The February 1985 issue of Playboy had a snatch about motivating employees, thus: “What happens in most companies is that you don't keep great people under working environments where individual accomplishment is discouraged rather than encouraged. The great people leave and you end up with mediocrity. I know, because that's how Apple was built.”
Yes, that is a quote of the iconic ‘i-Man' cited in I, Steve: Steve Jobs in his own words, edited by George Beahm ( >www.harpercollins.co.in ). A year earlier, in 1984, Jobs had said in Macworld that his job is to create a space – to clear out the rest of the organisation and keep it at bay – for the people who are the moving force behind the Macintosh.
“This is the neatest group of people I've ever worked with. They're all exceptionally bright, but more importantly they share a quality about the way they look at life, which is that the journey is the reward. They really want to see this product out in the world. It's more important than their personal lives right now.”
The book has enough and more of Microsoft bashing, such as that ‘the only problem with Microsoft is they have no taste.' Jobs explains that he does not mean the lack of taste in a small way, but in a big way, in the sense that they do not think of original ideas and they do not bring much culture into their products. “I have no problem with their success – they've earned their success for the most part. I have a problem with the fact that they just make really third-rate products.”Well compiled collection of valuable insights.