Do the Job of Hanging Out
When you join a company full of exceptional people, deliberately underweight your assigned role and spend the surplus on proximity to the most interesting thread in the building.
- Difficulty
- Easy
- Time to result
- ~ongoing to results
- Steps
- 5
- Confidence
- 82%
Sean Puri's argument, aimed at Steph after she joined a16z and works remotely, is that the real upside of the job is not the salary but access to some of the smartest people in the world — and that access only converts if you do the hanging-out part rather than the on-calls part. He ran this at Twitch after the acquisition, telling colleagues openly that he was not there to do his job, and instead deciding Emmett was the most interesting person in the building and simply staying in the room after his meetings ended while the next group filed in. When Ninja, Twitch's top streamer, got poached and secret executive meetings started, Sean was not invited, so he wrote up a plan and sent it to the three top executives despite not being on the team. Sam's parallel advice to his wife Sarah at Facebook was to physically attend the all-hands, front row with a pen and pad, and ask a question every single week rather than streaming it from her desk.
Origin
Sean Puri's own approach after Twitch acquired his company, offered to Steph Smith as the thing she should be doing at a16z instead of working remotely.
Core principles
- 01The upside of an elite job is access, not compensation
- 02Optimising for convenience quietly forfeits that access
- 03Pick one most-interesting thread rather than networking broadly
- 04Unsolicited work is the cheapest ticket into a closed room
- 05Nobody will stop you from simply staying in the room
How to run it
- 1
Name the most interesting person in the building
Do not spread attention across the org chart. Sean picked one person — Emmett at Twitch — on the explicit judgement that this was the most interesting guy in the building, and routed his time accordingly rather than going to see Jerry on the fourth floor.
Pro tip Judge by the interestingness of the problems they hold, not by their title.
- 2
Choose presence over convenience
Sam's counter-example is the Facebook employee who streams the all-hands from her desk while eating a salad because it is easier. The instruction was to go, sit front row with a pen and pad, and ask a question every single week until you get invited to dinner.
Watch out Convenience is the specific failure mode — you never notice you are choosing it.
- 3
Stay in the room
Sean's mechanic is almost passive: do the meeting, and when everybody gets up and leaves, stay there on your laptop. The next group walks in and you are already seated. He notes nobody is going to say anything.
Pro tip Have visible work open so staying reads as ordinary rather than as loitering.
- 4
Manufacture collisions
For remote or awkward people, Sean prescribes deliberate intersections — the romantic-comedy move of bumping into people and dropping your papers, not for romance but to create a small intersection between you and them. Steph's own instinct was that going up to someone grabbing a snack felt too awkward.
Watch out This only works in person; lurking on Slack does not create the intersection.
- 5
Send unsolicited work into the closed room
When the meetings you want are private, produce the artefact anyway. Sean wrote a plan for the Ninja poaching and sent it to the three top executives while stating openly that he was not even on the team.
Pro tip Lead with the plan, not with a request for access — the plan is the request.
In the wild
After Twitch acquired his company, Sean told colleagues outright that he was not there to do his job, and instead attached himself to Emmett's meetings by staying in the room as groups rotated through. When Ninja, the top streamer on Twitch, was poached and secret code-red meetings began without him, he wrote up a plan and sent it unsolicited to the three top executives, opening with the fact that he was not on the team.
→ They replied telling him to attend the meeting that night at 8:00 p.m., putting him inside the closed conversation.
Common mistakes
Optimising for convenience once you are inside
Sam's Facebook example is the pattern: because a stream exists, you take the stream, eat your salad at your desk, and over a tenure never once share a room with the person you joined to learn from. The choice never feels like a decision, which is what makes it costly.
Waiting to be invited into the interesting meetings
The rooms where the interesting decisions happen are closed by default and nobody will think to add you. Sean's fix was to produce and send the work anyway rather than to wait; without that move he simply would not have been in the Ninja meeting.
Being casual about it later in your career
Sean's point to Steph is that 21-year-old you would absolutely go in and lurk and be serendipitous, but it gets easy later to be casual about the same opportunity. Seniority makes the access feel routine exactly when it is most convertible.
Is it for you?
Best for
People who have just joined an unusually high-calibre organisation and whose main asset there is access, not salary
Not ideal for
Anyone whose role is under performance scrutiny, or in a company where the interesting work and your work are the same thing
From the transcript
“It's not your salary. It's that you can go hang out with some of the smartest people in the world.”
“You got to lurk. You got to be a lingerer.”
“I was like, "This is the most interesting guy in this building."”
“So, I just wrote up a plan and I sent it to like the three top executives.”
“that's the real upside of your job. Don't do your actual job.”
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