Steve Jobs: The Dark Side of a Visionary
Summary
TLDRThis script recounts the career of Steve Jobs, from his early days at Apple leading the Macintosh project, to his ousting and return that reshaped the company. It explores his visionary leadership, which brought iconic products like the iPod and iPhone to life, while also examining his darker traits such as taking credit for others' work, his volatile personality, and the reality distortion field that pushed teams to achieve the impossible. Despite his flaws, Jobs' legacy endures through Apple's continued innovation and success.
Takeaways
- 💡 Steve Jobs was a visionary leader who played a pivotal role in the personal computer revolution and the creation of iconic products like the Macintosh, iPod, and iPhone.
- 🚀 The Macintosh project, led by Jobs, was a significant milestone that popularized graphical user interfaces and made computers accessible to the masses.
- 📈 Despite his success, Jobs was known for his difficult management style, often missing appointments and not giving credit where it was due.
- 📉 Jobs faced challenges in his early product launches, with the Apple III and Lisa computers failing to achieve market success.
- 🔥 The term 'reality distortion field' was coined to describe Jobs' ability to convince others of his vision and push teams to meet unrealistic deadlines.
- 😔 Jobs' leadership style was polarizing; he categorized employees as either 'geniuses' or 'losers', creating a high-pressure work environment.
- 📱 The iPod and later the iPhone were game-changing products that solidified Apple's position as a market leader in consumer electronics.
- 🌐 The iPhone's multi-touch technology was not an Apple invention but was adapted and popularized by the company, showcasing Jobs' ability to refine existing technologies into successful products.
- 🤝 Jobs was known to take credit for the work of others, including his close collaborator, designer Jonathan Ive.
- 🔍 Personality assessments suggest that Jobs displayed traits of narcissistic personality disorder, which may have contributed to his complex leadership style.
- 🌟 Jobs' legacy is remembered for the transformative impact of his products rather than his controversial personality traits, as Apple continues to innovate and push boundaries.
Q & A
Who was Jeff Raskin and what was his role in the development of the Macintosh?
-Jeff Raskin was a man leading a team at Apple working on a personal computer project called the Macintosh. He had a vision for a thousand-dollar personal computer for the masses but found his vision being undermined by Steve Jobs.
What did Jeff Raskin's memo to Apple's president Mike Scott reveal about Steve Jobs?
-Jeff Raskin's memo revealed that working with Steve Jobs was difficult due to his poor management style, including missing appointments, attacking new ideas, not giving credit where it was due, and taking credit for others' work.
What was the outcome of Jeff Raskin writing the memo about Steve Jobs?
-After writing the memo, Jeff Raskin was removed from his role leading the Macintosh team and eventually left Apple.
What was the significance of the Macintosh computer in the personal computer revolution?
-The Macintosh computer was significant because it introduced a user-friendly graphical user interface, making owning a computer approachable and cool for everyday people, not just tech enthusiasts.
What was the term coined by Bud Tribble to describe Steve Jobs's influence on the Macintosh team?
-Bud Tribble coined the term 'reality distortion field' to describe Steve Jobs's ability to convince his team to meet impossible deadlines and push them beyond what they thought was possible.
How did Steve Jobs treat the team after the success of the Macintosh launch?
-After the success of the Macintosh launch, Steve Jobs showed a lack of empathy by firing 25 members of the Lisa team and offering them no kind words, despite having previously led and believed in the team.
Why was Steve Jobs eventually ousted from Apple?
-Steve Jobs was ousted from Apple due to his volatile personality, which caused distress and conflict with many people he worked with, leading the executive team to remove his power and push him out.
What was the state of Apple when Steve Jobs returned to the company?
-When Steve Jobs returned to Apple, the company had lost its innovative edge, released a series of unsuccessful products, and was verging on bankruptcy.
What was the impact of the iPod on Apple's business and brand?
