Apple's Inspirational Note For New Hires: 'People Don't Come Here To Play It Safe'

The Apple inspirational note left on the desk of Instagram user "M" and discovered by New York Times columnist Nick Bilton, sums what it means to be an Apple employee.

Basically, "Team Apple! F**k yeah!"

The Instagrammer who posted the photo of the note included these words: “What greets you on your first day at Apple. I've had this taped to my dresser for two years. Words to live by.”

The letter left on the desk of new Apple hires reads as follows, according to "M's" image:

There's work and there's your life's work.

The kind of work that has your fingerprints all over it. The kind of work that you'd never compromise on. That you'd sacrifice a weekend for. You can do that kind of work at Apple. People don't come here to play it safe. They come here to swim in the deep end.

They want their work to add up to something.

Something big. Something that couldn't happen anywhere else.

Welcome to Apple.

WARNING! Severe cynicism below!

Welcome to Apple. We're going to throw you into the deep end and you're going to work weekends. Be inspired. Don't play it safe, take risks, take chances, design the next iPhone by putting an "S" in the name. (Nobody is confirming if they drop these notes on new hires at Foxconn, an Apple supplier.)

Cynicism aside, Apple is a company built that was built in no small part by a man named Steve Jobs, a man with a reputation for developing revolutionary products that have quite literally changed the landscape of how humans communicate with one another. So it should probably stand to reason those people taking up positions at Apple are there because they're passionate about what they do and will willingly jump into the deep end over the weekend.

No matter which way the note rubs you; towards the cynical or the inspired, the words do have impact. They've had enough of an impact that this note has been around for at least a couple of years, as TheNextWeb points out this Apple inspirational note has surfaced on the internet back in 2010.

Related on HuffPost:

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• [via <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=gtuz5OmOh_M#at=53" target="_hplink">YouTube</a>]

• [via <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=gtuz5OmOh_M#at=53" target="_hplink">YouTube</a>]

• [via <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=gtuz5OmOh_M#at=53" target="_hplink">YouTube</a>]

• [via <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=gtuz5OmOh_M#at=53" target="_hplink">YouTube</a>]

• [via <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=gtuz5OmOh_M#at=53" target="_hplink">YouTube</a>]

• [via <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=gtuz5OmOh_M#at=53" target="_hplink">YouTube</a>]

• Apple's current Cupertino campus. [via <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=gtuz5OmOh_M#at=53" target="_hplink">YouTube</a>]

• Proposed building site, formerly owned by HP. [via <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=gtuz5OmOh_M#at=53" target="_hplink">YouTube</a>]

• [via <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=gtuz5OmOh_M#at=53" target="_hplink">YouTube</a>]

• via <a href="http://techcrunch.com/2011/06/07/steve-jobs-cupertino/" target="_hplink">TechCrunch</a>

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Comments

[Andrew Cole]

11:53 PM on 05/08/2012

Here's your tea and biscuit... now get back to work.

[MelanieMorgasm]

11:11 AM on 05/08/2012

yeah they dont "play it safe" ,after all they hired a "happy" guy as their ceo, gist sayin'....

[escapement]

11:07 AM on 05/08/2012

Oh, I thought it was going to be "Learn Chinese..."

[johnb123]

11:06 AM on 05/08/2012

As my father would say...."Just put it in the pay check". He didn't care about praises or slaps on the back. They don't pay the bills or put food on the table. If you want to say something to me...just put it in the pay check.

[DevRock]

12:03 PM on 05/08/2012

Call me jaded, but he's right. Somehow, the paper star stuck on my monitor isn't the same as an extra few hundred bucks...

[johnb123]

01:02 PM on 05/08/2012

You notice the CEO wouldn't stand for just praises alone...yet that's what they expect others to just accept.   Good words and pep talks sound much better when I have more then enough to live on....just like the CEO.

[Rick Eriksen]

10:33 AM on 05/08/2012

Free Apple ad by HP trying to pass as a news story...

[mados123]

10:15 AM on 05/08/2012

Inspirational notes for new employees, "Good artists, copy. Great artists, steal. Do you want to be a good artist or a great artist?!?!"

[Mroptimistic]

10:12 AM on 05/08/2012

"Work hard and don't jump."

[Gurinder Dhillon]

10:00 AM on 05/08/2012

"People don't come here to play it safe"
No kidding, tell that to all the FoxConn employees who have attempted to commit suicide at one of Apple's plants, only to land in one of the nets FoxConn has hung there in anticipation of the inevitable exit strategy of the inhumane work conditions.

[Justtheobvious]

09:59 AM on 05/08/2012

"P.S. Remember, we have little kids making pennies a day who can do your job if needed."

[RobParker]

09:49 AM on 05/08/2012

slightly better than the note that greeted me:
"Welcome to sanctuary. Here, you're not required to work 80 hours your first week. You're expected to, but not actually required to. Do Work!"

