Jim McKelvey
Jim McKelvey
Jim McKelvey is an American computer science engineer and businessperson who co-founded Square, a mobile payments company...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionBusinessman
Date of Birth19 October 1965
CountryUnited States of America
banking companies major money months move needed relationships running tech took
At Square, we got our tech up and running in three weeks, but it took us 18 months to get licenses, banking relationships and everything else we needed to be able to move money. We had to partner up with major companies to do it.
partner run somebody wants
I don't run any of my companies. I always partner with somebody who wants to operate.
certain gets good running
I'm not particularly good at running things when once they get to a certain level. Once it gets routine, get me out of the way.
gratifying job people replaced totally watch
I've been totally replaced by people who are superior. I was doing, like, 15 different things. It's very gratifying to watch your job done better.
becoming deals less money people seem
Personally, I don't want to do a lot of angel deals in a year. I get approached a lot. I'm becoming less and less polite, which doesn't seem to be helping. A lot of the things I get pitched on are from people who just want to make money.
decided
When my son was born, I decided I wasn't really into working 12 hours a day. That slowed me down a little bit.
advantages certain compared concentration louis
It's obvious that St. Louis has certain advantages compared to other cities: namely, a concentration of financial services.
environment financial louis tech
St. Louis is a customer- and partner-rich environment for any financial tech startup.
bored gotten hard material shape sort time took
It's hard to shape glass. It took me years of practice, and as a result, I've never gotten bored with it. It's difficult. Every time I come into the studio, I've got some sort of new challenge. And something that I would like to learn how to do better, and the material never disappoints me.
fed
This entrepreneurial energy that we have in the Midwest doesn't have to go out to the coasts to get fed and watered.
cool fraction glass move particular piece repeat rewards seconds split
Glass really rewards risk. A lot of times with glass, you're just waiting for the piece to cool down or for some temperature to adjust, and there's split seconds where you've got a fraction of a second where you get to make a move a particular way, and you don't get to repeat it if you do it wrong.
art good proven science
Art is what can't be proven mathematically, right, it's where science ends. It's the part that makes you feel good, but you don't know why.
needs prada
Everyone needs someone to tell them not to wear so much Prada.
book writing class
When I was 19 years old, I wrote my first book. I took a computer science class, and the book was garbage. I thought I could write a better one, so I did.