-The iPod transformed Apple into a dominant player in mobile devices, became a cultural phenomenon, and started a trend where Apple products became statements of personal identity.
What was the most defining feature of the iPhone according to Steve Jobs?
-The most defining feature of the iPhone, according to Steve Jobs, was the touch screen, which he claimed Apple invented, although multi-touch technology had been in development for decades.
How did Steve Jobs's personality traits align with the concept of 'dark triad' personalities?
-Steve Jobs's personality traits, including grandiosity, need for admiration, and lack of empathy, aligned with the concept of 'dark triad' personalities, specifically narcissistic personality disorder.
Outlines
💻 The Early Struggles of Apple and Steve Jobs
This paragraph discusses the early days of Apple and the challenges faced by Steve Jobs. Jobs is credited with iconic products like the iPod and iPhone, but his management style was problematic, often treating employees poorly. The narrative mentions the Macintosh project led by Jeff Raskin, who criticized Jobs' management style in a memo to Apple's president. Jobs' behavior included missing appointments, discrediting others' ideas, and taking credit for them. This memo foreshadowed Jobs' future behavior and his eventual ousting from Apple after the Macintosh's launch. The paragraph also touches on Jobs' failed products like the Apple III and the Lisa computer, named after his daughter but denied by him.
🚀 The Macintosh Revolution and Jobs' Departure
The Macintosh computer revolutionized personal computing with its graphical user interface, making computers accessible to the masses. Despite its success, the team behind it was overworked and burnt out. After the launch, Jobs was put in charge of both the Macintosh and Lisa teams, leading to his firing of 25 Lisa team members. His volatile personality led to conflicts with Apple's CEO John Scully, resulting in his ousting from the company he co-founded. During his 11-year absence, Apple lost its innovative edge, releasing unsuccessful products and nearing bankruptcy, leading to Jobs' return to revive the company.
🎧 The Rise of the iPod and Apple's Transformation
Steve Jobs' return to Apple marked a significant shift in the company's direction, as he aimed to make it more than just a computer company. He streamlined product lines and laid off a significant portion of the workforce. A key innovation was the iPod, a portable music player that became a cultural phenomenon. Jobs' insistence on simplicity and innovation led to the iPod's distinctive design and market dominance. The product became a status symbol, reflecting the owner's creativity and trendiness. Jobs' leadership style, a mix of fear, focus, and brilliance, drove Apple's success, but his lack of empathy and tendency to take credit for others' work were consistent issues throughout his career.
📱 The iPhone and the Legacy of Steve Jobs
The iPhone is highlighted as Steve Jobs' most significant achievement, becoming Apple's primary revenue source and transforming the company. Despite claims that Apple invented multi-touch technology, it had been in development for decades. Jobs' tendency to take credit for others' work is criticized, including by his close collaborator, designer Jonathan Ive. Jobs' behavior is analyzed through the lens of narcissistic personality disorder, a pattern of grandiosity, need for admiration, and lack of empathy. His complex personality is acknowledged as instrumental in Apple's success, but his leadership style, involving fear and categorization of staff, is criticized. Jobs' legacy is primarily tied to the products he helped create, such as the Mac, iPod, and iPhone, rather than his controversial personality traits.
Mindmap
Keywords
💡Personal Computer Revolution
💡Macintosh
💡iPod
💡iTunes
💡iPhone
💡Reality Distortion Field
💡Narcissistic Personality Disorder
💡Innovation
💡Graphical User Interface (GUI)
💡Multi-Touch Technology
💡Product Line Slashing
Highlights
Steve Jobs is regarded as an icon in the tech industry.
Jobs was known for not treating his employees well.
The iPod and iTunes were revolutionary products that changed the music industry.
Jeff Raskin had a vision for a personal computer for the masses, but his vision was being destroyed by Jobs.
Raskin's memo to Apple's president detailed Jobs' poor management skills.
Jobs often took credit for others' ideas and work.
