A JUAN GREAT LEAP EXCLUSIVE: An interview with General Nick Fury himself, credited with starting two very successful startups: SHIELD, where he now serves as Director, and more recently, The Avengers.

Peter Cauton: Uhm, thank you very much, Director for allowing us an audience. The Juan Great Leap community is ecstatic for this opportunity to learn from you.
General Nick Fury: Good for you this is part of the community service sentence they gave me, you know, when it was found I had something to do with the destruction of New York. Let’s get on with it, son. Nice hairstyle.
PC: Uhm, thanks. Anyway, sir! All our startup enthusiasts want to know, sir, how exactly did you pull off this recruitment coup with the Avengers?! I mean, what an amazing, kick-ass haul of founders!
GNF: Thank you.
GNF: Well, to be honest with you Cauton, the first thing I thought of was the problem I chose to tackle. I told myself, Nicky, if you wanted to protect the whole g__amned world, who would you enlist? This was what created SHIELD decades ago. I got the best agents from the CIA, the FBI. Got a lot of applicants as well. And you know what, we were fine. We kept the peace.
GNF: Until all these different E.T.’s decided, let’s phone their freaking homes! Then suddenly you had Aliens of Mass Destruction, throwing around my SHIELD guys like ragdolls. I became desperate. Very desperate. So this was my new problem: how do I protect the whole freakin’ earth from freakin’ alien invasions? With an emphasis son, on the S.
GNF: In. Vhay. Shon. SSSS.

GNF: This was the scope of my problem, son, and I knew I had to create a new startup to tackle it. I had to assemble a team of highly talented people. The creme de la creme.
PC: Any insights or recruitment tips for our readers on how to find highly talented people like these?
GNF: Well, for starters, it’s mighty hard to find them. You gotta do the heavy research. We found one guy frozen at the bottom of the ocean. I recruited one girl from the competition. One was hiding in India. One just sort of fell from the sky. Tough to find them.
GNF: Then you have to evaluate them. We passed on a lot of other potentials before selecting this group. You can’t settle. Selection is everything! For example, we almost hired this brilliant guy who was dressed like a bat, and was a cross between Stark, Hawkeye, and Widow. But I felt, you know, that he wouldn’t have been much of a team player. So we dropped his ass. Here’s his application form. He’s a bit more impressive in person.

GNF: Anyway, once I zeroed in on who I wanted, I switched on the Fury-charm and tried like hell to get them on board. I followed them around, one by one. Flat-out stalked them. Had one on one talks with them, coffee with them. Me. General Nick Fury, Director of SHIELD. In Starbucks. But you gotta swallow some pride when you are interested in getting the best of the best.
PC: Any suggestions on founder composition?

GNF: Balance. If you notice, I got people whose talents complemented one another. When Thor said yes, for example, I quickly called Hercules to say, “Look kid. I don’t have time. To wait. For you. To ask. Your father! You’re out. Fury out. “
GNF: We didn’t have expertise redundancy.
PC: Uhm, but what about Hawkeye and Black Wido…
GNF: Can Hawkeye seduce male dictators to get information?
PC: Well, no bu…
GNF: There you go. Let’s move on. As I was saying earlier, balance. Another thing I did was to ensure we had technical founders who had different specializations. In this time and age, getting on the tech bandwagon can be crucial, whatever your chosen startup field is.
GNF: I also got someone whom I knew would have the potential to lead someone from the ground, since I got general stuff to do. Wait, but not general as in standard stuff, mind you, but general as in GENERAL Nick Fury stuff. I needed a COO to my CEO, a Sandberg to my Zuckerberg. Is my point clear?
PC: Crystal. Did you have trouble making them get along?
GNF: Did I have trouble making them get along? DID I HAVE TROUBLE MAKING THEM GET ALONG?! YOU CAN BET YOUR ASS I DID!
PC: …
GNF: Sorry, it’s a bad habit.
GNF: Anyway, you should have seen what happened when all them met in a room. They were at each other’s throats. Being the master psychologist that I am, I KNEW this was what would happen if you brought great people in one room. One very important role I have is ego-management. There should be enough room for all the egos.
PC: So what did you do?
GNF: I did some uh…motivational tactics designed to show them that the vision was so much more important than their individual goals. That they had to put their differences aside to work on the common goal. I also ensured they had bonding time outside work so they could get to know each other a bit better.
PC: Did it work?
GNF: Do I have one eye?
PC: Uh…yup.
GNF: Case closed. Fury out. (disappears into basement)
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