[Runs With Scissors]

09:40 AM on 05/08/2012

"You can do that kind of work at Apple. People don't come here to play it safe. They come here to swim in the deep end. "

...While the pittance-paid people that make our products jump off the roof, because that's a better option than being enslaved to build our products.

[ChknLvr]

11:10 AM on 05/08/2012

They can always quit. Or maybe you could buy FoxConn and make things right instead of sitting behind your computer, flinging poo.

[Runs With Scissors]

06:23 PM on 05/08/2012

"Maybe you could buy Foxconn and make things right".

Oh, I love that. Where do you Apple fanboys come from, a rainbow colored unicorn shaped spaceship?

[Runs With Scissors]

09:37 AM on 05/08/2012

"a man with a reputation for developing revolutionary products that have quite literally changed the landscape of how humans communicate with one another."

When in fact, he didn't develop JACK SQUAT. More talented people did that, and he also didn't invent ANYTHING; much less smartphones or other ways people now communicate with each other. His company managed to sell a lot of things that OTHER people had already invented or designed. Proves that "reputation" does not equal "truth".

[ChknLvr]

11:12 AM on 05/08/2012

You're a sad hater. A lot of people want to be CEOs. CEO's want to be Steve Jobs.

[Runs With Scissors]

06:25 PM on 05/08/2012

" CEO's want to be Steve Jobs.”

Because he made a lot of money off the backs of sad fanboys like yourself, see.

[FiredUpRTG]

11:31 AM on 05/08/2012

Puh-leeze. Some people have ideas but can't make it with their hands. Others can hear ideas and can spot successes. Then they thank the employees. Those are good CEOs. The bad ones resent that they can't make it themselves, can't think of themselves, and they make a miserable workplace around them and no one feels valued.

[Runs With Scissors]

06:28 PM on 05/08/2012

“Puh-leeze. Some people have ideas but can't make it with their hands."

Yup, that's pretty much Steve Jobs you're describing. Couldn't design his way out of a paper bag. Or design the paper bag.

"Others can hear ideas and can spot successes. "

Yup, Steve Jobs was good at stealing ideas too, that's true.

[zee12]

09:25 AM on 05/08/2012

Mr. Anderson, I'm truly wondering why you would frame this "article" to be divisive.

Is there something wrong with a company trying to inspire people it hires to actually enjoy what they are doing, to find meaning and satisfaction in their work?

You belittle a great American company, one that has survived much adversity to emerge as the most predominant brand name in the world, by bashing nomenclature?

If you think that the real problem in this country is that Apple uses a foreign supplier that does not meet our American standards (a whole article unto itself), I humbly suggest that you rethink your attitude, and turn inwards to your own employment and ask yourself what you did to change anything for the better with your work.

Because everyday, I'm increasingly convinced that the countries hypocrisy and divisiveness is caused by the likes of the lazy and sub-par work that companies (especially media), seem to encourage - personified perfectly with your article.

[Royce09]

07:56 AM on 05/08/2012

Apple is riding high right now, but American people are beginning to catch on to them. They have no desire to HIRE employees to build their product, they have no hesistation when over charging the American people for their product, they have no desire to pay their fair share of taxex, unlike the American workers have to do since we dont have loop holes big enough to drive trucks through. Apple is a turn off to a lot of people and it is growing. Buying Apple is like going to the gas pumpm MOST of the time. American have to use their boycott power on some of these products , it is getting out rageous.

[Highball]

08:47 AM on 05/08/2012

You realize that if people did what you suggest, they would not own any consumer electronics products whatsoever, right?

No computer. No tablet. No calculator. No phone. No scanner. No external storage, television, Blu-Ray player, router, audio equipment (with a very few, very expensive exceptions), etc.

Hell, they wouldn't even have clothes.

Look: Argue that jobs should be here in America all you want. Make an educated, positive argument with actual understanding of the issue. But don't pretend that Dell, HP, Motorola, IBM, or any of the rest are any different than Apple.

They are all in the same exact boat.

[PenguinLinux]

12:48 PM on 05/08/2012

They are indeed..... so why does an Apple cost so much more if all else is the same production-wise?

[MomWithTwoHeads]

09:11 AM on 05/08/2012

Well actually, Apple does hire a ton of people and pays them well--in the US. Yes, they should have more American factories, if only for the political point of it. But everybody I know who works at Apple makes a great salary with great benefits. And the extended local workforce of Apple--their marketing, advertising, their vendors, etc. have good jobs. You are moaning (rightly) about a governmental policy called "free trade" that has allowed business to ship jobs overseas and turn American into a service industry, not a manufacturing base. Fix the government, dude. It's not about Apple.

[Royce09]

09:55 AM on 05/08/2012

Still not a fan of apple, sorry.

[MichaelMcKLA]

03:25 AM on 05/08/2012

I love the note. Inspires folks to...uhhh...kick butt.

:)