12A Reading Reflection No.1

Steve Jobs

1.    What surprised you the most?

What really surprised me was that he was a huge hippy. He did LSD, went to India to become enlightened, and worked on a farm with his friends.

2.    What about the entrepreneur did you most admire?

I admire his perfectionism. He knew what the customer wanted before they knew it themselves. He worked hard to create the most beautiful product that married technology and humanity, something other computer and tech companies weren’t delivering. Most importantly, he valued the presentation of the product as much as what was in it. In fact, he made sure that the inside of the product was a clean and well thought out as the outside, despite no one being able to see it.

3.    What about the entrepreneur did you least admire?

I had never heard of another entrepreneurial giant who built his company by being so callous. He alienated so many people with his mere ego and personality. He could have garnered the same success and reached many of the same goals without hurting the feelings of colleagues, partners, and friends. His personality, something interesting to read for a novel, wasn’t something people near him always thought was ideal.

4.    Did the entrepreneur encounter adversity and failure? If so, what did they do about it?

Interesting, Jobs, unlike the prototypical adult, acted petulant when faced with adversity, such as when he was fired from his own company or pushed off the Macintosh Team. However, he later realized that there was something good that came out of being pushed out of the project, a ferocious determination to one-up the new rivals (who were members of his own business) and produce an even better product because of it.

5.    What competencies did you notice that the entrepreneur exhibited?

He knew what people wanted and how to get people to do what he wanted by giving and taking as he chose. He impassioned his team and made them feel like they were soldiers fighting against an evil force and they were the saviors that needed to bring about change. He ability to influence people was probably his most striking attribute.

6.    Identify at least one part of the reading that was confusing to you.

What confused me was how Jobs can literally lie to himself and others, what some people call his reality distortion field, to the point where he abandoned his own daughter. What is more astounding is the fact that he himself was an orphan and was able to convince himself that neglecting his daughter was acceptable?

7.   If you were able to ask two questions to the entrepreneur, what would you ask? Why?

If this is just hypothetical, then I would ask if he could have a few more years, what he wanted to make next, the specifics about it, and then make it myself. It would probably be the next big thing. The second thing I would ask would be what he think he did right to get him to his success so then I can learn from it. What does he attribute his success to?

8.   For fun: what do you think the entrepreneur's opinion was of hard work? Do you share that opinion?

He believes that hard work comes from great discipline and from the purest passion for creating something that one loves and knows will change the world. I admire and agree with his intense love for the products he makes. He never stopped or grew complacent because he knew he only had a short time on Earth and he was going to squeeze everything out of it.