Steve Jobs was removed from his role leading the Macintosh team and later left Apple.
The Macintosh project was a significant milestone in personal computing.
The Macintosh team was pushed to meet impossible deadlines by Jobs.
The Macintosh was a hit and popularized the graphical user interface.
Jobs was put in charge of both the Macintosh and Lisa teams post-Macintosh launch.
Jobs fired 25 of the Lisa team, showing a lack of empathy.
Steve Jobs was ousted from Apple, the company he helped found.
During Jobs' absence, Apple lost its innovative edge and struggled.
Jobs returned to Apple with a plan to revitalize the company.
The iPod was a cultural phenomenon and a significant success for Apple.
Steve Jobs had a polarizing management style, categorizing employees as 'gods' or not.
The iPhone was a major success and became Apple's most important product.
Steve Jobs was known for his reality distortion field, convincing others of his vision.
Dr. Delroy Paulhus suggests that Jobs exhibited traits of narcissistic personality disorder.
Jobs' leadership style was a mix of fear, focus, and brilliance.
Despite his personality flaws, Jobs' vision for Apple was correct and continues to influence the company.
Transcripts
jobs from Apple computer we're very glad
to be here tonight we're no longer on
the verge of the personal computer
Revolution we're right in the midst of
it thank you I'm glad you had a chance
to see MacIntosh and he was like gen
generally regarded as an it's
not turning on here
it's called iPod with something we call
iTunes he thinks that Steve Jobs came
along became an icon but the sad part of
that narrative was he did not treat his
employees well every once in a while a
revolutionary product comes along
that changes everything and are people
willing to tell you you're wrong
that's calling it
iPhone
[Applause]
[Music]
in 1981 a small team at Apple was
working on a quirky personal computer
project called the Macintosh this team
is being led by a man called Jeff
rayskin reskin had the vision for a
thousand dollar personal computer for
the masses but had realized that his
vision was being destroyed by someone
without his approval
out of frustration he wrote a memo to
Apple president Mike Scott it read
working for with Steve Jobs he is a
dreadful manager I have always liked
Steve but I have found it impossible to
work for him jobs regularly misses
appointments this is so well known as to
be almost a running joke the ex without
thinking and with bad judgment
he does not give credit where do very
often when told of a new idea he will
immediately attack it and say that it is
worthless or even stupid and tell you
that it was a waste of time to work on
it this alone is bad management but if
the idea is a good one he will soon be
telling people about it as though it was
his own
shortly after writing this memo Jeff Ray
skin would be removed from his role
leading the Macintosh team and leave
Apple Fading Into Obscurity Steve Jobs
would step up and take over the
Macintosh project and the memo would
almost be forgotten from history but
eerily it identified these dark
behavioral patterns that would follow
jobs throughout his entire career prior
to the Macintosh jobs had several
attempts at building out Apple's product
line with the Apple 2E and then the
Apple III which was a computer design
for the business Market but
unfortunately it was riddle rid errors
and never took off then another computer
with a fairly strange name
there's a computer
called Lisa and everybody wondered
who the computer was named after
you know what coincidence is Lisa
like if you met someone
you made a new friend and her name was
Lisa too that would be a coincidence
Lisa stands for local Integrated Systems
architecture
l-i-s-a
it's coincidence
to make matters even worse jobs would
deny that Lisa was actually his child
even though he had been in a
relationship with her mother chrisanne
Brennan
when we were 17 and I was his first love
and I'm the mother of his first child
and my only child we knew loved and
admired each other and when things got
difficult
between us as Apple took off I witnessed
his incremental changes from sweet
Mystic poets super bright goofy guy into
a ruthless stunningly successful
business tycoon Steve is so hugely
successful and yet he traded so many
people so badly
how much of an do you have to be
to be successful what is the moral of
the story here it was around this time
that a software engineer called Bud
Tribble who was working on the Mac
developed a term which would Encompass
much of Steve Jobs's Strange Behaviors
he called it the reality Distortion
field and he had to explain to me well
it's Steve and he told me that Steve had
a reality Distortion field and Steve
could convince anybody of anything so
