Steve Jobs – and what he taught me.

Maybe I should have made that “what he is still teaching me”. 

Just a quick note – sorry for no post family and friends. I have been super busy with the business and the day job.Now then…

I know that most of you are tired of hearing about the Steve Jobs, the man who created Apple Inc., etc. etc. Maybe you lived in a cave and never heard of him. Maybe you don’t care. I still want to take this time to reflect on the things that Steve taught me. I never met the man, yet his style poured out of every product, every speech, and every story I ever heard from or about him.

I’ll go ahead and get this out of the way – Yes, I am an Apple fan, user, developer, fanboy, cult member, evangelist – and all the other things used to describe us. So, with that – I’ll move on.

It all starts with the – The crazy ones. It had the following dialog with the commercial.

 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 praise them, disagree with them, quote them, disbelieve them, glorify or vilify them. About the only thing you can’t do is ignore them. Because they change things.

They invent. They imagine. They heal. They explore. They create. They inspire. They push the human race forward.

Maybe they have to be crazy.

How else can you stare at an empty canvas and see a work of art?
Or sit in silence and hear a song that’s never been written?
Or gaze at a red planet and see a laboratory on wheels?

We make tools for these kinds of people.

While some 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.

I remember my first run at business. Craig, my business partner, was a Mac ‘evangelist’. He had some of these posters of the “rebels, misfits, and troublemakers”. I remembered the whole marketing thing Apple was doing at the time, but was stuck in the Microsoft world.

Craig knew I liked quotes – good ones – that made you think. That poem they used for marketing – did just that. He had the posters all over the office.

We failed at that business – miserably. Even though we completed the jobs, and bowed out somewhat gracefully…ok, well we quit. We failed – miserably. I could have left it at that. It was a lesson learned that we still look back on from time to time today.

Years later, when Craig and I decided to do it again – we were both Apple fans. (Craig converted me, and I was an Apple evangelist extreme myself). We leaned toward the Apple way of doing business. Trying to put into place these type of things that Steve portrayed to us.

• Most clients/customers have no idea what they want. It is our job to listen to them talk, and then deliver something that fills the void.
• Most clients/customers have no taste. Take a look at most web sites, applications, and printed material. It is blah, or should I say Microsoft like.
• Who cares what the status quo says about business. You don’t have to have a lot of money to start a business. You don’t need to project yourself as a “big” business. Do things your way – it’s your business. (We would need to give some credit to Dave Ramsey on these points LOL)
• So called experts – they don’t know a damn thing. All those talking heads on TV – waist of time. You can listen to them talk – but don’t buy in. Most of them are the ones that said Apple would fail, and be gone years ago.
• Be different – “Think Different”. You can go as deep as you want with that marketing phrase of Apple. You will win, big, when you can execute something that is not the same – it’s different – it works, and it sets you apart.
• Focus on the common person – don’t go through the “orfices”. Once the common people are happy and using your product – the ‘suits’ will buy in.
• Take on the challenge. That little bit of fear, will make you put out some of your best work. We’ve completed jobs that half way through – were doubting we should have even taken the job. In the end even we were amazed at what we had accomplished.
• Design – not just veneer. It is the very essence of what ever you are creating. It’s soul. It has to have design all the way through it. Design – then code, then re-design. Changing your mind is a sign of intelligence. It shows you’re thinking it through – obsess it.
• Sometimes people will think you’re an asswhole – you probably are – you probably shouldn’t care what they think. LOL
• Believe in it. Believe in what your are doing – be selfish about it. If there is no belief, there is no desire, no drive, no determination. It will never happen – it’s just a dream. Steve believed in Apple, and it’s products – the employees at Apple believed in Apple and it’s products – together with that belief, they put in long hours, scrapped initial designs, argued, fought, and came out on top, together, victoriously.

The last one – IT IS NOT IMPOSSIBLE. If an person born out of wedlock, given up for adoption at birth, dropped out of college, was fired from the business he created in a garage when it had made it to it’s first peak – only to come back when it was days away from bankruptcy and make it the biggest business in the world can do it – what is our excuse.

Here is to staying hungry and staying foolish. Steve, we’ll miss you.

Attached is a nice write up on the commencement speech that Steve gave at Stanford University.  Stanford commencement address, June 2005 | Technology | The Observer