The new issue of Business Week recounts the start of one of the most dramatic business meetings that we’ve seen in a while. The setting is on the occasion of Steve Jobs’ return to the helm of the then underperforming Apple Computer in 1997 after having been fired by them twelve years earlier. In a set tableau, Jobs enters the conference room, sits down and then turns slowly in his chair to the assembled remaining, and probably terrified, Apple executives and demands: “O.K., tell me what’s wrong with this place?”. After some mumbling by the execs, Jobs goes on to yell “It’s the products! The products SUCK! There’s no sex in them anymore!”.
Jobs’ vituperative opening remarks are appropriate, insightful, to the point, earthy, a defining moment, and ought to be considered a classic.
The remainder of the piece goes on to detail the Disney acquisition of Pixar, the fact that Jobs is now Disney’s biggest individual shareholder and a member of their board, the challenges of working with Steve and his credo of quality over quantity, as well as the many implications of all this for your living room.
Apple CEO Steve Jobs is on a roll, an icon, a billionaire and a genuine success. One hopes that, and wonders if, he can stay true to his adopted self-propelling aphorism of: “Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish.”.
Steve Jobs’ Magic Kingdom – Business Week, February 6, 2006
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Get well soon, Steve. The world needs more of these quotations.