The early days of @Twitter are a goldmine of lessons for founders & startup teams:

In 2009 I left a partner-track role @ a prestigious VC for an ambiguous job at a startup named @Twitter.

My peers thought I was insane
Few understood the product

But behind closed doors...

Twitter was making critical moves that would set the company's path for the future.

This is a story about 1 move I believe gave Twitter a superpower few others had. It's a strategy available to all startups today who are struggling to hire:

I call it "Unorthodox Hiring".

Here's a secret - Hiring is always hard. For everyone.

And like most startups today, Twitter had tough competition. Fb, Google...all more popular products.

But looking back on how they recruited me to join reveals a lot about about HOW they out-maneuvered their competition

The VC I worked at was an investor & I was hanging at the @Twitter office a lot. There was an energy I can’t describe, but could feel. I got to know the team as these deeply interesting people.

Months later, the company hired a COO, Dick Costolo.

One day, @dickc said to me:

"Since you're hanging out at our office all the time, I'm going to put you to work."

I was working at the a VC firm that had invested in Twitter.
They *could have* sucked up to me...

Instead, they assigned me work that needed to get done.

I realize now it was also a test...

At that time, many people would give their left arm for a top VC role.

And I was technical - MS Eng from @stanford.

But they had sh#% that needed to get done.

So, I did WHATEVER they needed. No matter how much above or "below me" the work was.

They saw my hunger in action:

- I planned team events
- I did BD calls
- I letterpress printed welcome cards for new-hires with the Twitter Logo
- I offered to make tshirts for the sprouting Twitter soccer league
- I even harvested grapes in Salinas at 4am for our non-profit wine label https://blog.twitter.com/en_us/a/2010/the-fledgling-initiative

Then @RonConway started nudging me to join the team. We were both at the office a lot, & would talk during team gatherings.

They needed someone to map an acquisition strategy, have biz dev conversations, & be a utility player.

Remember - Twitter was the wild west in '09.

They valued drive & low ego > experience & prestige.

The talent there was exceptional.

Yet all odds were against us. Twitter was basically a text bot at that time. It's easy to see why many thought we'd fail.

But one of the early companies we acquired changed everything...

It started with an acquisition target - a popular app called Tweetie.

At first the CEO @lorenb turned us down. They were growing. Users loved it. He loved startup life & didn't want to join a big company.

And I never want to strong arm anyone.

So what pushed him over the edge?

Remember - we all had many hats at Twitter. No one was above "grunt work". So I was still doing scrappy team culture projects.

I knew Loren was about to get married. And I was the keeper of Twitter merch so I got an idea...

I handmade a gift for Loren & his fiancé. Nothing fancy...tshirts, stickers, candy in a giant bird's nest!

But it showed him our culture...
that opened a conversation...
that led to a friendship...
that led to an acquisition...

That brought Twitter into our phones with an app.

Had Twitter hired for prestige & structured my role less ambiguously, that connection may have never happened.

"Unorthodox Hiring" is a non-obvious advantage.

Founders, remember this lesson from @Twitter's early days:

- You don't need to be #1 to hire A players.
- Talent is in unexpected places.
- Value hunger > experience.
- Exceptionally interesting people (at work & in life) are a non-obvious advantage.
- Give "grunt work" to everyone. It's not as "grunt" as you think.
- Culture WINS.