Because in the beginning you’re not going to have HR to help you find and hire a world-class team. You won’t even have a recruiter. For the first twenty-five or so employees it’ll all come down to you and your cofounder—your vision, your network, your ability to convince people that you know what you’re doing. You can lean on your mentors and board (and hopefully early investors), you can put them to work to prop up your reputation, but ultimately you’re selling yourself and your vision for success.

You need a story people can get behind. [See also: Chapter 3.2: Why Storytelling.] People you respect. People who will help you create something great. Your team is your company. And your first hires are crucial—they’ll help you architect what your business and culture will become.

That was the system we had at Nest. We called it the Three Crowns. Here’s how it worked:

1. Crown 1 was the hiring manager. They got the role approved and found the candidates.

1. Crowns 2 and 3 were managers of the candidate’s internal customers. They picked one or two people from their team to interview the candidate.

1. Feedback was collected, shared, and discussed, then the Three Crowns met to decide who to hire.

1. Matt or I would watch over it all and make the final call in the rare instance when the Crowns couldn’t agree. Typically the answer if we had to get involved was no, thank you: PASS.

Exposing people to multiple skills and functions is a win-win. For individuals, the change in pace, activity, and colleagues makes work more interesting. In return, Nucor gets a workforce that’s able to solve complex, multidisciplinary problems.

As part of their training, Nucor teammates participate in a daylong, Monopoly-like game called “Dollars and Tons,” where five-person teams run a fictional Nucor division. Teams make decisions on how much scrap to buy at what price, on how many people to hire, and when to invest in new equipment to expand capacity. At the end of the simulation, teams are assessed on profitability, return on assets, working capital management, and balance sheet strength—all drivers of a plant’s performance.

SPECIALIZATION. Nucor’s team members are deeply skilled, but they’re also multiskilled. Shared targets, cross-training, and malleable roles help them tackle the sort of tough, boundary-spanning problems that yield big productivity gains. There are no “slots” at Nucor and, thus, no artificial limits on where and how team members can contribute.