What kind of music do you like, and what do you want to play? This determines the type of guitar and method of picking you should start with. A guy who wants to play metal covers will want to start in a totally different spot than a guy who wants to play classical pieces.
The way I've always taught people to play is they give me a big list of songs that they like with guitar parts, and then I go through the list and find the simplest ones. Then break those songs down into small playable bits and riffs.
Once a person has several of these riffs under his belt and is enjoying what he's doing then I start working on teaching your basic open position chords. With those you can bang out a huge number of chord progressions and songs. Then (if the guy is interested in learning to solo) we cover pentatonic scales, playing over simple blues/rock/pop progressions and the like. From there we start getting into learning full guitar parts to songs note for note, more advanced technique (barre chords, slides, hammer-on/pull-offs, tapping, different picking styles), music theory (basic major/minor scales all the way up to modes), chord construction, note targeting while soloing, etc.