LinkedIn changed two things at once: how people build careers, and how companies find the people to hire. Reid Hoffman co-founded it, ran it for years, and sold it to Microsoft in one of the largest technology acquisitions of its time.
Then he became the person other founders call. Early cheques and board seats across a striking run of successful startups made him one of the best-connected figures in Silicon Valley, which in that ecosystem is its own form of capital.
He treats networks as the fundamental unit of the modern economy — of careers, companies and ideas alike.
He writes, too, and the ideas travel. Blitzscaling — grow recklessly fast and fix the damage later — became the operating manual for a whole generation of startups, for better and frequently for worse.
Lately the attention has gone to artificial intelligence: new ventures co-founded, and a consistent public argument that these systems should augment people rather than replace them. Building, investing, and shaping how the industry talks about itself — he does all three at once, which is rarer than it sounds.