Being a CEO of a company is not just about the respect, power, and admiration that one receives, it’s also about the huge responsibility. But, Jack Dorsey is a dual CEO and that too of two giant companies – Twitter and Square Inc.
Our Series, ‘Tech Entrepreneurial Genius’ is incomplete without the dual CEO. He co-founded Twitter along with Evan Williams in 2007 and was the CEO of the company until 2008. In 2015, he returned again after 7 years as the CEO of Twitter.
Early Life
Dorsey was born on 19 November 1976 in Missouri, United States. In his younger days, he occasionally worked as a Fashion Model. He built some of the open source software in the early days which are still used by some cab drivers.
He went to the University of Missouri and then to the New York University. But, he dropped out from both. Dual Dropper too!
While studying at the New York University, he got the idea of building a micro-blogging Social Media.
The first company he started was based in California. His company dispatched couriers, cabs, and emergency services from the web. His motto was to give a “friction-less service market”.
The idea of instant messaging and micro-blogging was loved by the Odeo’s heads – Biz Stone and Evan Williams. Williams sold Odeo to Google and invested in Twitter. In 2007, they all together co-founded what now is one of the most popular Social Networking websites.
“just setting up my twttr.”
March 21, 2006, Jack Dorsey posted the world’s first tweet.
“He came to us with this idea: ‘What if you could share your status with all your friends really easily, so they know what you’re doing?'”
Biz Stone, a former Odeo executive, on Jack Dorsey.
Dorsey, Stone, and Odeo co-founder, Evan Williams started a new Corporation, called Obvious, which later evolved into Twitter. Within two weeks, Dorsey had built a simple site where users could instantly post short messages of 140 characters or less, known in the Twitter parlance as “tweets.”
Dorsey served as the CEO for the initial year after being replaced by Williams. He then worked as the Chairman of the B
In 2016, Dorsey’s account was banned from Twitter for some time, which the company described as an internal technical error.
Square Inc.
A small business platform that Jack Dorsey founded in 2010 for online
payments in various ways. He has also added advanced features such as transaction of Bitcoins and other crypto-currencies through Square.
What makes Jack Dorsey different?
- Jack Dorsey aspires to become the Mayor of NY City. (Cause becoming the dual CEO was not enough!)
- Dorsey is very enthusiastic about the fashion world and loves to visit the fashion shows whenever he has time.
- He is a Yoga enthusiast.
- Jack believes that walking is the best utilization of mind and body. He walks 5 miles every day and calls it very refreshing.
- In 2015, Dorsey gave one-third of his Twitter shares to employees.
Honors and Achievements
- #85 Forbes 400 in 2018
- #766 Billionaires in 2018
- #11 America’s Richest Entrepreneurs Under 40 in 2015
- #92 Richest In Tech in 2015
- In 2008, he was named to the MIT Technology ReviewTR35 as one of the top 35 innovators in the world under the age of 35.
- The Wall Street Journal gave him the “Innovator of the Year Award” for technology in 2012
“Half of Jack Dorsey is worth 100% of anyone else. He appeals to investors, whom he attracts and employees, whom he retains.”
Charles Whitehead, a business law professor at Cornell Law School.
