The woman behind Canva shares how she built a $42B company from nothing
Internal Tensions4
Untitled tension
Side A
Claim A
— Melanie Perkins
Side B
Claim B
— Melanie Perkins
Untitled tension
Side A
Claim A
— Melanie Perkins
Side B
Claim B
— Melanie Perkins
Untitled tension
Side A
Claim A
— Melanie Perkins
Side B
Claim B
— Melanie Perkins
Untitled tension
Side A
Claim A
— Melanie Perkins
Side B
Claim B
— Melanie Perkins
Named Concepts7
Column B thinking
NewA planning approach that starts by dreaming of the perfect vision of the future and working backwards from that magical future, rather than building incrementally from current resources.
“So I guess there's two ways of planning. The way that you can plan is you can dream of what is the perfect vision of the future, what future do you want to exist in... And the alternate is, so just imagine you are building a castle on the hill and you're like, 'What would be the most magical, wonderful, mythical experience?' And the other thing you can do is you can look at the bricks around you and you can say, 'What can I do with these bricks?'”
Coined by: Melanie Perkins
Column B company
NewA company built using Column B thinking - starting from an ambitious future vision rather than incrementally building from current capabilities.
“I asked you what you believe has been the biggest factor in the success of Canva. You described something called building a Column B company and Column B thinking”
Coined by: Melanie Perkins
Crazy Big Goals
NewExtremely ambitious goals that make you feel completely inadequate before them, motivating you to work really hard to will them into existence.
“The thing that I love about a crazy big goal is that you feel completely inadequate before it. You want to work really hard to will it into existence.”
Coined by: Melanie Perkins
chaos to clarity
NewA concept where every idea starts in the chaos side and you work step by step to the clarity side by adding clarity with each incremental step.
“So we have this concept of chaos to clarity and every idea starts in the chaos side, and then you have to work all the way to the other side, which is clarity... how do you go from chaos to clarity? You add clarity.”
Coined by: Melanie Perkins
two-step plan
NewCanva's master strategy: Step one - build one of the world's most valuable companies, Step two - do the most good we can do.
“we've got this two-step plan, build one of the world's most valuable companies and do the most good we can do”
Coined by: Melanie Perkins
closing the loop
NewCanva's process of taking community requests, building the requested features, and then notifying users that their specific requests have been fulfilled.
“we get more than a million requests from our community every year and we've got a whole incredible team that then tallies them, breaks them down, and then delivers them to all of our product teams and then those actually get closed. So this year we've closed more than 200 loops”
Coined by: Melanie Perkins
AI walk
NewA personal productivity technique where you put in earbuds, go for a walk, and verbally brain dump everything on your mind to AI for processing and organization.
“Another really fun thing I do is an AI walk and it's when I just put my ear pods in and then I go for a walk and I just say everything on my mind and I use that to then kind of filter out my thoughts”
Coined by: Melanie Perkins
Intellectual Lineage15
People
Cameron Adams
A huge thank you to Cameron Adams and Melissa Tan for suggesting topics for this conversation.
Melissa Tan
A huge thank you to Cameron Adams and Melissa Tan for suggesting topics for this conversation.
Melissa Tan
I heard from one of your team members, Melissa Tan, there's a deck like this for every project you kick off.
Brian Chesky
This is exactly the way actually Brian Chesky thought. I worked at Airbnb for a long time and it was always just, 'Think about the world, the dream and then work backwards from that.'
Ed Catmull
This makes me think about this concept of an ugly baby from the book, Creativity Inc., by I think Ed Catmull
Books
Creativity Inc.
This makes me think about this concept of an ugly baby from the book, Creativity Inc., by I think Ed Catmull
The Power of Moments
One of the books I love is The Power of Moments
Designing the Obvious
one of the books early on I read was Designing the Obvious, which I found very insightful.
Lean Startup
I remember pitching an investor that had the lean startup book behind them when I was pitching them and they were never going to like Canva. We were not the lean startup.
