Upload
me012345012345
View
108
Download
0
Tags:
Embed Size (px)
Citation preview
Leadership Analysis Paper: Steve Jobs
Management: Leadership in Organizations
May 2011
Leadership Analysis: Steve Jobs 2
Table of Contents
Table of Contents...........................................................................................................................2
Chapter 1: Introduction....................................................................................................................3
Chapter 2: Leadership Practices......................................................................................................8
Chapter 3: Analysis of Leadership Practices I: Leadership Style and Organizational Goal
Achievement..................................................................................................................................12
Chapter 4: Analysis of Leadership Practices II: Leadership Style and Delegation.......................15
Chapter 5: Conclusions..................................................................................................................16
References......................................................................................................................................18
Leadership Analysis: Steve Jobs 3
Chapter 1: Introduction
The Early Years
“Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life. Don't be trapped by dogma - which is living with the
results of other people's thinking. Don't let the noise of other's opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important,
have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become.
Everything else is secondary.” --Steve Jobs
Born on February 24, 1955 in San Francisco to a pair of graduate students and
immediately given up for adoption, Steven Paul Jobs grew up in a middle-class suburb of
Mountain View, California. While at Homestead High School in Cupertino, Jobs became
interested in electronics and computers, frequenting lectures at Hewlett-Packard. Once, he called
Bill Hewlett, co-founder of HP, to get spare parts for his homework project. Impressed with the
young man, Hewlett gave young Jobs a summer job. It was Jobs’ high school friend, Bill
Fernandez, who shared Job’s interests in electronics, that first introduced him to Steve Wozniak,
or Woz as everyone called him. At the time Woz was building his first computer board, which
impressed the 14-year old Jobs.
After high school, Jobs attended Reed College in Oregon, but dropped out after just one
semester. In 1974, he got his first job at Atari. Jobs was impressed by the company’s founder,
Nolan Bushnell, who became an inspiration for Jobs to start Apple. He spent several months in
India in search of spiritual enlightenment, come back a Buddhist, and experimented with LSD -
Jobs was the quintessential example of the counterculture that permeated the early to mid-
seventies.
Young and Simon (2006), in the iCon Steve Jobs: The Greatest Second Act in the History
of Business, write: “Jobs rose from an outcast high school electronics nerd to become the driving
force behind Apple and avatar of the computer revolution, only to be driven from the company in
failure and disgrace. Then, having endured repeated personal and professional disasters, he went
on to make an indelible mark on the entertainment industry, reclaim the throne at Apple, and,
Leadership Analysis: Steve Jobs 4
with the extraordinary success of the iPod regain his reputation as arguably the greatest innovator
of the digital age.
The Organization
According to journalist Owen Linzmayer (2004), the author of Apple Confidential: The
Real Story of Apple Computer, Inc., the company was founded as a partnership on April Fools’
Day 1976 by a Stephen Gary Wozniak and Steven Paul Jobs. Within two weeks of the firm’s
start, Jobs got his first order for $25,000 for 50 computers from the Byte Shop, the country’s first
retail computer shop. From these humble beginnings, Apple has grown into a global brand with
the second highest market valuation of any company in the world. Major events in Apple’s
company history include many industry firsts:
1976 Company started1977 Incorporated1980 Goes public at $22 per share (AAPL)1984 Introduces the Macintosh computer1985 Jobs forced out by Scully, starts NeXT1990 Sales at $5.3 billion (milestone)1991 PowerBook introduced1994 Power Mac released
1998 Apple buys NeXT. Launches iMAC.2000 Jobs becomes CEO of Apple again.2001 iPod introduced. Apple Retail Store open.2003 iTunes Store - online music $0.99 a song.2006 MacBook released2007 iPhone and Apple TV announced2010 iPad introduced2011 Verizon iPhone launched
Headquartered at 1 Infinite Loop, Cupertino, CA in the heart of Silicon Valley, the
company formerly known as Apple Computer, in now simply, Apple Inc. The company has
46,600 full time employees, 233 retail stores in the United States and 84 stores internationally,
and it does business in over 140 countries around the globe.
