detail but I like presenting to an audience. I need a detailed person who may hate presenting to work with me. A commonly used system was developed by Myers Briggs which puts far more structure behind this (www.myersbriggs.org). However, as a starting point I would just decide on the types of personality you have and where you need and go from there.
- Personal Friends: ie deciding how much you will work with friends. I have no idea what to advise here as I have seen complete opposite approaches work. I raise it because you need to think it through before you approach any friends.
So have a think along these lines and then decide what types of people you would like.