Steve Jobs (1955 - 2011) : the hungry leader

Résumé du document

A monumental leader like Steve Jobs required a monumental biography, but one that neither falls into the trap of panegyric or hagiography, nor into that of prosecution or indictment ; which is often how the stories of those who became great leaders of their times is told. To put it simply, since our subject leader was sometimes too honest and too harsh, as is also the biography we chose : the famously posthumous Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson (2011).

This memo will constitute an attempt at presenting the most salient leadership and human attributes of Steve Jobs, often recognized as the "charismatic pioneer of the personal computer revolution". In order to do so, we will discuss Jobs' personal history and career, his major inventions and above all, what made him one of the greatest leaders of his generation.

Extraits

[...] So yes indeed, Steve Jobs did know how to address his public. But it was also true for interpersonal communication. Indeed, Jobs is also renowned for his ability to occupy space, for the fluidity of his speeches and more concretely, for the fact that he could stare at someone without blinking an eye, or get anything he wanted from his interlocutors after a casual outdoor walk. In any case, be it from the public or individual interlocutors, Jobs demonstrated strong persuasive powers almost every time. [...]

[...] On the opposite, he displayed various human and leadership defects. In our own view, this is what made him so interesting to start with. But that is very unlikely to be in the opinion of most of his personal and profesional relationships. Indeed, most of his defects have affected Jobs' relations. In this part we will see that actually the bulk of Jobs' flaws and issues were often related to his aforementioned qualities. F. When perfectionism leads to obsession Many of Jobs' relatives and former collaborators have testified (notably through extensive interviews with Isaacson) about how far Jobs' obsession for “the perfect product” has ruined their personal relationship or the atmosphere at work. [...]

[...] Steve Jobs kept the same approach when we was facing sickness and death. Indeed, he remained intensively active until his very last moments, and even encouraged a whole generation to “stay hungry and foolish” even when there is no hope. D. Anticipatory and instinctive vision “You have to trust in something – your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down” Commencement Speech at Stanford University “A lot of times, people don't know what they want until you show it to them” BusinessWeek, May Maybe as one of its most salient leadership attributed, Steve Jobs really had an anticipatory, instinct-driven vision that went well beyond his own generation needs. [...]

[...] However, issues often arised when Jobs had to treat people individually, i.e. with tolerance, respect and patience, in order to maintain certain of his most valuable assets – his employees. [In this sense, it seemed to us that Steve Jobs had an INTP personality (introverted, intuitive, thinking and perceiving) according to the MBTI assessment.] Jobs' premature death will prevent us from learning the long- term lessons of such a complex personality. In any case, Steve Jobs' main defects often derived from his own attributes as a brilliant (though imperfect) leader, like if his outstanding creative impulses had to be offset by destructive ones. [...]

[...] Indeed, during the conception of this project, Jobs put a strong emphasis on pure lines and on a minimalist use of buttons (which clearly differentiated the iPod from other MP3 players at the time), and overindulged designers while harassing engineers after the design phase, to make engineering fits the minimalist design. This was not always an easy task But as we will see below, Jobs had his tricks. He notably asserted that “design is not just what it looks like and feels like. [...]