Apple’s products include Macintosh desktop and notebook computers, iPhone, iPad,
iPod, Apples TV, third party hardware and accessories, numerous software operating systems
and applications, and digital content. The company sells its products through numerous retail
stores, online stores, a direct sales force, third-party mobile phone companies, wholesalers,
retailers and value added resellers (VARs). Apple’s customers include consumers, small and
medium-sized businesses, education enterprise, government, and creative markets.
Apple’s mission statement has been updated over the past two years and now appears at
the bottom of each press release as follows: “Apple designs Macs, the best personal computers in
Leadership Analysis: Steve Jobs 5
the world, along with OS X, iLife, iWork and professional software. Apple leads the digital
music revolution with its iPods and iTunes online store. Apple has reinvented the mobile phone
with its revolutionary iPhone and App Store, and has recently introduced iPad 2 which is
defining the future of mobile media and computing devices.”
As expected of an industry leader, Apple continuously sets aggressive goals for itself.
For 2011, the company’s many goals include new product launches, sales targets, operational
improvements, new operations, and even shutting down certain projects. Some of the major
items for 2011 include launching the Verizon iPhone and selling 10 million of them, selling 25
million iPads, recapturing smartphone market share from Google Android, launching the Apple
TV App Store, and discontinuing the iPod classic.
The Company’s business strategy leverages its unique ability to design and develop its
own operating systems, hardware, application software, and services to provide its customers
new products and solutions with superior ease-of-use, seamless integration, and innovative
industrial design.” The company further states that it believes the continual investment in R&D
is critical to its success.
As a transnational company, Apple has a global presence. As with any large company,
Weber’s Bureaucratic Model described by Certo & Certo easily applies to Apple. That is, the
company is organized in such as way as to make it efficient to reach its goals and objectives.
“With headquarters in Cupertino, California, Apple has manufacturing facilities in Singapore and
Ireland. It also has distribution facilities in the United States, Canada, Australia, Europe,
Singapore and Japan.” (Quick). It markets its products in over 140 countries, to business,
education, government, scientific, and consumer customers. Oversight for the company is
provided by the board of seven directors, Steve Jobs and Al Gore among them. An eleven
member executive management team reports directly to Steve Jobs and is responsible for running
the 17 groups that make up the company’s structure. While generally hierarchical in nature, the
Apple organization has a number of matrices that facilitate organization efficiency.
Leader Roles and Responsibilities
Leadership Analysis: Steve Jobs 6
The janitor gets to explain why something went wrong. Senior people do not. “When you’re the janitor,” Jobs has repeatedly told incoming
VPs, “reasons matter.” He continues: “Somewhere between the janitor and the CEO, reasons stop mattering.” That “Rubicon,” he has said, “is
crossed when you become a VP.” --Steve Jobs (after an unsuccessful MobileMe
launch)
Few would argue that Apple’s success is inextricably linked to Steve Jobs’ savant-like
technology vision and leadership. At the CEO of Apple and Pixar, Jobs’ role is to drive
organizational success and implementation of both companies’ mission, to realize the vision
through creativity, focused leadership, and hard work. His responsibilities to the shareholders
are to make a profit and grow the companies’ market shares. His responsibilities to customers
are to continue to provide them with innovative, fun, high-quality, and easy-to-use products. His
responsibilities to his employees are to lead, motivate, and support them in the achievement of
organizational goals. The quote above, illustrates that as a leader, Jobs can be volatile when
things go wrong.
Culture
The company’s slogan – “Think Different” – provides a glimpse into its culture. “As a
result, if the technology industry has a soul, Apple's employees are its keepers. And more than a
few companies have tried to replicate a little of the Cupertino, Calif.-based company's success by
hiring Apple employees” (Caulfield).
According to Matt Asay (2007), COO of Canonical, the maker of Ubuntu Linux OS,
“Apple is Apple because of the fervor with which its employees believe in the corporate mission.
