Critical Analysis of Leadership of Steve Jobs

In 1996, Apple was a struggling company that had lost more than 70% of its market capitalization in the past decade. Apple’s sales had fell dramatically and their new personal computers weren’t particularly popular with consumers. The return of Steve Jobs to the company was a turning point for Apple and initiated a new era for the firm. With the launch of innovative products such as the iPod, iPhone and iPad, Apple became the biggest brand in the world. Now it remained to be seen if Tim Cook would be able to continue to develop new products and maintain Apple’s success.

The Steve Jobs biography “Steve Jobs the Man Who Thought Different” provides a glimpse into the past and the development of current technology. Although at some points did this book fail to capture my attention, overall I came to the conclusion that it did help me learn a lot about the Apple Industry and how it came to be. Because of this I would recommend this book to a friend. The author’s unique way of reviewing Steve Jobs’s life and his impact made on society, along with his associates who helped him make it to where he was helped to build my interest in the book. Although, it did fail to capture my attention because of the, what I felt, extensive and repetitive descriptions of each situation Jobs found himself in throughout his life. By

One of the major challenges facing Apple was to get the appropriate replacement of the company’s visionary Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Steve Jobs who died on October 2011. The CEO was responsible for turning Apple into what it is today. Apple is in this case challenged to purse the strategies employed by Steve, that propelled the company to new heights, and which saw the company become a

Eric Reis, a successful entrepreneur, stated that successful companies in the future is need to fast adapt by practicing continuous deployment of idea, planning and more experimentation, ie creating organizations that have the ability to cultivate, test and materialize new ideas (Heskett, 2013). So, in terms of the large scale innovations like what Apple went through, transformational leadership was necessary.

The theories applied to Steve Jobs have opened my mind to realise how important effective leadership styles are to organisations. A lesson learnt from Steve’s leadership qualities is that a leader can adapt different style of leadership and this makes a leader more effective and efficient. The late Apple boss was a master of employing various strategies to adapt to differing scenarios and situations. Steve Jobs did not exhibit a single rhetorical style, but rather altered it depending on the situation and yet still managed to deliver a constant message to support his company’s

“ ( www.bbc.co.uk ). Steve Jobs has highly impressive leadership attributes, and he is a huge reason as to why Apple has been such a successful company.

Jeffrey Young and William Simon provide new perspectives on the legendary creation of Apple, detail Jobs’s meteoric rise, and the devastating plunge that left him not only out of Apple, but out of the computer-making business entirely.The authors examine the takeover and Jobs’s reinvention of the company with the popular iMac and his transformation of the industry with the revolutionary iPod. iCon is must reading for anyone who wants to understand how the modern digital age has been formed, shaped, and refined by the most influential figure of the

Steve Jobs founded Apple Inc. at the age of 21, three years later his brand was world famous and he was widely known as a fascinating pioneer in the computer revolution transforming “one industry after another, from computers and smartphones to music and movies” In 1985, following an internal power struggle with his board of directors, Jobs was fired and left the company and founded NeXT which was a computer platform development company and would become responsible for the NeXTSTEP platform which was the basis for the Mac OS X and Pixar. In 1996, Apple was facing bankruptcy so Jobs returned as CEO and saved the company. At Stanford University’s 2005 Commencement, Steve Jobs said, "The heaviness of being successful was replaced by the lightness of being a beginner again, less sure about everything. It freed me to enter one of the most creative periods of my life." And he added, "I'm pretty sure none of this would have happened if I hadn't been fired from Apple. It was awful-tasting medicine, but I guess the patient needed it." When Jobs left Apple it was a life-changing event, but it made him go back to what he was good at - being a creative innovator, it was about going back to the beginning and finding the way to remake his success. He knew he had become too comfortable and needed to be pushed back into action. This is just like a woman’s body when she is about to deliver a baby, her body tells her she should

As millions around the world swipe through their iPhones today, not much thought is given to the visionary man who played a pivotal role in the development of this innovative device. Steve Jobs, the man behind the development of iPhone and multiple other devices such as the iPods, iPads etc., was the backbone of Apple Inc. (CNBC Titans: Steve Jobs, 2011). Under his guidance and supervision, Apple Inc. has achieved new heights by re-defining the manner in which we, as consumers of electronics, interact with technology (Kane & Fowler, 2011). Apple Inc. not only introduced new and innovative devices into the market but also fulfilled Jobs vision of taking complicated technologies and simplifying them so that they can be used as consumer products (CNBC Titans: Steve Jobs, 2011). Jobs’ technology company was unique from others as it was the “one that developed tightly integrated packages of hardware and software.” (Steve Jobs: Insanely Great, 2011). Jobs creative ideas and visionary thinking enabled Silicon Valley to transform from a fruit orchard into the technology industry’s innovation center of U.S. today (Kane & Fowler, 2011).

Without a head, the body is useless. Likewise, leaders are necessary for forward progress. Steve Jobs, one of the most modern examples of a strong leader, is well-known for his highly successful company, Apple. Steve Jobs was a believer in achieving what others imagined impossible, and stayed true to his values while pursuing his visions. He did not follow a given set of rules; he rather went with his gut and had strong confidence in himself. Steve Jobs was a unique and extraordinary leader who brought technology in society to new heights.

The recent economic crisis has the world is shambles. The real estate market has seen the lowest values and large amount of foreclosures. Wall Street has fallen apart and many people have lost their life savings. Throughout this great ordeal Apple Inc. has stayed afloat. They have been able to hit record numbers in sales, both domestically and internationally. Apple’s upper management has been inventive and has been proactively trying to make sure Apple continues to grow.

Steve Jobs was a computer designer, executive and innovator, as well as an all-around role model for many people in both their businesses and their personal lives. As the cofounder of Apple Computers and former CEO of Pixar Animation Studios, he revolutionized the computer and animation industries, amassing a fortune worth $10.2 billion at the time of his death. Jobs intuitively understood the power of cultural influence in sustaining the strategic capabilities implicit in his perpetual vision of creating.

With the recent passing of Steve Jobs, there has been an intense spotlight focused on both the man and the company he built. Most of the attention has rightfully been focused on Jobs’ passion and creativity, as well as the remarkable period of innovation he preside. As a symbolic leader, the man not only once saving the company from bankruptcy but also building up a well-known brand that had integrate with our daily life – Apple.

Apple’s competitive position changed fundamentally in 1981 when IBM entered the PC market. The IBM PC, which used Microsoft’s DOS operating system (OS) and a microprocessor (also called a CPU) from Intel, was a relatively “open” system that other producers could clone. Apple, on the other hand, practiced horizontal and vertical integration. It relied on its own proprietary designs and refused to license its hardware to third parties.

Co-founded by Steve Jobs in 1976, the company was named under Apple Computers Inc. and its initial product Apple IIe gained relative popularity and success. The release of the Macintosh revolutionized the computer experience with a graphical user interfere and a pointer devise called the ‘mouse’ was launched in the same year. The company went public in 1980 resulting in its owners gaining immediate wealth. However, its company’s