Why Jack Dorsey’s Total Exit From Twitter Is Unusual | Almost 30% Of Unvaccinated Workers Say They Would Lie About Their Vaccine Status | Ray Dalio Is Worried About The U.S.

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Hello Forbes Careers readers,

Jack Dorsey is stepping away from Twitter—and its board. 

Unlike many founders, who exit the CEO job only to hang on as executive chairman or a director for years, Dorsey is leaving both roles. He wrote Monday that after handing the reins to Twitter Chief Technology Officer Parag Agrawal, he plans to serve on the board through “May-ish” to help with the transition. The company also named director Bret Taylor, who is Salesforce’s president, as board chair.

As Dorsey wrote in a memo to employees (shared, of course, via a tweet), “I believe it’s really important to give Parag the space he needs to lead.” The billionaire, who is on the Forbes 400 list with an estimated $11.9 billion fortune, added “it’s critical a company can stand on its own, free of its founder’s influence or direction,” writing that he’s “worked hard to ensure this company can break away from its founding and founders.” 

To be sure, Dorsey has long had a peculiar approach to leading Twitter. He co-founded the social media platform in 2006 and led it briefly in its early days before being pushed out; he rejoined as executive chairman in 2011 and returned as CEO in 2015. In the interim, he launched Square and then took the highly unusual step of being CEO of both companies, an arrangement that left Dorsey running Twitter part-time, sparking heavy fire from some investors. 

Since then, he’s become known for having an extremely hands-off management style, with eccentricities such as taking silent retreats and ice baths.

Governance experts say a swift board departure after a CEO exit by a founder is unusual, especially if they’re as enigmatic as Dorsey. But they also say it’s exactly the right move for founders who step down, even though some questioned why it took Dorsey so long to make it.

Noam Wasserman, dean of Yeshiva University’s business school and author of The Founder’s Dilemmas, who says Dorsey’s board departure follows advice he’d give, wondered “why is he finally getting religion now? Why hasn’t he done this [already]?”

For more on governance experts’ reactions to the news—and why having a founder on the board who’s not in charge can inhibit new CEOs—read my story here.

Cheers,

Jena

On Our Agenda

What we’re watching this week

Jobs day is Friday. Bloomberg reports that economists’ median estimates, ahead of Labor Department data, expect payrolls to rise by 550,000 and the unemployment rate to dip to 4.5%.

The omicron coronavirus variant has leaders on edge, with Moderna CEO Stéphane Bancel speculating that existing vaccines may be less effective. What changes will CEOs make to office reopening plans, holiday parties and corporate travel as a result?

Sales on Cyber Monday—the day online retailers supposedly offer special deals following the all-important Black Friday—appear mixed. Shopify President Harley Finkelstein told CNBC its numbers from November 29, while not final, showed that sales across its network had surpassed last year’s sales. Yet other reports from Adobe show that consumer spending fell. How will retailers ultimately fare?

The 10th anniversary Forbes’ 30 Under 30 list launches December 1. Check out the Hall of Fame list here.

Take Five

Five essential stories about work, careers and leadership from around the web

Wall Street banks have been the most stubborn about committing to a work from home future, with many calling employees back to the office. Now, some bankers are balking, and “Wall Street is in revolt,” the New York Times reports.

Bloomberg reports on why child care is so expensive—yet still doesn’t work as a business for providers, which have a typical margin of just 1%. “Child care in the U.S. is the rare example of an almost entirely private market in which the service offered is too expensive for both consumers and the businesses that provide it,” Claire Suddath reports, adding up to “an exceptionally precarious business model.” 

Sara Blakeley sold a majority stake in Spanx to Blackstone. Whitney Wolfe Herd took dating app Bumble public. Anne Wojcicki’s genetics startup 23andMe went public. Fortune asks: How might they open the door for future female entrepreneurs?

The Great Resignation is giving way to the Great Entrepreneur, with hundreds of thousands of Americans striking out on their own to launch businesses or become consultants, the Wall Street Journal reports. 

From “meeting FOMO” to “meeting amnesia,” there are common psychological pitfalls that lead us to hold and attend more meetings than we should, writes a behavioral scientist and two cofounders of a meeting software startup in Harvard Business Review.

Book Club

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Ray Dalio, the billionaire founder of asset management firm Bridgewater Associates, is following up his widely read leadership book, Principles, with a new book out November 30 focused on what can lead nations—including the U.S.—to decline. My colleague Maneet Ahuja interviewed Dalio about The Changing World Order: How and Why Nations Succeed and Fail, which she writes “paints a dire scenario” of the issues that “put the country at risk of not just economic hardship but war.” While readers looking for an investment playbook may find Changing World Order potentially frustrating, Ahuja writes, the book “offers a deeper analysis and some new tools to measure and navigate the risks” of changing global economies.

Key quote: “The last time those three things happened was in the 1930 to 1945 period,” Dalio told Ahuja, speaking of nations that experience rising debt levels and income inequality all while facing diminished power and influence in the world. “When they happen together, it’s a very telling story.”

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Having a greater sense of awareness for your brand can be a benefit when negotiating for a new job.

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Here are tips to becoming a stronger problem solver, one of the top skills workers gained over the last year.

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