Every employee carries an iPhone. Every employee has a MacBook/Pro. And every employee
seems ecstatic to be doing so. You get the same corporate feeling at Red Hat. Ditto for
Microsoft. Extreme ditto for Google. People believe in these employers. These companies are
winners. They are winners because, first and foremost, their employees fundamentally believe in
their products and the companies' mission. You can't buy that allegiance. You earn it” (Asay).
At the 2010 All Things D conference, Steve Jobs described Apple’s culture as “that of a startup.”
Leadership Analysis: Steve Jobs 7
According to Nilofer Merchant (2010), high-performance cultures such as Apple innovate and
win for the same reasons start-ups tend to. Jobs credits smart collaboration that underlies the
creativity of innovation at Apple, and that is what exemplifies the company’s culture. “Culture
is a shared understanding of assumptions and expectations among an organization's members,
and it is reflected in the policies, vision, and goals of that organization", says David Caldwell,
professor of management at Santa Clara University. A culture’s important components are
norms, values, customs, beliefs, attitudes, habits, skills, and level of education among other
characteristics. And while all of these components play a role, in the end, it is leadership that
drives culture and culture drives success. In the May 29, 2010 New York Times Article, the
CEO of Saks was quoted saying: “Culture drives innovation and whatever else you are trying to
accomplish within a company—innovation, execution, whatever it's going to be. And that then
drives results.” According to Merchant, corporate culture is what enables winners to emerge.
Through this culture, leaders are able to push the level of innovation, outcompeting the market
and attracting the best people.
As Brian Caulfield (2009) writes in an article named The Apple Mafia in Forbes.com, “In
Silicon Valley, Apple's quirky culture goes far beyond its walls. Inside the Valley, Apple is
known for producing hard-nosed industrial designers, interface gurus and entrepreneurs who
thrive on turning raw technology into a slick mass-market sensation--people a lot like Steve
Perlman, who left Apple in 1990. Perlman, now chief executive of tech incubator Rearden LLC,
developed much of the multimedia technology used in the color Macintosh” (Caulfield).
On a web site dedicated to the down side of Apple’s culture called Applepeels: A salty
perspective on Apple, the author contrasts the changes in Apple’s culture over the years. “For
many years, the most challenging management task at Apple was keeping your employees from
working themselves to death. Sixty to seventy hours a week was not abnormal for many Apple
folks. Sometime starting with the difficult times at Apple in the middle nineties, the culture at
Apple started to change. Some of the best people started to leave. Changes that came when
Steve and his crew took over created a very different relationship between Apple, its employees
Leadership Analysis: Steve Jobs 8
and customers. The first was the all pervasive secrecy which often meant that Apple executives
would brief customers on "future technologies" yet Apple field employees would be asked to
leave the room. A comment reported from one of Apple's Senior VPs really is a defining
thought for Apple. At a meeting, he first said that "Apple has no enterprise customers," and
followed that with the comment that ‘Customers don't know what they want, we have to tell
them what to buy.’ This was a radical change from the culture of Apple of the early nineties
where Apple spent a tremendous amount of time with focus groups and product advisory
councils. It is well recorded that Steve came in, focused Apple on a few products, got those
really right, and turned the company around” (Sobotta).
Chapter 2: Leadership Practices
Vision
Apple is inextricably tied with Steve Jobs. It is this man’s guiding vision and raw talent
that has transformed and invigorated not only Apple, but the technology industry as a whole. As
Bolman and Deal (2006) state in The Wizard and the Warrior: Leading with Passion and Power,
“The qualities of great leaders are characteristics of mind, soul, heart and skill that evolve over a
lifetime of learning and experience. There is no quick and easy route to leadership
effectiveness” (Bolman, et al.) At a 2008 industry conference Jobs was quoted, “Focus is critical
for effective leadership, with so many options, choosing the right one can be extremely difficult.
