I don't want to be spoonfed the information, but I definitely scoured the forums when I joined last summer. Took some folks' thoughts to heart. Dispensed with some entirely.
After about six months of playing, I sitemailed a successful coach and asked if he'd be willing to answer questions. He was, and I've asked a lot of questions, mostly extremely specific ones. Towards the beginning I asked some "what's wrong with this team" questions, and most of the answers were exactly what I thought they'd be. But it's nice to have a second pair of eyes sometimes. I think that the biggest benefit, other than the second pair of eyes, is the chance he's already tested something I want to try. If there's a strategy I'm considering using, or there's a recruit who doesn't meet the standard for X Position that I'm considering finding, I can say "hey, have you tried this? Have you signed a guy like that? How did it work? What happened?" No reason to go through trail and error when you can learn from someone else's trial and error. But if you're still coming up with the questions on your own, I feel like you're still being your own coach, not just someone else's disciple. At least I feel that way, Your mileage may vary.
And of course, there's an added benefit of mentors for brand new coaches in just answering simple cause and effect questions like "how much effort does it take to get someone considering me?"
I guess it really all depends on how you want to use it. You can look for someone who will basically give you a list of all the successful things he's done, or you can ask for a second perspective on what you're already doing, or anything in between.
Of course, I haven't won anything yet, and my mentor has seven championships, so maybe I should ask for some spoon-feeding. haha