�I am not that surprised that an academic of entrepreneurship (are you kidding me?) would lead a story about one of the world's best innovators and CEO's about that he actually and in fact ! OMG had body odour as a teenager because of his diet, not to mention the rest of your embarrassing piece. Forbes would be best sticking with writers that are inspired by such great entrepreneurs as Steve Jobs, and not with writers such as this, who are unhappy they have not had the courage to 'live the life they love and not settle' and so sit in front of their computer with not much else to do but trying to bring others down. Shame on you Mr Vermeulen�.
This is just one of the comments I received on my earlier piece �Steve Jobs � the man was fallible� (also published on my Forbes blog). Of course, this was not unanticipated; having the audacity to suggest that, in fact, the great man did not possess the ability to walk on water was the closest thing to business blasphemy. And indeed a written stoning duly followed.
But why is suggesting that a human being like Steve Jobs was in fact fallible � who, in the same piece, I also called �a management phenomenon�, �fantastically able�, �a legend�, and �a great leader� � by some considered to be such an act of blasphemy? All I did was claim that he was �fallible�, �not omnipotent�, and �not always right�, which as far as I can see comes with the definition of being human?
And I guess that�s exactly it; in life and certainly in death Steve Jobs transcended the status of being human and reached the status of deity. A journalist of the Guardian compared the reaction (especially in the US) to the death of Steve Jobs with the reaction in England to the death of Princess Diana; a collective outpour of almost aggressive emotion by people who only ever saw the person they are grieving about briefly on television or at best in a distance. Suggesting Princess Diana was fallible was not a healthy idea immediately following her death (and still isn�t); nor was suggesting Steve Jobs was human.
We are inclined to deify successful people in the public eye, and in our time that certainly includes CEOs. In the past, in various cultures, it may have been ancient warriors, Olympians, or saints. They became mythical and transcended humanity, quite literally reaching God-like status.
Historians and geneticists argue that this inclination for deification is actually deeply embedded in the human psyche, and we have evolved to be prone to worship. There is increasing consensus that man came to dominate the earth � and for instance drive out Neanderthalers, who were in fact stronger, likely more intelligent, and had more sophisticated tools � because of our superior ability to organize into larger social systems. And a crucial role in this, fostering social cohesion, was religion, which centers on myths and deities. This inclination for worship very likely became embedded into our genetic system, and it is yearning to come out and be satisfied, and great people such as Jack Welch, Steve Jobs, and Lady Di serve to fulfill this need.
But that of course does not mean that they were infallible and could in fact walk on water. We just don�t want to hear it. Great CEOs realize that their near deification is a gross exaggeration, and sometimes even get annoyed by its suggestion � Amex�s Ken Chenault told me that he did not like it at all, and I have seen that same reaction in Southwest�s Herb Kelleher. Slightly less-great CEOs do start to believe their own status, and people like Enron�s Jeff Skilling or Ahold�s Cees van der Hoeven come to mind; not coincidentally they are often associated with spectacular business downfalls. I have never spoken to Steve Jobs, but I am guessing he might not have disagreed with the qualifications �not omnipotent�, �not always right� and, most of all, �human�.
Frank J, author of the upcoming e-book, Obama: The Greatest President in the History of Everything, has an amusing piece in the NY Post entitled "Why we must lose the darn 1 percent." Many readers here will know Frank J and realize it (unlike the first NY Post commenter) but yes, the piece is satire.
Steve Jobs � the man was fallible
As a student, at Reed College, Steve Jobs came to believe that if he ate only fruits he would eliminate all mucus and not need to shower anymore. It didn�t work. He didn�t smell good. When he got a job at Atari, given his odor, he was swiftly moved into the night shift, where he would be less disruptive to the nostrils of his fellow colleagues.
The job at Atari exposed him to the earliest generation of video games. It also exposed him to the world business and what it meant build up and run a company. Some years later, with Steve Wozniak, he founded Apple in Silicon Valley (of course in a garage) and quite quickly, although just in his late twenties, grew to be a management phenomenon, featuring in the legendary business book by Tom Peters and Bob Waterman �In Search of Excellence�.
But, in fact, shortly after the book became a bestseller, by the mid 1980s, Apple was in trouble. Although their computers were far ahead of their time in terms of usability � mostly thanks to the Graphical User Interface (based on an idea he had cunningly copied from Xerox) � they were just bloody expensive. Too expensive for most people. For example, the so-called Lisa retailed for no less than $10,000 (and that is 1982 dollars!). John Sculley � CEO � recalled �We were so insular, that we could not manufacture a product to sell for under $3,000.� Steve Jobs was fantastically able to assemble and motivate a team op people that managed to invent a truly revolutionary product, but he also was unable to turn it into profit.