People think focus means saying yes to the thing you’ve got to focus on. But that’s not what it
means at all. It means saying no to the hundred other good ideas that there are. I’m actually as
proud of many of the things we haven’t done as the things we have done. The clearest example
was when we were pressured for years to do a PDA, and I realized one day that 90% of the
people who use a PDA only take information out of it on the road. They don’t put information
into it. Pretty soon cell phones are going to do that, so the PDA market’s going to get reduced to
a fraction of its current size, and it won’t really be sustainable. So we decided not to get into it. If
Leadership Analysis: Steve Jobs 9
we had gotten into it, we wouldn’t have had the resources to do the iPod. We probably wouldn’t
have seen it coming.”
Jobs has always held a strategic view with respect to technology and its benefit to the
world. In the company’s latest 10K annual report, he outlines Apple’s strategy as: “The
Company is committed to bringing the best user experience to its customers through its
innovative hardware, software, peripherals, services, and Internet offerings.” Jobs’ historical
approach to strategy was never to focus on near-term fixes, but rather on building a high-
performance culture by doing three things well: (1) focus the strategy to be about one thing, (2)
eliminate passive aggressiveness, and encourage debate and the formulation of new ideas, born
through the tension of the creative conflict, and (3) set up a holistic vision that leads to
organizational cohesion, from concept to product to sales.
It is almost impossible to conceive of a leader in the technology space that is more of a
“visionary” than Steve Jobs. Based on the findings of Bennis and Nanus (1985) research, Jobs
certainly fulfills the first criteria of transformational leadership as someone with clarity of vision
(Northouse,182).
Inspiration
Jobs rates high on Factor 2 of Transformation Leadership, which is Inspirational
Motivation. (Northouse, 179) "Why join the navy if you can be a pirate?" is one of Jobs’ great
quotes. Over the past 35 years Steve Jobs has been an inspiration to generations of students,
engineers, and of course Apple, Pixar, and NeXT employees. His 2005 highly inspirational
commencement speech at Stanford has over 4.5 million views on YouTube. According to
Carmine Gallo (2009) of Gallo Communications, “Jobs is said to exert a ‘reality distortion field’-
an uncanny ability to convince people to follow his vision. It’s not magic. It’s passion. Jobs has
never been passionate about computers, but how computers can be used as tools to unleash
human potential” (Gallo).
Goal Orientation
Leadership Analysis: Steve Jobs 10
In line with the Path-Goal Theory (Northouse, 125-146), Jobs is highly goal-oriented. To
ensure that his goals have the proper resources, he is singularly focused on ensuring the only the
most important projects are undertaken, and that these have the commitment of the entire
company. Two non-product related goals for the company set by Jobs and Cook, Apple’s COO,
are the commitment to support education and environmentally focused green initiatives. As a
serious gesture of his commitment, Jobs invited Al Gore, the former Vice President of U.S.,
Nobel Prize winner, and an environmental champion, to join the Board of Directors at Apple.
Problem Solving Orientation
As outlined in Skills Approach (Northouse, 44-48), Steve Jobs truly understands the
concept of what it takes to solve problems. In 1984, he’s quoted saying “When you start looking
at a problem and it seems really simple with all these simple solutions, you don’t really
understand the complexity of the problem. And your solutions are way too oversimplified, and
they don’t work. Then you get into the problem, and you see it’s really complicated. And you
come up with all these convoluted solutions. That’s sort of the middle, and that’s where most
people stop, and the solutions tend to work for a while. But the really great person will keep on
going and find the key, underlying principle of the problem, and come up with a beautiful
elegant solution that works.”
Day to Day Operations
Much about the situation approach of leadership (Northouse, 89-99) applies to Steve
Jobs’ operational style. Of the 46,000 people at Apple, he works with about 100, from key
individual contributors to vice presidents. As he describes it, “When a good idea comes, you
know, part of my job is to move it around, just see what different people think, get people talking
about it, argue with people about it, get ideas moving among that group of 100 people, get
different people together to explore different aspects of it quietly, and, you know - just explore
things." Distilling his style into an SLII model, while he spends most of his days in the D4
quadrant, he does make his way to D1 when the project requires it.
