I started this thread because for years i've seen non-technical people being bashed on forums and in real life because of their background and/or other stupid reasons.After some years of experience in the industry and some amazing discussions i must say that the situation is more complex than it seems.
I had a meeting with some investors and developers recently and we were talking about non-tech and tech people and what are the differences between them and after a long debate/discussions we realized that we were speaking of non-techies from different perspectives.
Some devs thought of them as a 3rd wheel to the carriage , some found them important.Investors had a problem with the name, stating that a non-technical person is in a way the same as the word “business” and it's too generalistic.
So at the end of the debate we reached these conclusions:
A non-technical person can have many roles in a startup and it should be clearly defined before he joined one.
A non-technical person can really suck or be a game-changer for the business.
Being a genius developer doesn't mean you can do both parts at the highest level.
These are some points i remember from the discussion.There are more but i will stop here for now.
Best example we can refer to is Steve Jobs.He was a non-techie after all.Why Was he better- in a way- than Wozniak and/or the entire team?Well Simply because of his vision and innovative style.Being Able to create a product in your mind in the highest detail is a trait few people have, yet overlooked by most.The only major flaw these kind of people have is that they are really nothing without a tech team.So yes, a hacker can be everything but not necessarily a visionary.
I believe we should give more importance to them because some of them can really make or break a company.
I had a meeting with some investors and developers recently and we were talking about non-tech and tech people and what are the differences between them and after a long debate/discussions we realized that we were speaking of non-techies from different perspectives.
Some devs thought of them as a 3rd wheel to the carriage , some found them important.Investors had a problem with the name, stating that a non-technical person is in a way the same as the word “business” and it's too generalistic.
So at the end of the debate we reached these conclusions:
A non-technical person can have many roles in a startup and it should be clearly defined before he joined one. A non-technical person can really suck or be a game-changer for the business. Being a genius developer doesn't mean you can do both parts at the highest level.
These are some points i remember from the discussion.There are more but i will stop here for now.
Best example we can refer to is Steve Jobs.He was a non-techie after all.Why Was he better- in a way- than Wozniak and/or the entire team?Well Simply because of his vision and innovative style.Being Able to create a product in your mind in the highest detail is a trait few people have, yet overlooked by most.The only major flaw these kind of people have is that they are really nothing without a tech team.So yes, a hacker can be everything but not necessarily a visionary.
I believe we should give more importance to them because some of them can really make or break a company.