When Jobs was fired from Apple � in 1985 � CEO John Sculley took control. Sculley is often described as a bit of a failure, because �nothing revolutionary came out of Apple under his watch�, �he could have done so much more with the company� and especially for �being stupid enough to boot out a genius like Steve Jobs�. However, the years after Sculley took over were some of Apple�s most profitable. The man did something right, and that was focus on exploiting the competitive advantage that Apple had built up.
In management research, following terminology cornered by the legendary Stanford professor Jim March, we often say that firms have to balance exploration with exploitation. Exploration refers to developing new sources of competitive advantage and growth. Exploitation refers to making money out of them. Steve Jobs was �insanely great� at exploration, but not � at the time � at exploitation. Sculley was.
Now Steve Jobs is a legend. And rightly so; our world literally would have looked different without him. However, what Steve Jobs� legendary status also tells me is that we � mere mortals � are inclined to overestimate the omnipotence of CEOs. We overdo it when we ascribe the failure of an entire company to just one man or woman (e.g. Enron�s Jeff Skilling) but also when we ascribe the entire success of a company to one individual.
Steve Jobs wasn�t omnipotent (John Sculley had qualities Jobs didn�t) and he wasn�t always right (eating only fruits does not eliminate the need for an occasional shower). His day-to-day influence on Apple over the last years must have been limited, given his rapidly and severely deteriorating health. If anything, he simply would not have been able to be around enough to control and take care of everything. Nevertheless, the company did well in spite of his absence. And of course that is his laudable achievement too; he managed to build a company that could do well without him. And perhaps that may prove to be his best business lesson after all: how a great leader eventually makes himself superfluous.
The job at Atari exposed him to the earliest generation of video games. It also exposed him to the world business and what it meant build up and run a company. Some years later, with Steve Wozniak, he founded Apple in Silicon Valley (of course in a garage) and quite quickly, although just in his late twenties, grew to be a management phenomenon, featuring in the legendary business book by Tom Peters and Bob Waterman �In Search of Excellence�.
But, in fact, shortly after the book became a bestseller, by the mid 1980s, Apple was in trouble. Although their computers were far ahead of their time in terms of usability � mostly thanks to the Graphical User Interface (based on an idea he had cunningly copied from Xerox) � they were just bloody expensive. Too expensive for most people. For example, the so-called Lisa retailed for no less than $10,000 (and that is 1982 dollars!). John Sculley � CEO � recalled �We were so insular, that we could not manufacture a product to sell for under $3,000.� Steve Jobs was fantastically able to assemble and motivate a team op people that managed to invent a truly revolutionary product, but he also was unable to turn it into profit.
When Jobs was fired from Apple � in 1985 � CEO John Sculley took control. Sculley is often described as a bit of a failure, because �nothing revolutionary came out of Apple under his watch�, �he could have done so much more with the company� and especially for �being stupid enough to boot out a genius like Steve Jobs�. However, the years after Sculley took over were some of Apple�s most profitable. The man did something right, and that was focus on exploiting the competitive advantage that Apple had built up.
In management research, following terminology cornered by the legendary Stanford professor Jim March, we often say that firms have to balance exploration with exploitation. Exploration refers to developing new sources of competitive advantage and growth. Exploitation refers to making money out of them. Steve Jobs was �insanely great� at exploration, but not � at the time � at exploitation. Sculley was.
Now Steve Jobs is a legend. And rightly so; our world literally would have looked different without him. However, what Steve Jobs� legendary status also tells me is that we � mere mortals � are inclined to overestimate the omnipotence of CEOs. We overdo it when we ascribe the failure of an entire company to just one man or woman (e.g. Enron�s Jeff Skilling) but also when we ascribe the entire success of a company to one individual.
Steve Jobs wasn�t omnipotent (John Sculley had qualities Jobs didn�t) and he wasn�t always right (eating only fruits does not eliminate the need for an occasional shower). His day-to-day influence on Apple over the last years must have been limited, given his rapidly and severely deteriorating health. If anything, he simply would not have been able to be around enough to control and take care of everything. Nevertheless, the company did well in spite of his absence. And of course that is his laudable achievement too; he managed to build a company that could do well without him. And perhaps that may prove to be his best business lesson after all: how a great leader eventually makes himself superfluous.
Are Men Lonely at the Top?
I am reading a new book called Lonely at the Top: The High Cost of Men's Success written by psychologist Thomas Joiner. Initially I thought that this was just another book undermining men's success by proclaiming that if men are successful at work, they can be setting themselves up for loneliness and suicide by middle-age or beyond. This negative interpretation of men's success seems to pop up in the media and culture from time to time to punish men for not being "more like women."