Relationship Orientation
Leadership Analysis: Steve Jobs 11
As the Ohio State LBDQ studies suggest, relationship behavior includes building
camaraderie, respect, and liking between leaders and followers (Northouse, 70). As alluded to in
the previous paragraph, much of Steve Jobs’ daily routine is spending quality time with a few
dozen key people, floating new ideas and engaging in creative dialog. Much about Jobs is not
about the people, but rather the ideas and the vision thing. When it comes to work relationships,
Edgar S. Woolard Jr. (2006), the former chairman of Apple offers his take. "People are
misreading Steve Jobs," he says. "If he has a good relationship with you, there is nobody better
in the world to work with” (Burrows).
Communication Style
As with the rest of his management and leadership style, Jobs’ communication style
varies to suit the situation. He’s reported to be a good listener and an assertive speaker. He
identified passive-aggressive behavior as a cancer and has vowed to eliminate it from Apple’s
culture. With employees he can be warm or harsh, depending on circumstance. But in the
public eye is where his communication style really shines. What makes Steve Jobs such a good
presenter at industry events are five key points: (1) Prepare carefully, (2) Create drama, (3) Use
pictures, (4) Make it personal, and (5) Have fun.
Rewards and Punishment
As founder and CEO of Apple, a technology expert and a cult figure in the industry, Jobs
enjoys Legitimate, Expert, Referent, Reward, and Coercive power to influence those around him
(Northouse, 7). Using his reward power, he can provide raises, promotions, bonuses or perks.
He has also been known to use coercion: yelling at employees and threatening to fire them.
Collaboration Orientation
While Steve Jobs is a big proponent of the use collaboration in the propagation of design
ideas, he is also authority-oriented when it comes to making key decision on which projects to
take on and which projects to pass on. In a 2008 interview, Steve Jobs told Fortune Magazine
that optimal collaboration taps into the masses, but is refined through the experts. That is, it is
not one or the other - it is the intelligent collaboration of both.
Leadership Analysis: Steve Jobs 12
Ethics Orientation
There are some unique and identifiable differences between the product and customer
focused and the personal and position focused ethics related to Steve Jobs. From a product and
customer perspective, Jobs’ ethics are beyond reproach; his commitment to quality and customer
satisfaction is world renowned – he truly lives the “customer is always right” motto. The issue
becomes more murky when it comes to Job’s ethical obligation to his shareholders. As Bruce
Wienstein, PhD (2008) writes, “Stakeholders have an interest in the CEO's health. By ‘interest,’ I
don't mean a morbid curiosity, but rather a right to know whether or not the captain of the ship
can physically perform the work expected. Jobs' medical condition, his treatment options, and
his prognosis all fall within the rightful purview of stakeholders” (Bloomberg BusinessWeek).
Chapter 3: Analysis of Leadership Practices I:
Leadership Style and Organizational Goal Achievement
The Situational approach to leadership proposes that different types of situations demand
different kinds of leadership. This approach stresses the directive and supportive dimensions and
that each must be applied according to the situation. “The essence of situational leadership
demands that leaders match their style to the competence and commitment of the subordinates”
(Northouse, 89-99). The four leadership styles identified in the SLII model are: Directing (S1),
Coaching (S2), Supporting (S3), and Delegating (S4). Each clearly matches directive and
supportive behavior of the leader with subordinates’ competence and commitment.
The Style approach to leadership focuses on the leader’s behavior – what they do and
how they act. Two types of behaviors are identified: task and relationship behavior. Task
behavior is about helping the team accomplish goals. Relationship behavior is about helping
subordinates feel good about their team, their setting, and themselves. Ohio State and University
of Michigan studies greatly contributed toward development of this approach. The Leadership
Grid refined by Blake and Mouton in 1985 “…was designed to explain how leaders help
organizations to reach their purposes through two factors: concern for production and concern
Leadership Analysis: Steve Jobs 13
for people” (Northouse, 69-80). The leadership styles associated with this approach are
identified by their location on the Leadership Grid: Impoverished Management (1,1), Country-
Club Management (1,9), Authority-Compliance Management (9,1), Middle-of-the-Road
Management (5,5), and Team Management (9,9). Two other styles: Paternalism/Maternalism
and Opportunism are also described; the first using 1,9 and 9,1 styles without integration and the
second using a combination of styles for personal advancement.