um Steve did not accept a reasonable
schedule at Apple working on the Mac he
was able to convince the team to meet
impossible deadlines and push them past
the point which they thought was
possible
he's a maniac he's a maniacal genius his
job is to stir up everything he's a
muckraker in the classic sense of the
word he will not leave anything alone he
will not allow
inadequacy or compromise to exist the
spot jobs this unconventional methods
the Mac was a hit
introducing Macintosh it does all the
things you'd expect a personal computer
to do
it does a lot of things you wouldn't
expect a personal computer to do and it
does some things no other computer has
ever done before
this wasn't the first ever personal
computer but this was the one that
changed the way we think about what
computers are and what they can do
welcome to Macintosh this 1984 Mac
really did change everything it's what
made graphical user interface popular
the Macintosh mean owning a computer
approachable and cool everyday people
not just Tech nodes could Envision
themselves using the Mac after it's
released to the public in 1984 the
Macintosh quickly became the new
flagship product for Apple but the
Macintosh team had been pushed too hard
and they were burnt out lost my wife in
that process I lost my children in that
process I
I lost the whole the whole structure of
my life was just changed Forever by
going and working on the Mac
coming off the success of the Macintosh
launch jobs was put in charge of both
the Macintosh and the Lisa team and in a
Showcase of callousness he fired 25 of
the Lisa teen and he offered them no
kind words telling them that they had
failed and they were B players this was
a team that Steve Jobs had led many
years before and really believed in so
much so that he named this very computer
after his daughter but as Jeff Ray skin
had highlighted in that dark memo jobs
was prone to acting without thinking
particularly when it came to the
feelings of others around him history
has a strange way of playing out and in
an interesting twist of fate Steve Jobs
would actually be ousted from Apple the
company that he helped founded 12 months
later
foreign
ly tonight we focus on an Apple Apple
the computer not the fruit the once
high-flying computer industry is having
its troubles Nationwide sales of the
Macintosh and the Apple II have been
slow since the first of the year despite
a small upturn in February many dealers
are stuck with big inventories both in
the warehouse and on their shelves under
forecast Max sales put more stress on
jobs and he became more and more
volatile and started to clash with then
CEO John Scully Steven Jobs sometimes
prickly attitude with both the business
establishment and the Press doesn't help
jobs likes to deal with both on his own
terms and on his own time
catch me later
this young Steve Jobs had so much
Visionary potential but his personality
was mean and volatile and he clashed and
caused distress with so many people that
worked with him the executive team just
didn't know what to do with him so they
removed all power and just decided the
best course of action would be to push
him out Steve would spend the next 11
years away from Apple honing his skills
as a CEO and a leader and on his return
he would embark on potentially the
greatest company turnaround in history
during the 11-year period without Steve
Jobs Apple lost its way from the way I
see it I mean Apple was a company that
was based on Innovation when I left
Apple 10 years ago
we we were 10 years ahead of anybody
else it took Microsoft 10 years to copy
Windows the problem was is that that
Apple Stood Still
even though it invested cumulatively
billions in r d the output has not been
there and people have caught up with it
and its differentiation has has eroded
they released a series of dud products
like the Newton
beat up Martin
well the power book 5300 which was
plagued with issues even occasionally
Catching Fire and needed to be recalled
Apple was desperate verging on
bankruptcy Bill Gates had to give him a
loan
right Michael Dell at the time was
saying shut down the company and give
the money back to the shareholders
so this is not the company that you know
that people oh my God the iPhone came
out it's a very different level of
confidence and financial
situation that the company was in so
desperate that they were willing to take
a chance on a man that they had ousted
11 years before jobs wanted to make
apple bigger than just a computer
company and to get there he would need
only the best people one of his first
orders of business was to slash product
lines like the Newton and in essence
made one third of the company redundant
about 4 000 employees reorganizing some
things a little bit differently
combining things in a few different ways
