Over the last 5-8 years or so there's been a formula to what made Jobs such a successful leader of Apple. Smaller, faster, focus on human usability, make it look nice, control the supply chain so you can build it cheap and make lots of money, let your competitors make the mistakes and swoop in with your own product with what you learn from their failures, don't bother building cheap low margin junk, etc. It's almost a science at this point. Like any good scientist Jobs surely has a lot of disciples within Apple who will carry that tradition on and move it forward. Astronomy didn't die with Newton did it? Apple will undoubtably change but if they continue to follow the values that Jobs has drilled into them for the last decade they should be fine. Success is the best teacher after all.
Since they've had some time to prepare for this transition I would expect that Jobs put much focus and intensity into thinking about how you move forward without him. That shift in focus may be a large part of why he stepped down last year. If he's been working on a new product then it's not a new iPad or Mac but instead it's how you build Apple to last another 20 or 30 years.
You've basically said what he did has been/is condensed down into a basic formula which anyone given enough exposure can repeat. If business were that simple, we wouldn't need book after book written about everything: new methodologies, strategies, innovation, management, etc.
I just don't think we understand people that well yet, let alone that we are able to copy them so effectively. Is the analogy of astronomy to Newton a good one? No. Business isn't anywhere close to being a science like Astronomy. Other people can observe and repeatedly make tests that further our understanding of space. Can you do that to a person, especially after they are gone? Nope.
Sure, Apple will exist for a long while to come, it will probably follow a lot of the principles/ethos of Steve Jobs, but will it be as successful without Steve Jobs actually making those decisions? We'll see.
I think that what Steve Jobs has done with Apple is able to be condensed down into a basic formula which anyone given enough exposure can repeat. Just because it's repeatable doesn't mean that it's easy to do, though.
The problem is that you can't repeat it if you're going to do it by half-measures. Apple succeeds because it applies its formula 100%; others fail to follow Apple's example because they do "all BUT" some aspect or another.
That said, if another organization wants to do what Apple does, they will have to make some adjustments to acknowledge their reality -- but you really can't do part of what Apple does and say that Apple's process isn't repeatable.
Fair points. The timing happens to work out pretty well that we're just now in the period where SmartPhones and tablets are becoming mature consumer products so Apple can ride the formula for many years to come. It will get a lot harder when it's time to make the next big leap forward.
Problem is, technology outpaces longterm planning exponentially. Apple laying out a plan for 20-30 years would actually work against them as they would be planning, in large part, based on current, or foreseen technology and cost. It's a little like when a movie director attempts to predict the future.
You just can't cut Jobs as a catalyst only. His mind is welded to the myriad of changing variables in technology and no plan is going to be able to emulate that.
If the repeatable method is, as mentioned above, "Smaller, faster, focus on human usability, make it look nice.." then we all win regardless of whether Apple does.
Try to do it better. It's inevitable that competitors are going to copy. I'm not sure Jobs could have stopped that either. Apple has some huge strategic advantages and big war chest which definitely helps.
Unless they can "start implementing" tens of billions of dollars sitting around to use for pre-purchasing heavily discounted parts for their devices to drive profit margins high as a kite and low as a rock for competitors, I don't think there's much to worry about.
Comments
Over the last 5-8 years or so there's been a formula to what made Jobs such a successful leader of Apple. Smaller, faster, focus on human usability, make it look nice, control the supply chain so you can build it cheap and make lots of money, let your competitors make the mistakes and swoop in with your own product with what you learn from their failures, don't bother building cheap low margin junk, etc. It's almost a science at this point. Like any good scientist Jobs surely has a lot of disciples within Apple who will carry that tradition on and move it forward. Astronomy didn't die with Newton did it? Apple will undoubtably change but if they continue to follow the values that Jobs has drilled into them for the last decade they should be fine. Success is the best teacher after all.
Since they've had some time to prepare for this transition I would expect that Jobs put much focus and intensity into thinking about how you move forward without him. That shift in focus may be a large part of why he stepped down last year. If he's been working on a new product then it's not a new iPad or Mac but instead it's how you build Apple to last another 20 or 30 years.
You've basically said what he did has been/is condensed down into a basic formula which anyone given enough exposure can repeat. If business were that simple, we wouldn't need book after book written about everything: new methodologies, strategies, innovation, management, etc.
I just don't think we understand people that well yet, let alone that we are able to copy them so effectively. Is the analogy of astronomy to Newton a good one? No. Business isn't anywhere close to being a science like Astronomy. Other people can observe and repeatedly make tests that further our understanding of space. Can you do that to a person, especially after they are gone? Nope.
Sure, Apple will exist for a long while to come, it will probably follow a lot of the principles/ethos of Steve Jobs, but will it be as successful without Steve Jobs actually making those decisions? We'll see.
I think that what Steve Jobs has done with Apple is able to be condensed down into a basic formula which anyone given enough exposure can repeat. Just because it's repeatable doesn't mean that it's easy to do, though.
The problem is that you can't repeat it if you're going to do it by half-measures. Apple succeeds because it applies its formula 100%; others fail to follow Apple's example because they do "all BUT" some aspect or another.
That said, if another organization wants to do what Apple does, they will have to make some adjustments to acknowledge their reality -- but you really can't do part of what Apple does and say that Apple's process isn't repeatable.
Fair points. The timing happens to work out pretty well that we're just now in the period where SmartPhones and tablets are becoming mature consumer products so Apple can ride the formula for many years to come. It will get a lot harder when it's time to make the next big leap forward.
Problem is, technology outpaces longterm planning exponentially. Apple laying out a plan for 20-30 years would actually work against them as they would be planning, in large part, based on current, or foreseen technology and cost. It's a little like when a movie director attempts to predict the future.
You just can't cut Jobs as a catalyst only. His mind is welded to the myriad of changing variables in technology and no plan is going to be able to emulate that.
A repeatable method can be copied. What does Apple do when one of their competitors figures it out and starts implementing it?
If the repeatable method is, as mentioned above, "Smaller, faster, focus on human usability, make it look nice.." then we all win regardless of whether Apple does.
Try to do it better. It's inevitable that competitors are going to copy. I'm not sure Jobs could have stopped that either. Apple has some huge strategic advantages and big war chest which definitely helps.
Unless they can "start implementing" tens of billions of dollars sitting around to use for pre-purchasing heavily discounted parts for their devices to drive profit margins high as a kite and low as a rock for competitors, I don't think there's much to worry about.