Leader-Member Exchange (LMX) is an approach to leadership that “conceptualizes
leadership as a process that is centered on the interactions between leaders and followers”
(Northouse, 147-158). This approach focuses on vertical dyadic relationships and introduces the
concepts of in-groups and out-groups. Research by Graen & Uhl-Bien (1991) suggested
leadership-making as a prescriptive approach should be used to develop high-quality exchanges
with all members rather than just a few, with the goal of moving every subordinate into the in-
group. The approach would develop in three phases: Phase 1 – Stranger, Phase 2 –
Acquaintance, Phase 3 – Partnership, throughout which the Roles, Influences, Exchanges, and
Interests would transition over time.
Transformational Leadership, coined by Downton in 1973, is currently one of the most
popular approaches. This approach, emerging from the 1978 work of James MacGregor Burns,
focuses “…more attention on the charismatic and affective elements. Bass and Riggio (2006)
suggested that its popularity might be due to its emphasis on intrinsic motivation and follower
development” (Northouse, 171-191). Transformational leadership is a process of changing and
transforming people and involves emotions, values, ethics, standards and long term goals. It
focuses on understanding the followers’ motives and satisfying their needs. This approach can
be used to influence one-on-one relationships as well as entire organizations. On the Leadership
Continuum, Transformational Leadership is the one side of the spectrum and Laissez-Faire
Leadership on the other, with Transactional Leadership occupying the middle ground between
the two. The four Leadership Factors associated with Transformation Leadership are: Factor 1 –
Leadership Analysis: Steve Jobs 14
Idealized Influence and Charisma, Factor 2 – Inspirational Motivation, Factor 3- Intellectual
Stimulation, and Factor 4 – Individualized Consideration.
Team Leadership model provides a mental or cognitive roadmap that helps leaders to
identify group needs, diagnose issues, and suggest appropriate corrective actions. It is based on
the “claim that the leader’s job is to monitor the team and then take whatever action is necessary
to ensure team effectiveness” and it “attempts to integrate mediation and monitoring concepts
with team effectiveness” (Northouse, 241-266). To use this model, leaders need to be
behaviorally flexible and have a wide range of actions and skills to meet the needs of the team.
Hill’s Model for Team Leadership consists of four areas: Leadership Decisions, Internal
Leadership Actions, External Leadership Actions, and Team Effectiveness, which provide a set
of guidelines for if, when, and what type of actions is to be taken.
Steve Jobs is the model of a transformational leader. He clearly satisfies the four factors
associated with this leadership style. As a cultural icon, Jobs’ idealized influence is completely
off the charts with his employees, suppliers, customers, the market, the media, and our entire
culture at large. As the spiritual leader of Apple and Pixar and a frequent speaker at numerous
technology industry events, his is the image and the persona that many identify with inspirational
motivation. As the technology visionary and the original author of “Think Different”, he rates at
the very top for intellectual stimulation. Throughout his 35-year career, Jobs has provided
support, leadership, and coaching to countless technology and marketing people within the
Apple, NeXT, and Pixar organizations. Currently working closely with his executive
management teams on succession planning, Jobs also rates highly on the individualized
consideration scale.
In reviewing market position, level of innovation, financial performance, corporate
culture, media exposure, and customer feedback of both Apple and Pixar, the data clearly
supports the finding that the organizations are achieving and surpassing their goals in every
aspect and that much of this is owed to Steve Jobs. Jobs’ leadership style and practices are
indeed well aligned with both organizations’ goals.
Leadership Analysis: Steve Jobs 15
It is difficult to imagine how someone could improve the leadership style of Steve Jobs
leadership style, given his surreal, “bigger-than-life” image. With 35-years of success and
failure, personal defeats and professional victories, and all of the achievement that he has been
credited with, Jobs has under his belt more natural abilities and honed skills than most of us will
ever aspire to. If anything, I would suggest that a bit of mellower approach (less dressing down
of his team) when dealing with difficulties that all of us run into on an ongoing basis.
