Steve Jobs - Walter Issacson

[Guest valueInv]

But I think the world would be a better place if we all concentrated on being better people to our fellow human beings than trying to squeeze the last dollar out of an investment, the last drop of productivity out of an employee, etc. when it comes at the cost of openly demeaning/terrorizing inferiors in the workplace or treating people like stepping stones to personal gain.

 

It would be nice if everyone could be all things to all people. The reality is that we are all composites of good and bad. Rather than wishing for something idealistic that will not happen, why not be glad that we have people who excel in different things, character faults notwithstanding.

 

We are infinitely better off in a world where Jobs, Churchill, Gandhi, Buffett, Mandela, Franklin, Princess Diana, etc focused on what they did best. The work of the great humanitarians would more than offset the pain caused by the "assholes." This would be certainly be a more interesting world than one in which Diana and Jobs wasted half their time doing things they were bad at, such as creating electronics and helping AIDS and landmine victims respectively. The Theory of Comparative Advantage works.

 

I personally don't believe the Theory of Comparative Advantage applies to morality.  I don't believe a man can mistreat others because he might be good at other things.  I don't believe there is a cost of being a good person.

 

There might be people that choose to overlook the bad if the good is good enough.  I, and some other, don't.  That's a well-traveled road to corruption.  I am not trying to seem high and mighty, but when compared to a brat like Steve Jobs, who never felt remorse for swindling people (his partner Woz included), I think this is an important discussion to have.

 

I remember as a kid, we all knew Ebeneezer Scrooge was a bad man.  But in today's society, we take his good with the bad because he built a very successful business. Ebeneezer Scrooge would be a hero today.  Money and power make people twist their views in ways they'll never quite grasp.

 

Steve Jobs was an Ebeneezer Scrooge that sold gadgets.  They were amazing gadgets (I own iPhone 4, iPad 2 and MBA) but I won't excuse his behavior for them.

 

What do you think Jobs's net contribution to the world is? Remember him for that.

 

He may have swindled Wozniak when he was 20 but Jobs also made him and others a lot of money.

[TorontoRaptorsFan]

Steve Jobs is amazing. So he was too tough on everyone. Boo Hoo! I like the fact he was opinionated, a perfectionist, and had kick ass attitude towards competitors. His name is on over 300 patents so obviously he had a key roll in many of Apple's innovations. Jobs was also incredible in retaining excellent talent. And if he was such a prick people like Jonny Ive, Tim Cook, and Scott Forstall would have left Apple a long time ago.

 

 

[biaggio]

He did superhuman work/innovation but was human.

 

I think in general I am usually a decent person (though my work may not be superhuman), but there are times, moments of weakness, when I have been an a$$hole or have done things that I would not be proud of.

 

Maybe it was his success + drive to succeed, at moments of weakness that led to some of these negative moments.

 

Thank God for my failures that give me humility, otherwise I  would hate to see what kind of tyrant(a$$) I would be.

 

Don t know Jobs's story as well as others  here, especially his negatives,  but I can always count on this board to give me perspective I don t get elsewhere. Thanks.

 

 

I agree with TorontoRaptorsFan--- I think it would be hard to be a sociopath, prick etc and build 3 successful organizations no matter how smart and what kind of visionary you are.

 

 

[Liberty]

Jobs was Ebenezer Scrooge? Now that's pushing your point way too far. Jobs had failings, but I'm sure he was doing the best that he could. I don't think he was cackling maniacally every time he did something 'bad', trying to think of better ways to be hard on people. He had lots of friends and loyal employees. I think everybody can concede that he has very sharp edges, but he had lots of very good sides too, and exaggerating in either direction is distorting the facts.

 

And context matters: Jobs was in lots of tough situations, under lots of pressure, with lots of people depending on him and scrutinizing each of his moves, people pushing him to change his mind or compromise because they were so sure he was wrong, all of it with while being very sick during the past decade. If we ever found ourselves in that kind of position, we might not always come out looking perfect (especially since every time you're nice, nobody notices, but every time you aren't, people immediately assume that it's all that you are).

[AZ_Value]

To me this discussion just goes straight to the point that nobody is perfect and unfortunately we will always weigh how bad their flaws were vs their qualities before deciding whether to be sad or happy when they pass; and often that has to do with how much did they hurt humankind in my opinion.

