By now, you've surely heard. Steve Jobs, the visionary behind Apple has passed away. There will be a million "legacy" stories written about the passing of Apple's front man, but the one I hope gets the most attention by investors is the story of Steve Jobs the CEO -- a true leader at a time when many in corner offices are frankly not worthy of the post.
Steve Jobs passionately built Apple with his own two hands, and he redoubled his efforts in 1997 to save the company from failure. He was a true leader who always wowed the masses with his creativity and never stopped making Apple better -- right up until the very end.
Wall Street's corner offices desperately need men and women with the vision and drive of this man. Instead we are stuck companies like Hewlett-Packard that have a revolving door in the corner office, a lack of vision and a mania for big buyouts and bigger layoffs. (Read why tech giant Hewlett-Packard represents everything that's wrong with corporate America). By contrast, Apple is a shining example of doing things the right way.
Lest you fall into that old Wall Street trap of counting money, understand that dollars and cents have nothing to do with money. Yes, Apple Inc. is now a $100 billion business thanks to Steve Jobs, and the man was one of the 50 wealthiest Americans at the time of his death. But Jobs was building a cultural force of a company more than building a bank account. Of course, it's easy to get rich when you're a cultural force -- but Steve Jobs knew which step had to come first. User experience and the products always came first.
Some may scoff at this statement that money was secondary at a publicly traded stock. But in case you haven't noticed, the folks who tend to put money first and foremost see only short-term success at best and long-term damage at worst. Think about record profits at banks due to subprime loans. Think of Detroit automakers who thought high-margin SUVs were the only vehicle worth making. I'm sure you can think of a dozen other examples. (And here are three more iconic U.S. brands that could soon be in the trash heap)
I admit, it's hard to believe that a CEO would do anything that isn't for money -- especially after the ugly headlines of the past few years. Bank of America CEO Ken Lewis got a $125 million payday when he left the smoldering wreckage of a financial company in 2009. (Just one of the many reasons why EVERYONE hates BofA these days.) Now-ousted Yahoo CEO Carol Bartz got nearly $50 million for her first year on the job before being fired 20 months later -- after accomplishing next to nothing. And she got a plush $10 million severance deal.
But Steve Jobs was different. He was a leader, a creative force, a true "business builder" as the phrase was meant to be used and not some joker with an MBA who has a Six Sigma certification.
Don't get me wrong -- he was far from perfect. By many accounts, his management style was a bit severe. And while Apple has many fans, it also has many critics of its control-freak mentality.
But that's the company Steve Jobs built. It was a business faithful to his vision above all else, and it achieved fantastic success as a result.
Wall Street would be wise to learn from how Steve Jobs built and ran Apple. It doesn't matter if you went to a fancy college. It doesn't matter how many boards you've sat on. Hell, it doesn't even matter if you can juice the earnings numbers this quarter to make analysts happy. Most folks agree that Wall Street "targets" for profits are always just lies and BS anyway.
The only way a company truly succeeds over the long term is if it finds a unique and creative way to connect with customers, and if it stays true to that vision above all else.
Yes, that's much harder than just watching the clock, waiting for that golden parachute to unfurl. But if corporate America is ever going to dig out of this current economic quagmire, we're going to need more CEOs who think this way.
Steve, shareholders everywhere need you more than ever. You will be sorely missed.
As of this writing, Jeff Reeves did not own a position in any of the stocks named here. Write him at editor@investorplace.com.
Follow Jeff Reeves on Twitter: www.twitter.com/JeffReevesIP
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For Steve Jobs, it was about the user experience
I am convinced that the shared timeline of the growth of the MBA and the decline of the Western Economy is not coincidental. The concept of the leadership of a business organization being a "business" person, rather than a person expert in the particular industry, is the core of the problem. Anyone who knows about widgets are just technicians to the people now running widget companies, hirelings. The stock price, the quarterly report, and their own bonuses are what is important to these people. If they need to cut costs, which they ALWAYS need to do, do they consider the dead weight of themselves and the other non-productive people? No, they can always do with less engineers, or line workers. The others can just take up the slack.