Chapter 4: Analysis of Leadership Practices II:
Leadership Style and Delegation.
The situational approach to leadership stresses the directive and supportive dimensions.
Of the four leadership styles in the approach, the SLII model defines the S4 delegating style as
the low supportive – low directive style. That is, the leader offers less task input and less social
support, in effect giving subordinates more control without interference from leader. For this
style to be effective, the subordinates must show high degree of competence and commitment.
That is, they must confirm their understanding of the task, have the skills and experience to
effectively and efficiently complete it, and they must acknowledge their commitment to the
completion of the task.
One would think that long term success in the technology space almost my definition
would necessitate solid management and leadership skills, without which such success would be
fleeting. No so much in the case of Steve Jobs. Jobs tends to be more of a micromanager at
Apple and a delegator at Pixar. Careful by his very nature when hiring people, Jobs does a lot of
hard work up front ensuring that only the right people work at Apple. After this difficult task is
behind him, he delegates almost complete authority to the likes of Tim Cook and John Ive, while
really getting his hands dirty when a product launch doesn’t go exactly right. He sets the trust
bar very, very high and most employees at Apple have a clear understanding of the repercussions
of failure.
Leadership Analysis: Steve Jobs 16
A lot has changed with Jobs over the past half decade that has to do with his health.
While prior to 2005, his delegation practices and concerns for the developmental levels of his
followers left much to be desired, since that time, Steve’s unfortunate encounter with his own
mortality has manifested changes in his approach. Over the past few years, he’s worked closely
with his executive team to develop in them a sense of his own instincts. For the third time in the
past few years, he’s handed over day-to-day operational control to Tim Cook, Apple’s COO. In
The Steve Jobs Way: iLeadership for a New Generation, authors Jay Elliot and William Simon
(2011) write, “Steve was on leave most of the time during the final stages of iPad development
and launch. Even so, the iPad proved to be another ground-breaking product with sales topping
billions of dollars in the first couple of months… Steve was even less able to take part in
development of the second-generation iPad he has just announced, yet a first look suggests that
his team has successfully applied all the lessons they learned from working under him… So far,
it’s clear that Steve Jobs has created a team and structure that are capable of functioning
splendidly even without him at the helm” (Elliot, et.al).
Given the unfolding events of the past year, and in light the information in the previous
paragraph, I believe that Steve Jobs, driven as much by temporal necessity as his love of the
company he created, has already put in place the required changes with respect to delegation
practices that are appropriate and necessary for organizational success.
Chapter 5: Conclusions
This research paper provides a leadership analysis of Steve Jobs, CEO of Apple and
Pixar. It starts out by examining his formative years, the influences that have shaped his skills
and his psyche, and the road he traveled to his current leadership position. His interest in
electronics and calligraphy, the early relationships he built and his highly individualistic and “go
after it” approach is evident in his early years. The paper provides background information on
Apple (and a little on Pixar) that illustrates the level of achievement that this leader is credited
with. As the head of the second highest valued corporation in the world, Jobs has reached a
Leadership Analysis: Steve Jobs 17
pinnacle few have enjoyed. Leader roles and culture are explored as they relate to Jobs and what
he has created at Apple. The paper explores Jobs’ leadership practices including vision,
inspiration, goal and problem solving orientation, day-to-day operations, relationship orientation,
communication style, his use of reward and punishment, and collaboration and ethics
orientations. With Jobs’ highly public persona, many sources as well as Jobs’ own quotes are
widely used. Five key leadership styles identified in the Peter Northouse text are then reviewed.
Jobs clearly fits the transformational leader model. Lastly, the paper analyzes Jobs’ leadership
style and delegation.
