recently shared intriguing insights gained from his time working closely with Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg. Kagan took to the platform X (formerly Twitter) to reflect on his journey, revealing that despite being fired from Facebook, he went on to become the CEO of a $100 million company. His post titled “10 non-obvious lessons I learned from working directly under Mark Zuckerberg” sheds light on the valuable takeaways from his experience.
A Journey of Lessons
In his revealing post, Kagan delves into Mark Zuckerberg’s approach to growing Facebook, outlining ten key lessons that transcend the ordinary. These lessons touch upon the importance of fostering a grand vision, empowering teams through ownership, the significance of swift hiring and sometimes necessary firing, the value of meticulous attention to detail, and other critical aspects essential for success.
Noah Kagan’s narrative underscores the transformative impact of learning directly from visionary leaders like Zuckerberg, encapsulating valuable insights for those navigating the complexities of business and leadership. Read the complete post here:
I was employee #30 at Facebook.
Then I got fired.Now I’m the CEO of a $100 million company.
10 non-obvious lessons I learned from working directly under Mark Zuckerberg:
10) Focus on ONE goal
Mark’s goal was 1 billion users.
Every idea we’d bring, he’d ask, “Does this help user growth or not?”
If it wasn’t driving toward that goal, we didn’t do it.
You don’t grow fast by doing many things, but by doing ONE thing extremely well.
9) Move fast
At Facebook, it was normal to work 12+ hours a day.
We were constantly pushing out new features and letting our users give feedback.
As a startup, your biggest advantage against giant companies is speed.
8) Only hire A players
Mark would only hire people he would be happy to work for.
Even our customer support team was filled with Harvard Ph.D.s.
Facebook employees have gone on to start Asana, Quora, AppSumo, OpenAi, and more.
A startup depends on great people much more than a big company.
7) Treat your employees well
Facebook did a lot of things that are the norm now.
* Free lunches
* Free dry cleaning
* Paid for our apartments
* Paid for our parking tickets
Treating your employees well improves work and boosts morale.It doesn’t have to be money – people just want to feel acknowledged.
6) Scratch your own itch
I used Facebook to connect with friends and meet girls.
Which meant if I saw something wrong, I could fix it myself.
Most people start businesses in categories they don’t have an interest in.Build selfishly, share selflessly.
5) Pay attention to details
I remember Mark sent me an email at 3 am telling me that I missed a period in one of our documents. A period (!!)
Mark set a high standard of excellence for us.
It was challenging, but also super rewarding.
4) Give ownership to the team
Surprisingly, Mark wasn’t super involved in the day-to-day operations.
He coded some of the time, but mostly was focused on the macro vision.
He was great about giving people a goal, some boundaries, and coaching them from the sidelines.
3) “People” not “Users”
Mark would yell at us if we said “users”.
“They’re human beings”, he’d tell us.
On the other side of that username or email address is a fellow human.
2) Hire fast, fire faster
My boss was fired the day I started. My next boss was fired a month later. I got fired in 9 months.
Mark was intense about keeping A players only.
At @AppSumo , we run paid trials with potential teammates before bringing them on full-time.
1) Have a big-ass vision
We were all in our 20s when Mark was offered $1B to sell Facebook. When he said no, he sent a message to all of us and the world.
His goal was to connect the ENTIRE world. That inspired the shit out of us.