Steve Jobs was the best argument for the traditional way of doing business. The CEO was the guy/gal who knew more about widgets than anybody.. This computer I am typing on right now is another great argument. An HP, 3 months old, a total piece of crap, revolving door Republican part-time politician MBA CEOs at the helm.
I learned. One month ago I bought my wife an I-Pad. She loves it.
Thanks for pointing out that free-market capitalism and pure unfettered seeking of profits is what drives innovation and produces super entrepreneurs like Jobs. We need to stop vilifying those that strive to be rich and instead celebrate them as the engine that creates jobs in America. The class warfare rhetoric and the assault on Wall Street is misplaced and companies like Apple would not be the great employer they are today without its help.
Thanks for pointing out those economic policies of Obama are exactly the policies that will stifle innovation, reduce opportunity, and ultimately hobble America’s ability to create more jobs/Jobs.
We need to celebrate profit motive and income inequality, really another way of saying meritocratic reward, encouraging more people to take risks, gamble on making the American Dream, and once made allowing them to keep as much of it as possible.
Wall Street is a net positive to America and the vilification of it is misdirected.
Kai
You must lack an MBA if you do not understand the underpinnings of economic growth.
Kai
Semper fi
Kai
In any case, rest in peace Jobs! You will become known as the man that created the tools that Generation X and Y use to take down the system. For this, your genius has been invaluable. Journey Well!
tis one thing to innovate, but to maximise the benefits of a new technology you must produce it as well
You are right, though. It is a conversation we desperately need to have in this society.
How did that come about? Jobs studied Eastern religion and philosophy and understood. “It” is all about “service” and “making a difference in the lives of others”. It isn’t about making an enormous killing in the market and squashing one’s competition like bugs. It’s doing something so everyone benefits.
“Service” and making a “difference” are immutable spiritual laws and the human being is ‘hard-wired’ to respond favorably. When that’s understood and practiced, the “end of the quarter” takes care of itself. Everyone wins. This shouldn't be a secret; but in a ‘profits at the end of THIS quarter’ culture, Jobs was proficient in the manner most are spiritually ignorant and thus, behave in ethically challenged ways.
Notice the spiritual timing. Jobs passed when protests grow about how business and finances impact people. There are ‘no coincidences’. Do not castigate all business people for the misdeeds of a much smaller, though influential beyond their number core – rather learn. We have a choice; his tempestuous management style, notwithstanding: Steve Jobs approach or our cultural paradigm responsible for tanking the economy and re-creating Gilded Age inequality?”
BINGO.
Excellent post!
The United States now has the most dysfunctional and impaired managerial class on Earth. Just appalling. Look at the wreckage of Wall Street and the disarray of many of our once great industries. It was the total failure of our business schools. I am a graduate of the Wharton School and saw this coming many years ago. It all became a culture of ticket punched entitlement for essentially copy cat "F" student dunces. A nightmare. Their entitlement professors too. (See the scathing documentary "Inside Job".)
Steve Jobs was the real deal up from the shop floor that created the product. He will be very sorely missed and you will probably never see his like again in the me too cookie cutter management culture of the now massively dumbed down United States.
I will tell you right now Hewlett Packard is not going to survive. They have one of the worst corporate boards ever assembled in the history of American business. Total appalling morons. Mark my words.
Today's CEOs only passion is for the stock market ticker in hopes of cashing out earlier with their stock options and leaving a wake of disaster behind. Steve's vision enriched millions of peoples lives by the products he developed. A byproduct of his success was all the jobs that were created and leaving the world a little bit better place than he found it. Like all companies, Apple was in business to make a profit, but, it never seemed like this was Steve's first goal, the profit was simply an end result of all the great products he created.
Unfortunately,many CEO"s today don't care about the company, it's people or the products, just the profits. The ends justify their means.
Apple does keep all their support for our country here, it is the support by far in tech.
So while manufacturing went else were so did most if not all of tech's manufacturing leave.
I do not like it but the USA lost there a long time ago. People just it can be made here, not any longer.
Apple was never in the manufacturing business.