and in some cases When the Music Stops
there'll be some people that don't have
a chair jobs was never one to shy away
from firing people and throughout his
career many people have commented on his
lack of empathy in this department in
fact he had quite a confronting and
binary way of viewing people they would
fit into one of two buckets or
gods
it was difficult working under Steve
because there was a great polarity
between gods and if if you
were a god you were up on a pedestal and
could do no wrong those of us who were
considered to be Gods as I was knew that
we were actually mortal and made bad
engineering decisions and farted like
any person so we were always afraid that
we would get knocked off our pedestal
the ones that were who were
brilliant Engineers working very hard
felter was no way they could get
appreciated and Rise Above their status
Apple law states that employees at this
time were scared to use the elevators in
the building for fear of meeting Steve
in there and ultimately getting fired as
he decided they were not up to his high
standards on his return He Led Apple
with a cocktail of equal parts fear
focus and Brilliance one of the most
inspired moves he made was to have a
small team start working on a project
for a portable music player Once Upon a
Time Apple was just a computer company
and then came this the iPod before the
iPod there really wasn't an easy way to
take a lot of music with you on the go
it really set the stage for Apple to be
the dominant player when it comes to
mobile devices throughout his life Steve
considered himself as an enlightened
being someone that was truly special and
he believed that he was really destined
to make a big splash on the world it may
have been this confidence in himself
that allowed him to gamble the whole
company on a portable music player
iMac iBook iPod but with big risk comes
big reward the iPod was easily the best
music player on the market it wasn't
even close it was so beautiful and well
designed using a mechanical scroll wheel
nothing like this had ever been built
before so it wasn't long before it
became a cultural phenomenon
one of the most genius design moves at
the time was to make the headphones
white which were the opposite of all the
other black and gray headphones that
were out there this became the signature
look for the iPod an apple leaned hard
into it for their marketing it was at
this point that Apple started to do
something that very few other brands
have been able to do their products
started to transcend the hardware and
the software and they became statements
of your identity owning an iPod said a
lot about you as a person it signaled to
the outside world that you were creative
and cool and that you had your finger on
the pulse and apple became more than a
company it became a movement and all of
this was architected by Steve Jobs the
iPod would live on for six Generations
so half a billion units and it would
fund the development of the most
important product jobs would ever work
on
in 2007 Steve Jobs would unveil Apple's
latest and most impressive creation
every once in a while
a revolutionary product comes along
that changes everything
and an internet communicator
an iPod
getting it
these are not
three separate devices
this is one device today apple is going
to reinvent the phone safe to say the
single most defining feature of the
iPhone is the touch screen in 2007 the
biggest foam manufacturing the market
was Blackberry who actually used a
physical keyboard jobs is always a
stickler for Simplicity so The Story
Goes that Apple invented the multi-touch
touch screen and we have invented a new
technology
which is phenomenal claim that jobs
makes that Apple invented the
multi-touch is just simply not true
multi-touch had been developing for
decades in many different iterations I'm
really really excited to be here today
because I'm about to show you some stuff
that's just ready to come out of the lab
literally and
I'm really glad that you guys are going
to be amongst the first to be able to
see it in person because I really really
think this is going to change really
change the way we interact with machines
from this point on this thing allows you
to have multiple points at the same time
they can use both my hands I can use
cording options I can just go right up
and use all 10 fingers if I wanted to go
like that multi-touch sensing isn't
anything isn't completely new I mean
people like buildbox and have been
playing around with in the 80s I think
who had teams of people working on this
problem was aware of what was happening
in the industry at that time this Ted
presentation was only minutes away from
Apple HQ in California and it gets worse
there are actually other accounts of
Steve Jobs taking credit for other
