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by Jim McKelvey
Premium summary · Opens in the app · 30 min read
In 2009, Jim McKelvey was a glassblower in St. Louis, Missouri. He made beautiful, handcrafted glass art and sold it at craft fairs, galleries, and through his studio. One day, a customer walked into his studio and fell in love with a piece of glass. She wanted to buy it. She pulled out her credit card.
**Author:** Jim McKelvey
**Estimated Reading Time:** 45 minutes
**What You'll Learn:**
- Why the most successful companies are built on a foundation of interlocking inventions, not a single breakthrough idea - How to identify the "perfect problems" that create billion-dollar opportunities - What Square, IKEA, Southwest Airlines, and Bank of America can teach you about building an unassailable competitive advantage - Why copying is often smarter than innovating, and when you must invent instead - How to manage fear, uncertainty, and the emotional reality of doing something that has never been done
**Who This Book Is For:**
This book is for entrepreneurs who feel like they are building something that does not fit the standard playbook. It is for founders who have been told their idea is impossible, impractical, or already solved. It is for anyone who has ever wondered why some companies become unstoppable while others with better funding and smarter teams fade away. If you are building something new, or thinking about building something new, this book will change how you understand the process.
In 2009, Jim McKelvey was a glassblower in St. Louis, Missouri. He made beautiful, handcrafted glass art and sold it at craft fairs, galleries, and through his studio. One day, a customer walked into his studio and fell in love with a piece of glass. She wanted to buy it. She pulled out her credit card. McKelvey could not accept it. He had a merchant account, but the process was cumbersome. The hardware was expensive. The contracts were confusing. The fees were opaque. And so, in that moment, he lost the sale. The customer walked away. The piece of glass stayed on the shelf. This was not a rare occurrence. It happened all the time. Small merchants across America were losing sales every day because the financial system had been designed for big businesses, not for the woman selling handmade jewelry at a weekend market or the plumber who wanted to get paid on the spot. McKelvey called his friend Jack Dorsey, who had co-founded Twitter. He explained the problem. Dorsey listened. They both knew that the technology existed to solve this problem. Smartphones were becoming ubiquitous. The hardware could be made cheaply. The software could be beautiful and simple. The only thing standing in the way was the entire existing financial infrastructure. What happened next became Square, one of the most successful financial technology companies in history. But this book is not really about Square. It is about something McKelvey discovered while building Square, a pattern he saw repeated in the histories of other remarkable companies. He calls it the Innovation Stack. An Innovation Stack is not a strategy you design in advance.…
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Get the complete summary in the appAn Innovation Stack is a collection of interlocking inventions that emerge from solving problems that have never been so
A perfect problem is a real problem with a possible solution that does not exist yet.
Copy when you can. Invent when you must.
Expertise can be a liability when solving problems that have never been solved before.
Low price builds trust and creates a barrier to entry for competitors.
If the timing feels right, you are probably too late.
"The Innovation Stack" is a strong fit if you want practical ideas around business, entrepreneurship, leadership, especially themes like an innovation stack is a collection of interlocking inventions that emerge from solving problems that have never been so; a perfect problem is a real problem with a possible solution that does not exist yet. The MinuteRead summary distills these concepts into a focused read, whether you're deciding whether to buy the book or applying its lessons at work.
Motivated to help readers with innovation Stack is not something you bring home from some management retreat along with the embroidered, Jim McKelvey wrote “The Innovation Stack” to package those ideas for a fast, focused read. In “The Innovation Stack”, Jim McKelvey focuses on innovation Stack is not something you bring home from some management retreat along with the embroidered. Through “The Innovation Stack”, Jim McKelvey distills the core ideas on business into lessons readers can absorb in…
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