Twitter Names CEO: Jack Dorsey Becomes Permanent


Twitter finally named Jack Dorsey as the permanent CEO. This has been a long time in coming, ever since Dick Costolo stepped down in June of this year and Dorsey was named Interim CEO.

According to CNN Money, investors in the major social network have been demanding that the company’s board finally appoint Dorsey permanently in the position, indicating that he has their full support. Twitter finally made it official Monday morning.

Dorsey is one of the four founders of Twitter Inc., which was incorporated in March of 2006. For that reason, he’s always had the company’s best interest in mind. He has a lot of great ideas about how he is going to work to continually expand the company and make it better for users.

First of all, he’s been talking about growing the network’s following. His number one priority seems to be making Twitter easier to use and understand. He told CNN Money‘s Samuel Burke, “We have to make Twitter easier because currently the product makes people do a lot of work to understand the value.”

One of the biggest reasons Dorsey is taking this approach is because of how far behind it is in users compared to Facebook. There are only 316 million Twitter users, compared to the 1.49 billion monthly active users for Facebook. It’s true that Twitter can never hope to become like Facebook. They’re different entities with different purposes, but, as Dorsey says, it has to be better if they want to grow their followership to even half of Facebook’s status.

Dorsey also reported that he wants people to understand Twitter better. He said as follows.

” ‘Why Twitter’ must be articulated clearly. What should you expect from Twitter? To be as easy as looking out your window to see what’s happening. To show you what’s happening in the world [first], directly from the source.”

One of the things that Twitter’s new CEO wants to focus on is the news aspect. Because of the simplicity of tweeting and the setup of the network, Twitter traditionally sees news reports 10-15 minutes faster than all other networks. If Jack Dorsey can show users the value of that particular element of the network, he’ll be in good shape for growing the number of followers.

Dorsey has already begun making changes to the company’s board, starting with his announcement that the chief operating officer of the company would be Adam Bain. Bain was the head of revenue and partnerships. Bain has a long history of both social media and news correspondent, which means he can bring a new perspective to the way Twitter operates.

He’s also looking at switching up the board members and changing the way the platform is run. He has already moved away from the 140 character limit in DMs, in order for people to make their messages longer, and he’s looking at some other big, but unnamed, changes in the future, as well.

Some have questioned Jack’s ability to handle his two major roles now that he’s the CEO of Twitter. He remains the chief executive officer of Square, as well, the mobile payment company founded by Dorsey himself. The board has expressed their desire that the new Twitter CEO be able to make a full-time commitment to the company, but with Jack’s attentions split, that might not be possible.

Jack doesn’t seem to be worried about it. He tweeted Monday morning, “I’ve been CEO of both companies for over 3 months now. I have the smartest, strongest, and most determined leaders in the world on my teams.”

His ability to rely on his strong team members and use his delegation skills will be the thing that helps him handle the two major responsibilities. Twitter has named Jack Dorsey their permanent CEO, and it will take all of the board’s support to keep him there.

[Image via Bill Pugliano / Getty Images]

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