Essay ~ Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson (part 2)

Part 2 of 2 Top Ten Leadership Qualities of Steve Jobs

Steve Jobs had the single greatest impact on the world of business and technology of any person in the last 100 years. A complete list of his accomplishments can be found in part one of this article.  In Part One I declared that Jobs is a prime example of my belief that the outcome of ones life is completely at the mercy of destiny.  Destiny overrules personality, values, and intelligence.

Now I will list ten secondary traits and values of Steve Jobs that I feel were key ingredients to his success.  I have incorporated these tools into my portfolio of management skill as I believe they yield high levels of return in the realm of business. 

one  VISION OF GREATNESS    The skill that gave Jobs the most leverage was the gift of a grand vision.  Jobs vision was to create a great company who distributed great tech products and services that profitably met the demand of millions of ordinary people around the world.  Monetarily his company Apple achieved that goal as it is presently the most valuable company in the world.  Jobs firmly believed in his vision and embodied it as the purpose of his existents.

two  REALITY DISTORTION FIELD    The embodiment of this purpose created a source of power that pulled in required resources to bring his vision into existence.  His ability to motivate others to buy into his vision ultimately helped him and his companies become successful.  He also had the ability to block out or overrule barriers that appeared to make achieving his goals impossible.  Ultimately Jobs often times was able to bend his reality toward the vision in his mind.

three  CONSUMER PERSPECTIVE    Jobs understood products and services from the end user perspective.   At the heart of Jobs systems and products was purity.  A simple easy operating unit with minimal steps to activate function gives the end user a sense of empowerment over technology, making him the master of his new device.  An aesthetically pleasing design and product reliability causes people to have a passionate desire to be a consumer of Apple products.  These variables make up the definition of purity from Jobs perspective.

four   A Players   Jobs believed in himself and only chose to work with people who could help him make the best products.  Jobs felt that working with people he deemed as A players was a necessity and surrounding himself with people he could believe in was never optional.

five  FEARLESS   Jobs was generally not intimidated by anything and aggressively pursued his vision regardless of obstacles confronting him

six  SIMPLISTIC FOCUS   Under Jobs leadership, Apple Inc. focused on no more than three to five projects at one time.  Each product or service had reliable simplicity at the foundation of its purpose.

seven  CARE   Although most would not describe Jobs as a caring person, he in fact cared very much about each project and the experience of the end user.  Jobs constantly challenged himself and his team to reevaluate projects, making sure that what they had in production was really user friendly and aseptically pleasing.  Their best work has many drafts and models created until the perfect one was produced.  Jobs was attentive and present with every aspect of his company.  His obsession to make a great company lead him to spend most of his waking hours working on his career.

eight  APPEARANCE AND PRESENTATION   Purchasing an Apple product is more like joining into a culture and buying a piece of art.  Apple creates this feeling by presenting its brand in a way that gives a consumer the ability to magnify his own identify and or to have something greater than himself to identify with.  Jobs was able to achieve this goal through great marketing including advertising and product launch events.  Jobs believed that anything that was a big deal, only had to look like a big deal.   This was evident in his ceasing the moment on product launches. Anything consumers could see had to be appealing to the senses.  Therefore combining art with technology was a pillar to every project Jobs worked on including product design and package presentation.  Perception of his audience meant everything to him.

nine  CONTROL   Jobs believed in end to end control and responsibility of the entire user experience ranging from product content, design, production, packaging, and distribution.  It was beneficial that Jobs was given a great range of autonomous authority to run his companies the way he deemed fit at critical junctures where the company needed it most.

ten  RESTART, DO OVER   Jobs had the ability to look at works in progress or even his entire company and was willing to restart or phase out what was not working or yielding the best return.  His ability to see when projects or ideas are ineffective and could have a problematic impact long term was essential to Jobs function as CEO.  Using his fearless, unashamed ability to change direction, sacrifice projects in the pipeline or layoff staff was absolutely necessary to save the company and to make it what is today. 

These ten attributes are gifts that I believe helped propel Jobs and his companies to the level of greatness they are today.  I ask King Jesus, Lord of all to grant them to KMBriggs, LLC according to his will.  Amen   


Martin A. Briggs
KMBriggs, LLC   

Essay ~ Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson (part 1)

Part 1 or 2 Destiny the Basis of all Things

In an effort to improve myself as a leader, I have made it my goal to read (or rather listen to) autobiographies of highly influential people and organizations. I immensely appreciate the increased value of the time I spend on the road listening to audio books. Many of my car trips have become leadership seminars that improve my perception of the world and how I interact with it.

I just completed the book Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson, wow what an experience! From a technology and business perspective I can think of no other persons life who has had more influence on the human experience than Steve Jobs since the 20th century.