That said, while I felt that Joiner's book subtlety promoted the message that if you are male and "on top," you would suffer for it, he also had some good ideas about how men could improve their mental health and did seem to have some empathy for his fellow man. He gives an example of his clinical treatment with a man who was depressed every November and couldn't figure out why. It turns out that 14 years ago, in November, his wife had left him after giving birth to their son. The man had been confused, never grieved her loss and instead, sunk into a depression. Once he understood what had happened and worked through the loss, the depression lifted.
Joiner makes a good point about men not seeking treatment often enough, though given the anti-male climate of the mental health crowd, who can blame them? However, instead of saying "get to a therapist if male and depressed," he gives simple and effective solutions that can lessen depression in men. These include phoning someone everyday or having even a short polite conversation, getting back to nature and getting good quality sleep which he says, is often difficult for men.
The book has some decent advice for men or their loved ones who want to decrease the depression in their lives. Just watch out for the PC chapters by the author such as the one entitled, "Causes, Don't Tread on Me--the Perils of Independence."
Good grief, without this independence, nothing would get done. The author does acknowledge that independence is important, along with connection, but sometimes connection is another word for submission. I get the feeling that this author is not keen on political autonomy if the reader is male and right-leaning.
Anyway, any thoughts from readers out there on loneliness and success for men? Do you think it is lonely at the top or is it just a buzzword for men acting more like women in our society?
That said, while I felt that Joiner's book subtlety promoted the message that if you are male and "on top," you would suffer for it, he also had some good ideas about how men could improve their mental health and did seem to have some empathy for his fellow man. He gives an example of his clinical treatment with a man who was depressed every November and couldn't figure out why. It turns out that 14 years ago, in November, his wife had left him after giving birth to their son. The man had been confused, never grieved her loss and instead, sunk into a depression. Once he understood what had happened and worked through the loss, the depression lifted.
Joiner makes a good point about men not seeking treatment often enough, though given the anti-male climate of the mental health crowd, who can blame them? However, instead of saying "get to a therapist if male and depressed," he gives simple and effective solutions that can lessen depression in men. These include phoning someone everyday or having even a short polite conversation, getting back to nature and getting good quality sleep which he says, is often difficult for men.
The book has some decent advice for men or their loved ones who want to decrease the depression in their lives. Just watch out for the PC chapters by the author such as the one entitled, "Causes, Don't Tread on Me--the Perils of Independence."
Good grief, without this independence, nothing would get done. The author does acknowledge that independence is important, along with connection, but sometimes connection is another word for submission. I get the feeling that this author is not keen on political autonomy if the reader is male and right-leaning.
Anyway, any thoughts from readers out there on loneliness and success for men? Do you think it is lonely at the top or is it just a buzzword for men acting more like women in our society?
Michelle Tillis Lederman, author of The 11 Laws of Likability: Relationship Networking . . . Because People Do Business with People They Like,
discusses why it's important to expand your network outside your group at CNBC.com.
discusses why it's important to expand your network outside your group at CNBC.com.
How to Break Bad Habits
I'm reading a helpful little book by Darren Hardy called The Compound Effect
with the subtitle: "Jumpstart your income, your life, your success." What I like most about this book is that it addresses bad habits and how to overcome them using a variety of methods that seem to make sense.
I have a couple of bad habits at the moment: too much caffeine and too much time on devices that are giving me text neck. The Compound Effect, according to the book, is the principle of reaping huge rewards from a series of small, smart choices. The author has you write down every time you engage in one of your bad habits and very slowly, work towards changing them.
For example, today, I stayed off my electronic devices for most of the morning but obviously not all morning as here I am blogging about my bad habit of using the computer etc. Anyway, I am also going to try substituting my afternoon caffeine fix (which sadly, is very little, but I am supposed to have none as I have heart problems) with some de-caf green tea. Yuck. Anyway, I'll see how this works out. The book does seem to be a good one, and if nothing else, is so cheerful and positive that it is worth the price for that alone.
Do you have any bad habits that you have been able to break through small, smart choices?
with the subtitle: "Jumpstart your income, your life, your success." What I like most about this book is that it addresses bad habits and how to overcome them using a variety of methods that seem to make sense. I have a couple of bad habits at the moment: too much caffeine and too much time on devices that are giving me text neck. The Compound Effect, according to the book, is the principle of reaping huge rewards from a series of small, smart choices. The author has you write down every time you engage in one of your bad habits and very slowly, work towards changing them.
For example, today, I stayed off my electronic devices for most of the morning but obviously not all morning as here I am blogging about my bad habit of using the computer etc. Anyway, I am also going to try substituting my afternoon caffeine fix (which sadly, is very little, but I am supposed to have none as I have heart problems) with some de-caf green tea. Yuck. Anyway, I'll see how this works out. The book does seem to be a good one, and if nothing else, is so cheerful and positive that it is worth the price for that alone.
Do you have any bad habits that you have been able to break through small, smart choices?
