Creating Unicorns with Simple Innovations: The PISA Method

WINNER OF THE 2025 INTERNATIONAL IMPACT BOOK AWARDS for Outstanding Literacy Achievement!

The untold story: creating simple high value innovations.

This book presents a five-step method to create high worth non-technical innovations through:

1. Focus on simplicity (which as said is the ultimate sophistication);
2. Opportunities that come to us(instead of having actively to look for them);
3. Adapting solutions already in use elsewhere (rather than constructing them anew);
4. Testing consumers actions and emotions (in lieu of words or thoughts); and finally
5. Entering the market in an inexpensive way and with minimal risk.

Examples are numerous. Some are unicorns (valued at one or more billion dollars): Spanx, Rent the Runway, Dollar Shave Club, GymShark, Gousto, Athletic Greens, Havaianas, etc.Others are in the multitude of millions: Knix, Drop Stop, Pouchee, Lisa Gable Accessories, Readerest, SafeGrabs, Chawel and so on.

This book presents what is common among hundreds of such innovations, shared by all in a sequence of steps called the PISA method.

So, in a certain sense this book was written by those entrepreneurs who achieved financial independence and changed the lives of others by solving complexity through simplicity.That is the quiet revolution underway which falls below the radar and therefore is an untold story.

Jorge Sá, PhD, is an expert on Peter Drucker and Philip Kotler, founders of modern management and modern marketing, respectively, with whom he studied and who offered letters of recommendation for his books and endorsements for his work. His doctorate is in Business Administration, from Columbia University and was awarded the Jean Monnet Chair by the Jean Monnet Foundation in Brussels.

His books have been translated into twelve languages and has worked as private consultant, non-executive director or taught in the executive programs of multinational companies, among others, of: Coca-Cola, IBM, Johnson & Johnson, Pfizer, Henkel, McDonald's, UnitedHealth Group, Merck, Volkswagen Group and Microsoft.

Magda Pereira has an undergraduate degree in Management by ISEG School of Economics & Management and she is the general manager at Vasconcellos e Sá Associates. Magda has co-authored books with Professor Jorge Sá and has also managed many consultancy projects for Vasconcellos e Sá Associates.

Nadiia Nikitina has her master's degree in Chemistry by Vasyl' Stus Donetsk National University and an undergraduate degree in Ecology by the Volodymyr Dahl East Ukrainian National University. She is a director at Vasconcellos e Sá Associates and has co-authored books with Professor Jorge Sá.