people's work even people working with
him inside Apple the most disturbing and
notable comes from Johnny Ive I was the
chief design officer at Apple and worked
there from 1992 to 2019. he's
responsible for leading the design team
that made some of the most iconic Apple
products the iMac G3 the iPod the iPhone
the iPad Johnny Ive did it all and Steve
Jobs loved Johnny Ive he was on the god
side of the equation at Apple in a
biography of Steve Jobs written by
Walter Isaacs and Johnny I was candid
about the pain he felt when Steve Jobs
took credit for his work
he will go through a process of looking
at my ideas and say that's no good
that's not very good I like that one and
later I would be sitting in the audience
and he will be talking about it as if it
was his idea I pay maniacal attention to
where idea comes from and I even keep
notebooks filled with my ideas so it
hurts when he takes credit for one of my
designs
again that memo comes into play where
race can said jobs would take credit for
other people's work it was something
that happened in the early 80s and
continued to happen throughout his whole
career regardless of who stole whose
work the iPhone was a major success it
would become Apple's most important
product the iPhone now is about 60
percent of Apple's Revenue so this has
been a transformative product at the
core and jobs would become the face of
it just like how he was the face of the
iPod and the Mac before history is
written by the Victor but looking back
there is an explanation that can help us
understand what was going on in the mind
of Steve Jobs all these years
Dr Delroy palhas is a well-respected
personality psychologist who works at
the University of British Columbia he
has dedicated his life to understanding
what he calls dark Personalities in 2002
Powerhouse created his Flagship work the
dark tri-hat the Triad is a theory of
dark personalities consisting of
psychopathy machiavellianism and
narcissism Dr Powerhouse believes that
Steve Jobs's bad behavior fits perfectly
with the traits of someone that has
narcissistic personality disorder
wrote a paper on Steve Jobs for example
some time ago
it helps to be a genius of course but if
you're a full narcissist who believes
you have the right idea and the entire
world is wrong about it
everyone disagreed with them
and he was right well in fact he was
fired by his own company
after having proved himself to be a
genius and changing the world in so many
ways
his own company said he was too
obnoxious
so they let them go
eventually the company kind of faded out
they had to bring them back but right
how can how can you be so super
successful and fired by your own team uh
classic case narcissistic personality
disorder is defined as a pattern of
grandiosity Need for admiration and lack
of empathy beginning in early childhood
and categorized by five or more of the
following traits
in a scientific paper titled
transformational leader or narcissist
researchers Charles A O'Reilly and
Jennifer a Chapman built on the work of
Powerhouse and they explored how many
transformational leaders including Steve
Jobs showed strong signs of narcissistic
personality disorder in the paper they
state that Steve Jobs is often cited as
a prototypical transformational leader
but in his biography Walter Isaacson
described how jobs humiliated others was
impulsive took credit for others work
lied the reality Distortion field and
believed that the rules did not apply to
him even routinely parking in
handicapped spots jobs girlfriend after
reading about the narcissistic
personality disorder decided that the
criteria applied perfectly to him it's
clear that Steve Jobs was a complicated
man in my humble opinion Apple wouldn't
be the company they are today without
Steve Jobs taking over and leading them
from 1997 to 2011. I believe leave in
order to build a great company you need
to have a strong vision and people need
to be pushed outside of their comfort
zone two things that jobs was definitely
fantastic at doing but I also disagree
with many of the ways that he treated
people I believe leading with fear is
wrong I believe categorizing your staff
into labels like is wrong I
also think obviously taking credit for
others work like he did with Johnny Ive
is bad ultimately though his vision that
he had for Apple was correct and it
continues to live on more than a decade
after his death apple is still pushing
boundaries and not scared to take risks
by building new products that will shape
our future and whether it's good or bad
many people won't remember jobs for his
personality specifically the bad traits
about his personality they'll remember
him because of the products he helped to
give birth to the Mac the iPod and the
iPhone
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