They studied this religiously, and it inspired their most famous frameworks on wealth creation.

Here are six lessons from the Innovator's Dilemma that helped turn Apple and Amazon into trillion-dollar empires:

The Innovator's Dilemma was released in 1997.

It changed the way two of the world's biggest technology leaders think about innovation.

Steve Jobs said this explained why Apple needed to keep reinventing itself.

Jeff Bezos made his top executives study

Lesson 1: Disruption starts at the grassroots Most people think that leaders lose because a stronger competitor beats them. But in reality, disruptors start with a worse product. Great players ignore them. By the time they realize it, it's too late.

In the early 2000s, Blockbuster dominated the movie rental market.

Netflix sent DVDs through the mail — slow, inconvenient, and niche.

Blockbuster dropped them.

Then Netflix got better: streaming, original content, AI-based recommendations.

Lesson 2: Listening to customers can be deadly

Great companies focus on their best customers.

This is often smart, but in disruptive markets, it is a trap.

If you only focus on what your current customers want, you will miss out on the future.

Kodak proved it.

They invented the first digital camera in 1975.

But its customers loved film, so Kodak buried the technology.

Meanwhile, digital cameras continued to improve.

When Kodak adopted the new technology, they were already behind.

Lesson 3: The best ideas seem stupid at first

If an idea is obviously good, the giants will invest in it.

Disruptors win by betting on ideas that seem ridiculous.

They start with inferior products that seem like a joke, but then they get better.

Tesla's first car, the Roadster, was a disaster.

It was expensive. The battery overheated. It had limited range.

Detroit automakers have dismissed electric vehicles as a niche market for environmentalists.

Now? They forced the auto industry:

Lesson 4: Success breeds complacency

The bigger a company gets, the harder it is to change.

They reinforce what worked yesterday and ignore tomorrow.

Nokia learned this the hard way.

At their peak, they held 50% of the telephone market.

Then Apple launched smartphones. Nokia scrapped them.

In 2013, they sold their phone division to Microsoft for next to nothing.

Six years. That's all it took to go from king to irrelevant.

Lesson 5: Small markets can become giants

Disruptors don’t start by conquering the entire industry.

They start in weird niche markets that seem too small to make a difference.

Then these markets explode.

Just look at the streaming market...

Airbnb is a great example. At first, people made fun of them.

Who would pay to sleep in a stranger's guest room?

The hotels ignored them.

Airbnb is now worth more than $100 billion — more than Hilton and Marriott combined.

Lesson 6: If you don't mess up, someone else will.

Most companies see disruption coming.

But they don't act. Too risky. Too inconvenient.

The best companies change before they are forced to.

Apple could have exploited the iPod. Instead, they eliminated it to prioritize the iPhone. Jeff Bezos created AWS despite Amazon being an e-commerce company. Netflix has abandoned DVDs and gone all-in on streaming. They burned the old one to build something

Great companies don't fail because they are bad.

They fail because they cling to the past instead of adapting.

You can:

Play defense and disappear. Or think like a disruptor and stay ahead.