Ideas
1% pledge
In the early days we took the 1% pledge, which I think is an incredible program. Every single person, every single company should take that where you give 1% of time, money, equity and profitability.
Companies
Airbnb
This is exactly the way actually Brian Chesky thought. I worked at Airbnb for a long time and it was always just, 'Think about the world, the dream and then work backwards from that.'
UserTesting.com
Yeah, we use a lot of UserTesting.com, find that super valuable.
GiveDirectly
We've just, over the last few years, we've donated $50 million to GiveDirectly, where they give money directly to people in Malawi who are in extreme poverty
Fusion Books
And then we applied it to the school yearbook market in Australia with our first company Fusion Books.
Calm app
I love the Calm app. It is my daily companion. I use it to meditate. I use it to listen to music.
Unanswered Questions10
What specific evidence supports the claim that Column B thinking is superior to Column A thinking for building companies?
Based on: Column B thinking (working backwards from a dream future) is presented as fundamentally better than Column A thinking (building from current resources)
Why unresolved: While Canva's success is cited as proof, no comparative data or controlled analysis is provided to demonstrate this approach's superiority over traditional planning methods.
How do you know when you're setting goals that are 'crazy big' enough versus just unrealistic and demotivating?
Based on: Crazy Big Goals should make you feel 'completely inadequate' and require years of work to achieve
Why unresolved: No framework is provided for distinguishing between appropriately ambitious goals and goals that are so unrealistic they become counterproductive.
What was the actual retention and engagement impact of the two-year product freeze during the front-end rewrite?
Based on: The company survived two years without shipping any new features while rewriting their codebase
Why unresolved: No metrics are shared about customer churn, competitor gains, team attrition, or other business impacts during this critical period.
How do you systematically evaluate which of the million annual community requests actually get built?
Based on: Canva receives over a million requests annually from their community and closes 200+ loops per year
Why unresolved: The process for prioritizing, evaluating, and deciding which 0.02% of requests to act on is not explained beyond having 'a whole incredible team' that tallies them.
What evidence supports the claim that 99.8% of community requests that aren't implemented still represent valid user needs?
Based on: Each implemented request represents many more people who don't bother to fill out the request form
Why unresolved: No data is provided to validate this assumption that non-requesters share the same needs as requesters, which could lead to building for vocal minorities.
How do you measure whether the 1% pledge actually creates meaningful impact versus just being a cost of doing business?
Based on: Every company should take the 1% pledge (giving 1% of time, money, equity, and profitability) because it will compound greatly over time
Why unresolved: No framework is provided for measuring impact or determining whether 1% is the optimal allocation versus other percentages or approaches.
What specific mechanisms ensure that Canva's mission-driven structure doesn't compromise business performance or decision-making speed?
Based on: Having authentic mission alignment where what you say matches what you do creates better business outcomes
Why unresolved: No concrete examples are given of how mission considerations are weighted against business considerations in actual decisions, or how conflicts are resolved.
How do you validate that your 2050 vision board goals are achievable rather than just aspirational thinking?
Based on: Creating a vision board for 2050 with goals like meeting everyone's basic human needs helps guide daily decision-making
Why unresolved: No methodology is described for ensuring these long-term visions are grounded in realistic pathways rather than wishful thinking.
What data supports the assertion that AI integration should be product-driven rather than investor-driven?
Based on: AI should only be integrated where it genuinely helps customers achieve their goals, not just because investors like AI
Why unresolved: While this sounds reasonable, no framework is provided for objectively measuring when AI 'genuinely helps' versus when it's just novel or trendy.
How do you determine when advice or practices from other successful companies are worth adapting versus when they're incompatible with your culture?
Based on: Taking practices from other companies often doesn't work because they're like 'bricks from someone else's house' that don't match your house
Why unresolved: No systematic approach is described for evaluating external practices or identifying which elements of company culture are truly core versus changeable.