Startup to $15 billion: Finding your life’s work with Shopify’s Harley Finkelstein
The Chase Jarvis LIVE Show
Chase Jarvis
4.8 • 641 Ratings
🗓️ 3 January 2019
⏱️ 79 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Harley Finkelstein bounced from DJ gigs to a t-shirt business to law school before joining a small internet startup in 2009 dedicated to helping creators and entrepreneurs make money doing what they loved. Today, he's the Chief Operating Officer of that same “startup" called Shopify now serving more than 600,000 businesses - and worth more than $15 billion.
In this episode we cover a lot of ground - from his early gigs, through struggle, failure, rejection and rebirth…and now thriving. I’ve had the good fortune to know Harley for nearly a decade now and his personal journey is both an inspiration and a play book of sorts for anyone who wants to tap into their life’s work - and what to do when you catch the ride of your dreams.
You’ll also be inspired to know that:
- Building and creating may feel like a lonely process, but you're not alone. Harley shares his time tested strategies to get through the tough times and find inspiration to keep going.
- It’s an exciting time for creators. No longer do you need to get your product into a big box store. You can use the power of the internet and social media to reach your audience, cut out so many of the middle men and make great $$$.
- It’s never been a better time to serve even the most niche community. As Harley says, every niche has a mass market on the internet.
- and more…
Enjoy!
Today's episode is brought to you by CreativeLive. CreativeLive is the world's largest hub for online creative education in photo/video, art/design, music/audio, craft/maker and the ability to make a living in any of those disciplines. They are high quality, highly curated classes taught by the world’s top experts -- Pulitzer, Oscar, Grammy Award winners, New York Times best selling authors and the best entrepreneurs of our times.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hey, hey, what's up y'all? It's Chase. Happy podcast day. My favorite day of the week |
| 0:10.2 | every week is when a new podcast drops because that allows me to share with you these amazing |
| 0:15.7 | conversations with people who have not only transformed my life but I think are inspiring |
| 0:20.4 | and people from whom we can |
| 0:22.4 | all learn a lot. This episode is no different. You guys know this show. This is where I sit down |
| 0:28.0 | with those people and I do everything I can to unpack their brains, whether that's in career, |
| 0:32.7 | in hobby, or in life. I've got to give a shout up to Creative Live for helping this possible. |
| 0:37.3 | And today's guest is one of those people who has made it. |
| 0:42.3 | Now, it sounds weird to say that, but I like to use the word making it in two senses of the |
| 0:47.3 | word. |
| 0:48.3 | You know, you heard the word sort of, or the concept of fake it until you make it. |
| 0:52.3 | I've always advocated that we should make it until we make it. |
| 0:56.7 | And so my guest today on the show is Harley Finkelstein, and Harley is one of the creators |
| 1:02.1 | of Shopify. |
| 1:04.7 | Now, when I say making it, he has made it and that he's built Shopify from a company. |
| 1:10.5 | It started out of just a couple of ideas |
| 1:11.9 | in a dorm room, I think, to now as a $15 billion company. And what I love about Shopify is |
| 1:17.7 | that it powers the stores and the commerce of basically almost anyone who sells anything on |
| 1:24.7 | the internet who's in the creator community. So many of the tools that we have in pop culture, whether it's social media or your website, |
| 1:34.3 | in this case, the ability to create goods and to sell them online, that has been transformed |
| 1:39.9 | by Shopify. |
| 1:42.4 | And so what I love in the show is finding out some of the things and people who've unlocked |
... |
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