The bad things that Jobs did, parking in handicap parking spots etc., definitely qualify as major dick moves that would turn off anybody and probably prompt someone to confront him except that he was "Steve Jobs" and who's going to confront him if the parking spot is outside Apple's HQ, so he not only acted like a dick but used his status to get away with it.

The thing is we process that info and seem to quickly decide that he didn't kill anyone as far as we know, so we file him under "eccentric visionary who was also a dick to people" and he gets a pass. Right or wrong that's what I believe happens.

Think about someone like Hitler, he could have invented penicillin it still wouldn't outweigh "that other thing" he's responsible for.

 

I've personally thought about this a lot when studying people like Martin Luther King, he was an awful husband and cheated on his wife in virtually every city he stopped in, going as far as taking back to his hotel room 2-3 women at a time.

So should parents around the country not talk to their children about the pivotal role he played in getting a deeply flawed nation to work towards equality because of his personal flaws?

It sucks for his wife and family and all the women he used but I'm just being pragmatic when i say that I think the answer is no. It is OK for kids to idolize him because when they're doing that they're idolizing the message he represented and not that he couldn't keep it in his pants and that message is a wonderful message so it's OK.

 

Same with Jobs when people here are calling him an idol they're referring to what he did to revolutionize entire industries and change the world by doing so but that doesn't mean that they're embracing him parking in handicapped spots because he thought rules don't apply to him.

A few years ago no one thought they needed an Ipad until Jobs told us so, now it feels like I'm the last one without one lol. It takes a special dude to do that.

 

[JSArbitrage]

We will just have to agree to disagree regarding Steve Jobs.  I think great business men are just that: great at business.  I think great innovators are just that: great innovators.  It ends there for me. I don't try to warp who they are as human beings by "netting out" their personal behavior from their contributions to business or technology.  My brain isn't wired that way.

 

But I am also a quirky person.  I would never be a business partner with someone that cheated on their wives.  I would never be a business partner with someone that openly treated people harshly.  I might end up poorer because of it, but that's how I'm wired.

[biaggio]

I would never be a business partner with someone that cheated on their wives.  I would never be a business partner with someone that openly treated people harshly.  I might end up poorer because of it, but that's how I'm wired.

 

You re  a wise man + will be richer for it.

 

MLK cheated on his wife-is that really true? Wow.

[JSArbitrage]

Speak of the devil....

 

http://www.businessinsider.com/steve-jobs-jerk-2011-10#

 

When Steve had to make cutbacks at Pixar, he fired people and didn't give any severance pay. Pamela Kerwin, an early Pixar employee, pleaded that employees at least be given two weeks notice.

 

"Okay," he said, "but the notice is retroactive from two weeks ago."

 

And it mentions how he denied paternity of his daughter while she and her mother lived on welfare.  And he had more money than he could spend in a lifetime.

 

Who said he wasn't Scrooge again?

 

 

[Myth465]

Interesting list jobs was a prick, but over a lifetime I am sure a list like that could be developed about me. Minus the daughter and firing part...

[Guest valueInv]

Speak of the devil....

 

http://www.businessinsider.com/steve-jobs-jerk-2011-10#

 

When Steve had to make cutbacks at Pixar, he fired people and didn't give any severance pay. Pamela Kerwin, an early Pixar employee, pleaded that employees at least be given two weeks notice.

 

"Okay," he said, "but the notice is retroactive from two weeks ago."

 

And it mentions how he denied paternity of his daughter while she and her mother lived on welfare.  And he had more money than he could spend in a lifetime.

 

Who said he wasn't Scrooge again?

 

We're talking about this guy, right?

 

http://blog.pluckytree.org/2011/10/last-time-i-saw-steve-jobs.html

 

For every article you post about his flaws, I can post 5 about him being kind. And I can post 10 about people

talking about how Apple products changed their lives for the better.

 

Are you gonna sell BRK stock because Buffet didn't have a great relationship with his family?

 

If you choose to disqualify people for their flaws, you'll have to disqualify everyone. It's our flaws that make us human.

 

 

[tombgrt]

Speak of the devil....

 

http://www.businessinsider.com/steve-jobs-jerk-2011-10#

 

When Steve had to make cutbacks at Pixar, he fired people and didn't give any severance pay. Pamela Kerwin, an early Pixar employee, pleaded that employees at least be given two weeks notice.

 

"Okay," he said, "but the notice is retroactive from two weeks ago."

