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An Insider's Take on Steve Jobs

Posted by ScuttleMonkey on from the quite-a-bit-of-new-money-to-go-with-it dept.

Jerry Rivers writes "Business Week has an interesting, if short, interview with Edgar Woolard Jr., the man who brought Jobs back to Apple in the dark days of 1996. "Old money" Woolard offers some interesting insights into the man behind the iMac and the iPod, including his take on Jobs' 'five special characteristics' that make him the success that he is."

9 of 114 comments (clear)

  1. Re:The fifth quality is true by mkiwi · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I remember from way back then when Steve's yearly salary at Apple was $1.00. Someone asked him why he had such a small salary, and he replied, "So I can get the company's [Apple] health plan." I think that speaks volumes to his personality.

  2. Re:The fifth quality is true by Space+cowboy · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I think that speaks volumes for your lack of sense of humour. Off-the-cuff, he's managed to (a) subtlely let people know Apple employees are looked after, and (b) deflect the question with a humorous response.

    Steve's a private guy - he wants the limelight on his terms (eg: when he's doing a keynote). Telling the questioner to mind their own fucking business might be more appealing, but it's not-so-much the company line. Damn, I'll never make a CEO :-(

    Simon

    --
    Physicists get Hadrons!
  3. Reality Distortion Field by D4C5CE · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Need I say more... (Follow the links, Luke! ;-))

  4. Secrecy in product design by heroine · · Score: 2, Interesting

    He doesn't reveal a single thing about what he's working on. Anyone who leaks information gets killed. When the new gadget is revealed, the audience cheers because it's nothing like anyone expected. Every living thing on Earth loves Steve Jobless.

    Then of course, there are the other visionaries. When the other guys design products in secrecy they're the devil for not involving anyone else. They're selfish bastards for not allowing anyone else to copy their idea.

    1. Re:Secrecy in product design by jcr · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Anyone who leaks information gets killed.

      No, just fired. And deservedly so.

      Not long after I got to Apple, a director there explained to me what the secrecy is worth in dollar terms. Apple got the cover of Time magazine for the G4 iMac, because it was a surprise. You can't buy the cover of Time as an ad placement, but if you could, it would probably be worth at least a hundred million bucks.

      -jcr

      --
      The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
  5. The more I read about him by topham · · Score: 4, Interesting

    The more I read about him, the more I think perhaps the negative comments are sour grapes.

    I used to think that Steve Jobs and Bill Gates where similar people. I've come to the conclusion that Steve Jobs is who Bill Gates wishes he was. Bill Gates has repeatedly said he wanted a computer in every home, etc.

    But he failed to have a computer designed that DESERVED to be in every home. (and, in many ways, an OS that deserves to be on any computer...) He build an empire that could almost force it to be true, but that is hardly the same thing.

    A lot of people seem to be unimpressed with the current crop of new Intel based Macs. I think Apples implementation of it is almost perfect.

    Apple could have chosen to be bold, all the new machines based on the Intel processors could have been completely new designs ascetically. Instead they chose the keep the outwards appearance the same and replace everything inside, and make it function exactly the same as before. (Ok, with a decent improvement in speed.)

    Had Apple chosen to be bold, and had the OS failed to deliver the promise of running almost all applications then the whole thing would have been looked upon as a fiasco. Instead they focused on getting the internals right.

    I remember having conversations with people years ago about the idea of emulating a PowerPC based Mac on an Intel x86 platform; nobody thought it would been feasible. Even if you got it to work, it would never be fast enough to be useful. But Apple has done it, Rosetta is a stunning achievement and it's integration with the OS is almost seamless.
    (yes I tried the PowerPC emulator (PearPC) and was amazed that it worked as well as it did. But that doesn't make it viable for joe-user.

  6. Who's on what board? by stevewz · · Score: 2, Interesting

    It would be cool to see a matrix of the members of the Fortune 500 Boards of Directors. We always hear about who's CEO of this or that corporation, but it's amazing when you hear about who's on the Board.

  7. Still $1.00 salary by SteeldrivingJon · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Jobs still gets $1 salary at Apple. It's in the annual 10-K report with the SEC.

    I think he gets the same at Pixar.

    --
    September 2011: Looking for Cocoa/iOS work in Boston area Cocoa Programmer Quincy, MA
  8. Re:The fifth quality is true by NutscrapeSucks · · Score: 1, Interesting

    Yes, Apple is on the vanguard of removing a $0.10 port so that their legacy customers are forced to buy a $50 adapter.

    "Try finding a desktop from dell without them." Why would I want to? Seriously. Give me one good reason.

    With all the agressive dumping of legacy support, and the numerous platform changes, Apple basically supports itself on the hardcore Mac zealot market which totals about 2% of the whole. Which is fine for them, but it's not at all comparable to the engineering decisions that Microsoft needs to make in order to support what everyone else wants.

    --
    Whenever I hear the word 'Innovation', I reach for my pistol.