Steve Jobs pioneered Apple Inc. which is now one of the most valuable companies in the world with revenues over $100 billion and retaining a third of it in net income from the labor of fewer than sixty-thousand employees. Compare that to Walmart who makes over $400 billion in revenue with over two million employees but only retains half the net income made by Apple. The efficiency and ability to produce products with a global demand valued far greater than their cost is what makes Apple such a remarkable company.

Through the integration of several technology and service concepts Apple has broadened its meaning beyond the definition of a company as it is more suitably categorized as an industry. In a short 56 year life span Steve Jobs pioneered the development of some of the most significant products and services the world has ever experienced including:

- Apple developed and produced the first personal computer that was easy to use and readily accessible to the average person
- graphical design bridging technology and art
- Pixar Animation Studio the first digital animation film company that has produced many of the most profitable movies in the film industry
- Apple Inc. retail stores are the most profitable stores in all the world
- the ipod with a thousand songs in your pocket
- iTunes and apps that gives users access to millions of ideas and services through one easy to use portal
- iPhone which is more than a phone, it is a computer in our pocket
- iPad the first tablet computer and soon to be the future of business and academic communication
- iCloud the most empowering online concept since the internet was created

As I consider the remarkable impact Steve Jobs had on the world, I empathize with communities throughout history who falsely idolize people and deem mere men as Gods upon earth. I am amazed that Jobs life is not more celebrated as he had the most impact on the world than any other single life in at least the last 150 years. Like Michael Jackson was to music or Michael Jordan to sports, Steve Jobs standing in the world of business technology is supreme.

Steve Jobs life is certainly worth the time to analyze and learn how he made such a tremendous impact on the world. The objective of this report is to pull the essence of what made Jobs a great leader and incorporate those principles into my nature. Many aspects of Jobs leadership style stand out as key components on how he reached his level of achievement. However after much consideration I have come to conclude the basis of Jobs success is rooted in the law of destiny.

destiny (dictionary.com)
1. something that is to happen or has happened to a particular person or thing; lot or fortune.
2. the predetermined, usually inevitable or irresistible, course of events.
3. the power or agency that determines the course of events.

FLAWS   The proof of destiny
I sincerely appreciate how the author Mr. Walter Isaacson was given the ability and authorization to write what I felt was a truthfully biography of the nature of Steve Jobs. From a Christian perspective Jobs conducted much of his life in a manner we deem as destructive behavior and against the will of God. Given my understanding from the book, I think very few of the people who intimately knew Jobs would disagree with the conclusion that he lend toward having a self absorbed personality. For the most part Mr. Jobs did not work well with people as his personality tended to be extremely disagreeable and distasteful. Jobs was also a rebellious student throughout most of his growing up and never attained academic diplomas in higher eduction past grade school. Although Steve Jobs made his fortune in the tech world, he was not a very good technician and never was the sole inventor of the products that made his companies great. In spite of Jobs robust life it was short, as he only lived to the age of 56 (twenty year shy of his expected life span).

ANOMALY 

Most people would agree that the flaws of Steve Jobs life do not correlate with the level of achievement he obtained. This juncture is an anomaly and requires further study until a point of understanding is reached as it stands as the most significant attribute of his success.

CONCLUSION   Destiny overrules personality and values

I argue the greatest factor Steve Jobs contributed to earth was not his material success, but concrete evidence to the fact that destiny overrules personality, religion, values, academic achievement, purity, knowledge, wisdom or any other indicators. Moreover each and every life is limited to the invisible hand of destiny that chooses the placement, position, and time for everyone. For example it is not probable that the identical person of Steve Jobs would have reached the same level of success if his paternal parents living in the Midwest did not choose to relinquish Jobs as an infant to a lower-middle income family who adopted Jobs and raised him in Silicon Valley just before the region clearly became the center of the technology world. Jobs gleaned his love of technology from his adopted father and other role models in his community during the formative years of his youth. These circumstances orchestrated by a higher power outside of mankind's control undoubtedly serve as the basis of how Steve Jobs came to be such a great success. Destiny provides both external earthly conditions and internal soul conditions that lead to the outcome of each persons life.

The inescapable hand of destiny is the single greatest lesson I learned from the book Steve Jobs by Walter Isaascon. What ever purpose God places in each of us cannot be hindered weather we are aware of his influence in our lives, deny his existence, or readily embrace him. No persons internal factors (including soul, mind, and body) or external factors can prevent any of us from being what God has planed for our lives. His purpose is our destiny and the reason each person exist. The root of why you exist, what you have become, and are going to be is a result of being chosen to be such person. Our responsibility is to witness what God is making of us and with the little power destiny allots to us, position ourselves so that we may reap the most optimal yield when the wind of destiny blows upon our sails.

There are secondary traits beyond destiny that are key tools of Jobs leadership and made up much of the ingredients of his greatness, a complete list of those attributes are listed in part 2 of this essay.

Martin A. Briggs
KMBriggs, LLC