 

And it mentions how he denied paternity of his daughter while she and her mother lived on welfare.  And he had more money than he could spend in a lifetime.

 

Who said he wasn't Scrooge again?

 

Maybe he had his reasons for not believing it was his kid. If I believed someone was claiming such a thing just to get my money I might do the same.

 

The same with the employees. Who knows what they did to piss him off. Or maybe they are frustrated about getting fired.

 

I'm not saying he had was a good man, I haven't met the guy so I can't judge. But there is always a story and context to it. There is no way you won't make any enemies over the years if you're that successful. I bet people will be saying the same kind of things in relation to Buffett and his daughter and about other things when he passes away.

[Myth465]

Rose gets to the bottom of this - http://www.charlierose.com/view/interview/11962

 

Great interview.

[bargainman]

Maybe he had his reasons for not believing it was his kid. If I believed someone was claiming such a thing just to get my money I might do the same.

 

The same with the employees. Who knows what they did to piss him off. Or maybe they are frustrated about getting fired.

 

"Isaacson writes that after helping choose the name Lisa, Jobs refused to acknowledge paternity for years, even after a court-ordered DNA test proved he was the father."

 

wrt employees it wasn't anything they did, it was Jobs.  That was who he was.

[ubuy2wron]

I think if you study the lives of most great men and women and I define that as being individuals who have reached the absolute peak of what ever their field of endeavor may be. You will discover a common thread and that is they had some pretty glaring short commings in many areas of their lives. To achieve iconic status you by definition have to have an obsessive focus on what ever it is you are striving to achieve. It never surprises me when GREAT MEN have glaring character flaws it would greatly surprise me if they did not. 

Warren Buffet would not be the 2nd richest man in the US if he had spent time with his kids and paid attention to his wife.

[Myth465]

 

Warren Buffet would not be the 2nd richest man in the US if he had spent time with his kids and paid attention to his wife.

 

Bill Gates does both and he is the first most of the time.......

 

Alot of great people are toolbags, but you dont have to be a toolbag to be a great person.

[SmallCap]

It never surprises me when GREAT MEN have glaring character flaws it would greatly surprise me if they did not.

 

I would agree with this statement.

 

I am sitting here thinking of the list that someone could compile about me if they only knew of all the petty, vicious, vindictive things that I have done. The times when I have stolen from others. The times i have plagiarized and never given credit. The many times I have promised to do something and then willingly forgot about it. The times I took advantage of a loophole in the system to my own advantage even knowing that it would cost some person/organization. Yet if you were to meet me you would come away thinking what a nice person I am.

 

I was talking to someone who was by his own admission poor and he came across as rather proud of that fact because as he put it money corrupts people. Well I disagreed, I don't believe that money or power corrupts. Power/money only brings out and often puts on display the corruption that is already in us.

 

As much as people would like to elevate Steve Jobs to the status of a deity, he is just a corrupts and fallen man, just like myself. But he has done SO MUCH MORE with his life then I have and has had his life under an amazing amount of scrutiny and so his flaws are documented and looked on with glee by those who would like to take this man who makes them feel like slackers and bring him down to a level where they can look down their noses at him and not feel so bad about their lives.

 

 

[DCG]

Bill Gates does both and he is the first most of the time.......

 

Alot of great people are toolbags, but you dont have to be a toolbag to be a great person.

 

Gates was often a jerk in his younger days as well.

[twacowfca]

Interesting list jobs was a prick, but over a lifetime I am sure a list like that could be developed about me. Minus the daughter and firing part...

 

Yeah.  I can read a bio like that and say," That's awful; I would never do something like that." But the truth is that: "Wud t' have th gift he gae us, t' see irselfs as ithers see us"  Then, I might not fare very well in comparison.

[twacowfca]

A lot of you guys give him way too much credit.  It's not Steve Jobs that turned around Apple, it's Jonathan Ive. 

 

And Edison?  Fuck Edison.  He doesn't deserve any of the credit given to him.  I think Tesla deserves all the praise and Edison should have gone down in history as the biggest ass of all time.

 

Tesla was brilliant, but he was also off his rocker in later years.  :-[

[ubuy2wron]

Bill Gates does both and he is the first most of the time.......

 

Alot of great people are toolbags, but you dont have to be a toolbag to be a great person.

 

Gates was often a jerk in his younger days as well.

Agreed about not having to be a tool bag to be great but it does seem to the case that nice guys are not likely to finish first. (I hope that is not my envy speaking) Regarding Bill G I think that he was saved from dirtbagdom by Belinda and Warren.