From a personal perspective, based on extensive research undertaken, the lesson I’m
taking away from this assignment is the importance of following your own vision. From the
many books and articles that I read, I distilled the fact that Jobs has never worried much about
what others think and what others want. One of his favorite quotes from Henry Ford states “If
I'd have asked my customers what they wanted, they would have told me ‘A faster horse'." While
with most people, such blatant disregard for market needs, would surely spell out failure, in Jobs’
case, his vision and innate sense of what is “next” has enabled him to build a tremendous
success. Boiling down what I learned about Steve Jobs, and applying it to my own life, I would
say that it is very important to achieve clarity on where I’m going, before engaging in the task at
hand. And then, it is important not to allow anyone to “reason” their way into changing my
course. There are always obstacles and “nay-sayers” – it is important to follow my own North
Star.
In conclusion, my final thought is that this project, while taking the better part of a whole
week to complete, has resulted in real learning that should have positive outcomes for my career
and personal life.
Here’s to the crazy ones. The misfits. The rebels. The troublemakers. The round pegs in the square holes. The ones who see things
differently. They’re not fond of rules. And they have no respect for the status quo. You can quote them, disagree with them, glorify or vilify
them. About the only thing you can’t do is ignore them. Because they change things. They push the human race forward. And while some
Leadership Analysis: Steve Jobs 18
may see them as the crazy ones, we see genius. Because the people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world, are the ones
who do.--Steve Jobs (Think Different
commercial)
Leadership Analysis: Steve Jobs 19
References
"Apple Computer, Inc." 2011. Hoovers Online: www.hoover.com
Asay, M. (2007). The power of Apple’s culture. CNET News. Online: news.cnet.com
Bolman, L. and Deal, T. (2006). The Wizard and The Warrior. (213-214). California: John Wiley
& Sons.
Bryant, A. (2010, May 29). For the Chief of Saks, It’s Culture the Drives Results. The New York
Times.
Burrows, P. (2004, October 12). The Seed of Apple’s Innovation. Bloomberg BusinessWeek.
Caulfield, B. (2009, February 18). The Apple Mafia. Retrieved from www.forbes.com
Certo, S. & Certo, T. (2009). Modern Management Concepts and Skills. 11th edition. (125-127).
India: Prentice Hall.
Elliot, J. & Simon, W. (2011). The Steve Jobs Way: iLeadership for a New Generation. New
York: Vanguard Press.
Gallo, C. (2009). 7 Secrets of Inspiring Leaders: Lessons from the world’s greatest brands.
Gallo Communications. Retrieved from gallocommunications.com
Kawasaki, G. (1990). The Macintosh Way. New York: Doubleday Publishing
Linzmayer, O. (2004) Apple Confidential: The Real Story of Apple Computer
Merchant, N. (2010, June 14). Apple’s Startup Culture. Bloomberg BusinessWeek.
Noce, J.E. (2002). Steve Jobs. Business Leader Profiles for Students. Volume 2. (246-250).
Farmington Hills, MI: The Gale Group.
Northouse, P. (2010). Leadership: Theory and Practice. Thousand Oaks: Sage Publications.
Quick, A. (2002). Apple Computer, Inc. Company Profiles for Students. Volume 3. (58-63).
Farmington Hills, MI: The Gale Group.
Rabe, C. (2006). The Innovation Killer. New York: American Management Association.
Scully, J. & Byrne, J. (1987). Odyssey. New York: Harper and Row.
Sobotta. (2005). The Apple Corporate Culture. Applepeels: A salty perspective on Apple.
Retrieved from www.viewfromthemountain.typepad.com
Leadership Analysis: Steve Jobs 20
Stone, B. & Burrows P. (2011, January 24-30) The Essence of Apple. Bloomberg Businessweek.
(6-8).
The Apple Museum Online. (2011, April 4). Retrieved from:
http://www.theapplemuseum.com/
Wozniak, S. & Smith, G. (2006). iWoz : Computer Geek to Cult Icon: How I Invented the
Personal Computer, Co-Founded Apple, and Had Fund Doing It. New York: W.W.
Norton & Company.
Young, J. & Simon, W. (2005). iCon Steve Jobs: The Greatest Second Act in the History of
Business. New Jersey: Wiley and Sons.