Perhaps its his daily 5 mile walks that the founder of industry disruptors Twitter and Square generates new ideas of how to keep both companies expanding while staying at the edge of innovation. Or perhaps it’s in his 10 day retreats to rejuvenate and disconnect that he has sudden flashes of brilliance upon his return to productivity mode.
The secret to Jack Dorsey’s success is most likely in the astounding amount of time he spends in thinking deeply about the future and how to best position his companies towards the inevitable merging of new technological concepts. For example he was quick to introduce Bitcoin trading to Square Cash across of the U.S. stating he believes the internet could move towards adoption of a single currency and that currency could be Bitcoin.
He has also recently announced his desire to decentralize both companies in favor of the workstyle naturally preferred by today’s younger generation, which is to work where you want and how you want. And if that’s in a coffee shop where more creativity can happen, then that’s where their workers should be.
Jack Dorsey was born in St. Louis, Missouri. In his younger years he worked as a fashion model. He chose to attend the University of Missouri but then transferred out to NYU, where he began his fascination with short and instantaneous alert messaging – which would eventually become Twitter. In 2000, Jack started his company in Oakland, CA and designed his platform technology around dispatch solutions for couriers, taxis and emergency services from the web.
Over the years Twitter faced many ups and down including the seemingly frequent change in its leadership and uncertainty about how connected Jack would be to the Company in future years. Eventually, he returned to the CEO position and has proven his ability to be the most effective lead strategist and executive for the Company.
Square meanwhile continues to scale as a leading payments solutions for small and medium sized businesses. The Company, which was founded in 2010, reached an estimated valuation of $3.2 billion in late 2012 and by 2015 went public. At the time of the IPO, Jack owned nearly 25% of Square’s outstanding shares.
