One of the most interesting revelations of the Fortune piece “Inside Apple” that’s making headlines this weekend is how Steve Jobs thinks Apple will be OK without him.
Fortune reporter Adam Lashinsky writes:
“Jobs himself believes he has set Apple on a course to survive in his absence. He has created a culture that, while not particularly jolly, has internalized his ways.”
“… these days, he’s especially focused on institutionalizing his ways of doing business. His mission: to turn the traits that people most closely associate with Jobs–the attention to detail, the secrecy, the constant feedback–into processes that can ensure Apple’s excellence far into the future.”
And here’s me writing for CNN in January:
In the last decade, Jobs has thoroughly remade Apple in his image. His personality traits have become encoded as the way the company does things. His perfectionism, attention to detail, even his design taste, have become part and parcel of Apple’s processes, from product development to advertising.
One of the most interesting revelations in Lashinky’s piece concerns the “case studies” that are being written about Apple’s most important decisions, such as consolidating iPhone manufacturing around a single factory in China. Jobs hired Joel Podolny, former dean of Yale School of management, as Apple head of HR. He’s been busy with a team of “eggheads” writing studies about Apple’s business decisions.
“It runs out Podolny has been busy working on a project that speaks directly to the delicate topic of life at Apple after Jobs. At Jobs’ instruction, Podolny hired a team of business professors, including the renowned Harvard veteran and Andy Grove biographer Richard Tedlow. This band of eggheads is writing a series of internal case studies about significant decisions in Apple’s recent history. It’s exactly the sort of thing the major business schools do, except Apple’s case studies are for an Apple-only audience… The goal is to expose the next layer of management to the executive team’s thought process… Jobs even is ensuring that his teachings are being collected, curated and preserved so that future generations of Apple’s leaders can consult and interpret them.”
Lashinsky’s piece isn’t yet online but is available on the iPad. MacStories has a pretty good summary.
Leander Kahney is the editor and publisher of Cult of Mac.
Leander is a longtime technology reporter and the author of six acclaimed books about Apple, including two New York Times bestsellers: Jony Ive: The Genius Behind Apple’s Greatest Products and Inside Steve’s Brain, a biography of Steve Jobs.
He’s also written a top-selling biography of Apple CEO Tim Cook and authored Cult of Mac and Cult of iPod, which both won prestigious design awards. Most recently, he was co-author of Cult of Mac, 2nd Edition.
Leander has been reporting about Apple and technology for nearly 30 years.
Before founding Cult of Mac as an independent publication, Leander was news editor at Wired.com, where he was responsible for the day-to-day running of the Wired.com website. He headed up a team of six section editors, a dozen reporters and a large pool of freelancers. Together the team produced a daily digest of stories about the impact of science and technology, and won several awards, including several Webby Awards, 2X Knight-Batten Awards for Innovation in Journalism and the 2010 MIN (Magazine Industry Newsletter) award for best blog, among others.
Before being promoted to news editor, Leander was Wired.com’s senior reporter, primarily covering Apple. During that time, Leander published a ton of scoops, including the first in-depth report about the development of the iPod. Leander attended almost every keynote speech and special product launch presented by Steve Jobs, including the historic launches of the iPhone and iPad. He also reported from almost every Macworld Expo in the late ’90s and early ‘2000s, including, sadly, the last shows in Boston, San Francisco and Tokyo. His reporting for Wired.com formed the basis of the first Cult of Mac book, and subsequently this website.
Before joining Wired, Leander was a senior reporter at the legendary MacWeek, the storied and long-running weekly that documented Apple and its community in the 1980s and ’90s.
Leander has written for Wired magazine (including the Issue 16.04 cover story about Steve Jobs’ leadership at Apple, entitled Evil/Genius), Scientific American, The Guardian, The Observer, The San Francisco Chronicle and many other publications.
Leander is an expert on:
Apple and Apple history
Steve Jobs, Jony Ive, Tim Cook and Apple leadership
Apple community
iPhone and iOS
iPad and iPadOS
Mac and macOS
Apple Watch and watchOS
Apple TV and tvOS
AirPods
Leander has a postgrad diploma in artificial intelligence from the University of Aberdeen, and a BSc (Hons) in experimental psychology from the University of Sussex.
He has a diploma in journalism from the UK’s National Council for the Training of Journalists.
Leander lives in San Francisco, California, and is married with four children. He’s an avid biker and has ridden in many long-distance bike events, including California’s legendary Death Ride.
You can find out more about Leander on LinkedIn and Facebook. You can follow him on X at @lkahney or Instagram.
38 responses to “Steve Jobs Believes Apple Will Be OK Without Him”
Is that from the current Forbes Magazine?
This is going to be very interesting….Apple’s Bible, Steve’s Gospel. Hope in this case there will not be different interpretations on his writings!!!
If that’s not micro-management then I don’t know what is. He wants everything to be perfect including the future, all products and the one company left standing.
It’s from the newest issue of Fortune magazine. It should be on news stands now or very soon. I’ll definitely get my hands on one just to read this piece. Should be fun.
Make your tag line a littler shorter and you can maybe fit more words into it so it will make sense.
BE
As long as Steve’s vision is part of the Apple culture, Apple will be OK without him. It will be a sad day when he leaves the scene, but that is no reason Apple’s fundamental ethos should change. And there is no reason to think that, short term at least, Apple will be any less competitive or profitable without Steve. I think the danger will come later, when people who did not necessarily share the original vision take the reins and try to reshape or reinvent Apple. But this philosophical continuity issue is not a problem unique to Apple.
http://www.youtube.com/user/De… i dont like how he treats his employees but they still get paid
BE OK
Honestly… An egregious typo in the title… I stopped reading there.
While I believe he’s right, I’m in no hurry to find out. Be well, Steve.
i don’t know bro, they seem to be doing OK.
Interesting article except for the needless distraction of you bragging about your CNN prophecy. Who cares?
I hope when he does leave is b/c of retirement and not something worse.. It’ll sure be the end of an era..but if he taught them well and the employees are still as passionate about Apple as Steve is, then
Apple shouldn’t have any problems.
Apple will be OK, Does he believes that he is a god?
Mr. Steve let’s be realistic and accept it YOU ARE NOT A TECHNOLOGY gOD.
Grow up.
Yet you posted. Silly.
Its a business. Not a charity.