[Kraven]

I find this thread somewhat interesting.  There are those who appear to want the utopian ideal of being successful in an other worldly kind of way without being a prick and those who say successful people have character flaws.  At the end of the day we are all flawed beings, but those who are extremely successful in their professional lives typically in my view have their flaws magnified.  It just really isn't possible to be successful in an exceptional way and not be viewed as a tool by at least some people.  They are typically very driven and busy and simply don't have the time for pleasantries or what have you.  They are forceful and intend for their way to be the only way. 

 

I am not sure why this is such a surprise.  To paraphrase a line from Wall Street (the movie), we're not talking about making $400k, flying first class and being comfortable.  We're talking about liquid, being rich enough to own your own jet.  How many people in the latter category aren't pricks in some way to someone?  In my various places of employment everyone at the top of their professional lives was a douche in some way.  The only exception I've seen is those who have "made it" and then can relax on the negative aspects of their personalities.  Take Steve Jobs for example, from all accounts he seems to have chilled a bit in his later life, was a devoted family man, etc.  I knew people who had been total assholes their entire working careers until their business was so set that they were able to finally stop being an ass to everyone.  And you know what, they knew it and everyone knew it.

 

I'm just not sure why it's such a surprise that successful people aren't warm and cuddly.

[JSArbitrage]

It isn't that we expect them to be "warm and cuddly;" but we do expect some kind of professionalism.  I've worked in two very large organizations in my life and I've dealt with various personalities.  I understand the idea that sometimes a manager has to put their foot down or an executive has to control their perception in the workplace to be effective.

 

But parking in the handicap spot every day at work? Really? Anyone here want to claim that Jobs couldn't do the same job from a normal person's parking spot? Or is that the cost of brilliance?

 

No offense, but the idea that being an asshole is some kind of prerequisite for brilliance is stupid.  There are tons of assholes that went nowhere in life and there are tons of brilliant people that a perfectly adjusted human beings. 

 

 

[Uccmal]

I am enjoying the book.  I am up to the point where Jobs gets ousted.  He's 30 years old and has built the company from nothing over a ten year period to that point.  To a degree he seems to recognize some of his blind spots, which is why they hired in an outside CEO.  I dont think sociopaths can do that.  To motivate others you need to be in tune with how they think and feel. 

 

He dounds like he is a bit bipolar, or just very moody.  The stress of running a large and growing company treading on the edge of bureaucracy had to have been huge.  It must be huge for anyone.  The way he treated Daniel Kottke is poor but Kottke stayed and took it.  A man with such obvious experience and skill could have gone anywhere else at the time. 

 

He sounds like alot of young men I knew back at that age including myself.  Self centered in the extreme.  Unlike him Most have checks and balances put on them by society such as having to earn a paycheck.  Had I been a multimillionaire in my early 20's I would have been insufferable. 

 

You see alot of Jobs' behaviour with wildly successful musicians or Actors.  I could list dozens of Prima Donna's but you all know who I mean.  "were an American band, were coming to your town, were goin to party it down" sort of sums it up.

[Guest Dazel]

I too recognize his behaviour as immature but also as an incredibly successful motivator. I played professional hockey and his antics although immature because of his age are nothing compared with coach's that i have had and heard of. In the hockey dressing room it was in my time... anything goes to motivate players to perform to their highest levels... Everyone was different so a coach had to pick out a weakness to bring strength. If they responded than they would flourish and try to impress that coach if not...well they were gone! Everyone knew the rules..if you were there than you were there to win. The tactics are sometimes not right and do not happen the same anymore. However, would you want a whinny baby the calls his agent after you yell at him and bench him or do you want a man to rise to the occasion and prove you wrong? You will see that most everyone that stood up to him and was competant flourished. "Old School " is gone.

For those of you that feel sorry for those people that became millonaires because of Steve Jobs making superstars out of normal people at Apple...think again. Their success killed apple the first time...they no longer had to listen because they were all rich! That made Steve jobs sick to see it and likely drove him over the edge. This was a team that changed the world...as he promissed.

As for his personal life...that is his business..not mine.

 

The heart of Apple is gone and it will fall off in the future because the brillant are rich and do not have Steve Jobs to perform for...i will be "betting" on it.

 

Dazel

[DCG]

Finished the book last night and that it was outstanding overall.