The Legend of Steve Jobs – His Life and Career – 10

Steve Jobs (1955 – 2011) – His Legacy

Over the next few years, a monument of a giant circular building will emerge, as Silicon Valley has not yet seen. For Steve Jobs it was not only about converting his legacy into glass, steel and concrete and making it visible for future generations. The most important “product” on which he worked during the past few years, was Apple itself. For Freddie Geier, who worked for Apple in California and managed the operations of Apple Germany and Central Europe for almost two years, Steve Jobs was an “infinite source of inspiration, a visionary and a genius.” “He was the God of style who could make things beautiful and simple and provide products with emotion at the same time”

At the end, the products always benefited from Jobs’ perfectionism. Under the motto “think different”, he succeeded in finding new ways and celebrating the presentation of secret developments in a masterly manner. It was clear to Jobs that there was nobody in the company who was able to take over all these challenges alone. During the past years, he therefore set up a management team and distributed the heavy burden on the shoulders of several successors. Apple CEO Tim Cook is responsible for ensuring that the company works logistically and is making money. During the memorial service for Steve Jobs at the Apple campus in Cupertino, Cook radiated sovereignty and authority, which is now expected from him by the Apple employees, customers and shareholders.

Tim Cook said Jobs had told him that Apple employees, should not ask what he would have done. “Just do what’s right.” He had seen Disney going into crisis after the death of founder Walt Disney, where “everyone spent all their time thinking and talking about what Walt would do.” In the future, the soul of Apple will probably be represented by Jony Ive. The chief designer has to guarantee that Apple will continue to bring products to market, which are desirable solely because of their elegant appearance.

Meanwhile, rumors have also vanished that the Briton was homesick for the UK, – among others because he saw his twin sons in better hands there. His poised presence at the funeral service, with which he freed himself from his (superior) father Steve Jobs, has not only moved the people on the campus. Jony Ive is also trusted to preserve the high level of Apple’s designs without yelling and strong criticism of the employees.

The software expert Scott Forstall will also take a key role in the management team of Apple. Steve Jobs took him in 1992 from Stanford University to NeXT. In 1997 Forstall followed his boss to Apple. He is now responsible for the iOS platform.

“Scott is a gifted genius like Steve. He is in love with every detail, too,” says a former Apple manager. But like Jobs, Forstall is also often difficult and maintained a catastrophic communication culture. The Bloomberg Business Week called Forstall the ” Sorcerer’s Apprentice at Apple” and quoted former Apple software developer Mike Lee: “I once referred to Scott as Apple’s chief a–hole. And I didn’t mean it as a criticism. I meant it as a compliment. You could say the same thing about Steve Jobs.” In such an area of tension, Tim Cook will have the task of softening Forstall’s emotional outbursts and call his younger fellow board member to reason.

In the fine adjustment of the tasks on the management level, Cook, Ive, Forstall, as well as marketing chiefs Phil Schiller and Eddy Cue, who are responsible for the iCloud line at Apple, can count on help: In the end of 2008, seriously ill Steve Jobs lured away the management professor Joel M. Podolny, Dean of the elite Yale School of Management, to found an in-house university at Apple. “Steve was looking to his legacy. The idea was to take what is unique about Apple and create a forum that can impart that DNA to future generations of Apple employees,” said an employee to the “Los Angeles Times”. “No other company has a university charged with probing so deeply into the roots of what makes the company so successful.”

After all, Podolny had almost three years of direct experience with Steve Jobs. Whether and how he will succeed to transfer Steve Jobs’ success formula to future generations of managers from Apple is yet to be seen. ” While there are many great companies, I cannot think of one that has had as tremendous personal meaning for me as Apple.” Podolny wrote in his goodbye to his Yale students. Steve Jobs advised his successors to rely on their own intuition and not on market research.

Steve Jobs quoted Henry Ford, who reportedly said, “If I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said faster horses.” Jobs said, people don’t know what they want until you show it to them. “That’s why I never rely on market research. Our task is to read things that are not yet on the page.”

Update: Oct. 29, 2012:

Apple announces that Scott Forstall, vice president of iOS software, and John Browett, head of retail, are out. Memo cites need for more collaborative environment. Bob Mansfield un-retires and returns to company.

(Source: Apple Press Release)