Amazon cutting out publishers
I saw this New York Times article over at CNBC about Amazon publishing books directly with top authors:
I love that guys like Tim Ferris, author of some pretty entertaining books like The 4-Hour Workweek and The 4-Hour Body: An Uncommon Guide to Rapid Fat-Loss, Incredible Sex, and Becoming Superhuman can now bypass mainstream publishers altogether. Soon other lesser known writers will join him, without the need for a publisher. It's about time.
Amazon.com has taught readers that they do not need bookstores. Now it is encouraging writers to cast aside their publishers.....
It has set up a flagship line run by a publishing veteran, Laurence Kirshbaum, to bring out brand-name fiction and nonfiction. It signed its first deal with the self-help author Tim Ferriss. Last week it announced a memoir by the actress and director Penny Marshall, for which it paid $800,000, a person with direct knowledge of the deal said.
Publishers say Amazon is aggressively wooing some of their top authors. And the company is gnawing away at the services that publishers, critics and agents used to provide.
I love that guys like Tim Ferris, author of some pretty entertaining books like The 4-Hour Workweek and The 4-Hour Body: An Uncommon Guide to Rapid Fat-Loss, Incredible Sex, and Becoming Superhuman can now bypass mainstream publishers altogether. Soon other lesser known writers will join him, without the need for a publisher. It's about time.
"If I'd been kept in the dark by a federal task force, I might not have been here to write this."
A reader sent me an article from the Mercury News entitled "Milken: Why block a cancer test that saves lives?"
The U.S. Preventive Services Task Force (USPSTF), a panel supported by a congressional mandate, now recommends that healthy men not receive prostate-specific antigen (PSA) tests, which measure a protein in the blood produced by prostate tissue. I agree that the current PSA test is inexact and, in many cases, leads to overtreatment that can have terrible side effects such as incontinence and impotence. However, research supported by the Prostate Cancer Foundation has led to the development of several new molecular markers that could soon complement or even replace the PSA test. These new tests, now in clinical trials pending approval from the Food and Drug Administration, should greatly improve diagnosis and treatment of prostate cancer. In the meantime, the USPSTF recommendation is a disservice to the majority of men. While it would eliminate some short-term health care costs, long-term costs of treating metastatic disease would be higher. And some men will die. A recent European study showed that testing reduced deaths significantly among men ages 55 to 69....
The Prostate Cancer Foundation agrees with the American Urological Association that PSA screening provides important information for men and their doctors. In 1993, I was one of those "healthy" men the task force says should not be tested. I asked for the test. The result was a reading six times the upper limit of normal. If I'd been kept in the dark by a federal task force, I might not have been here to write this.
The Secret of Selling Anything
I am reading Harry Browne's book The Secret of Selling Anything. Actually, it's an old book that he wrote years ago and after his death in 2006, his widow Pamela Wolfe Browne, found two manuscripts and made them available at the Harry Browne website. Harry Browne, if you remember, was the libertarian presidential candidate in 1996 and 2000. I was always a big fan of his, voted for him and read several of his books, including my favorites How I Found Freedom in an Unfree World and Why Government Doesn't Work.
The book on selling is described as "A road map to success for the salesman...who is not aggressive, who is not a smooth 'talker' and who is not an extrovert." Browne uses his libertarian principles in the first chapters of the book to help the reader understand his own nature and that of others. His first law of human nature is "all individuals seek happiness." Browne says that the second law is that happiness is relative, each individual will look for happiness in different ways. Throughout the book, Browne teaches that succeeding at selling means finding out what people want and helping them to get it. A good salesman finds out what will make a person happy enough to part with his or her money. Browne's discussion of libertarian principles and how it applies to selling is worth the read.
The book on selling is described as "A road map to success for the salesman...who is not aggressive, who is not a smooth 'talker' and who is not an extrovert." Browne uses his libertarian principles in the first chapters of the book to help the reader understand his own nature and that of others. His first law of human nature is "all individuals seek happiness." Browne says that the second law is that happiness is relative, each individual will look for happiness in different ways. Throughout the book, Browne teaches that succeeding at selling means finding out what people want and helping them to get it. A good salesman finds out what will make a person happy enough to part with his or her money. Browne's discussion of libertarian principles and how it applies to selling is worth the read.
New Back-Up Blog
Hi all,
I am having trouble yet again with Blogger locking me out of my account due to my password being changed. I have a back-up blog now at drhelenblog.com. I have also put a link to the back-up blog in the sidebar.
I am having trouble yet again with Blogger locking me out of my account due to my password being changed. I have a back-up blog now at drhelenblog.com. I have also put a link to the back-up blog in the sidebar.
"How to Win a Fight" is out today
I wanted to let readers know that Larwence Kane and Kris Wilder’s new book How to Win a Fight: A Guide to Avoiding and Surviving Violence is out today.
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