Introduction: Background/History
People who have changed humanity and its habits sometimes have a crisis in childhood. Steve Jobs is an example of such an individual who has achieved a lot while realizing a dream. The man was born on February 24, 1955, to American students Joanne Schieble and Abdulfattah Jandali in California (“Steve Jobs,” 2020). Jobs got the last name due to early adoption, as the boy’s biological parents were forced to abandon the child. The individual’s school life was ordinary except for one detail: Steve preferred to think outside the school curriculum, which was almost impossible with the constant workload and standard assignments.
Consequently, the future technician chose to attend exhibitions with innovative gadgets and digital systems, which were shocking at the time. After high school, Jobs entered Reed College and quitted several times while returning for individual courses (“Steve Jobs and Reed,” n.d.). The man founded Apple Inc. together with Steve Wozniak and NeXT Inc. and played a significant role in the development of Pixar and Disney. Steve’s role in these projects ranged from advisor to CEO.
Leadership Traits
Steve Jobs was an eccentric leader who propelled a personal vision of a product into a giant company. It is essential to understand that Apple’s governance, even before its worldwide acceptance, was the same as in subsequent years. In other words, Jobs demonstrated identical leadership traits both at the startup stage and at billions of dollars in annual turnover. The man was noted for the attention to detail, a desire to control every creation process independently, and a passion for integrating creativity into technology (Kassim, 2020).
Besides, Steve preferred to create a radically new product than replace existing offerings. Each of these characteristics indicates that the entrepreneur is an example of an inspiring leader who strives to build a team of the most qualified people in their fields. In particular, these people should share a corporate vision and not need to be tightly managed. Thus, Apple’s ex-CEO had a clear personal philosophy of creating a unique and durable product, projected onto the administration style.
Personality Type
Managing giant companies results from a titanic effort invested in self-development and building an entrepreneurial foundation. The current successes of Apple and other organizations seem impossible without the leadership potential of Steve Jobs. In addition to the natural passion for technology and academic training, the man also had a commander’s personality type characteristic. First of all, it is characterized by a clear focus on success and confidence that hard work and charisma will become the basis for future achievements. The entrepreneur can be assessed as a natural-born leader, as the vision of the future result and the awareness of all the steps required to achieve the goal were used to develop Apple. Jobs was also a perfectionist, which is evident from the first acquaintance with technical devices. iPhones and other products by Apple combine branding, aesthetics, and functionality that were not available even ten years ago. All these factors indicate that the individual had a personality type that did not tolerate imperfections and would insist on every action’s strategic planning until the final stage.
Personal Characteristics
Steve Jobs was a leader who differed from mainstream governance models. The man has integrated personal characteristics into the product’s properties, thereby making it unique in its market. As noted earlier, the entrepreneur was a strict perfectionist who strove to create the perfect technology that fully matched the original idea. It can also be assessed as obstinacy, namely, focus on results and ignorance of environmental factors. A controversial argument is Jobs’ dominance in a professional context since this characteristic has a connotation of injustice and cruelty. Instead, it was expressed as no alternative and required to fulfill orders and initial plans from employees. Thus, Steve had a clear vision of the outcome and a preference for an unquestioning management model.
Education & Training Development
Jobs has become a figure used as an example to teach leaders. Despite the narrow specialization in the technological field, the entrepreneur has shown from the own experience pushing entrepreneurship and business development participation boundaries. It is these qualities that are fundamental when using the image of Jobs in education. Vision and philosophy are conveyed as elements of corporate culture that are most in-demand in companies with fierce competition and the need for differentiation. Thus, the development of education and training indicates an entrepreneur’s traits that are characteristic of an eccentric leader.
Learned or Gifted Leadership Traits & Skills
The specialist’s leadership qualities characteristic was passion and personal example to optimize the production of unique products. The challenge here is learning the natural and learned skills that Jobs has developed throughout the career. The study of childhood and youth life of the person shows that craving for perfectionism and creating entirely new products while integrating creativity into technology were the original traits of an entrepreneur. However, strategies for managing people and linking ideas to commerce are acquired approaches.
Differentiating the iPhone in the market based on aesthetics and unique functionality is tailored leadership skills. It can be concluded that the original traits were complemented by more commercial-oriented characteristics, which together gave a unique style of administration for the most expensive corporation in the world.
Leadership Style
The standard classification of leadership styles is too categorized and strict about describing Steve Jobs’ management’s traits. The man was an artist who appreciated technology as a limitless field for the realization of creativity. The integration of personal vision into market conditions and entrepreneurship can be demonstrated by an eccentric leader distinguished by a differentiated image of day-to-day processes. Jobs’s creativity also covers a combination of familiar concepts to make a unique product (Kassim, 2020). For example, most Apple products are perfect in terms of aesthetic appeal and responsiveness. Thus, the combination of several solutions together makes the specialist different from other leaders in this area.
The same characteristics were achieved through autocratic leadership, namely, the rigidity of decision-making and the lack of alternatives to negotiations. As stated earlier, Steve preferred to adhere to the original idea unquestioningly and did not tolerate imperfections in the process of creating technologies. The driving force behind business development was also a clear understanding of the psychology of the people who surround the CEO every day. These individuals are motivated to fulfill the leader’s requirements, but at the same time, they are first-class specialists in their fields. Thus, Jobs was an autocratic and eccentric leader due to a combination of unpredictable decisions and rigid administration.
Core Focus of Leadership
Steve Jobs has demonstrated the value of thinking creatively and going beyond the usual business of technology entrepreneurs. Besides, the main feature of a man’s leadership is perfectionism, which consists of understanding the goal and continuously improving it. It is the core focus of the administration, which is evident when analyzing the leading corporation’s assortment in the life of Jobs, namely Apple. iPhones, iPods, iMacs, and accessories are updated every year, but there are no significant changes. This trend reveals Steve’s leadership values since the initial ideas are operational strategies in the long term. Continuous improvement in current productivity and the introduction of creativity at all stages of decision-making differs the entrepreneur from other suppliers in this segment.
Notable & Memorable Accomplishment
Apple’s ex-CEO is one of the key innovators in technology history and the inspiration behind dozens of inventions. The most significant and fundamental is the Macintosh, which embodies computer science progress for individual use. As known, this device was the first affordable middle-class product to function as a PC and perform as many simple operations as massive industrial plants (“Steve Jobs,” 2020). It is worth noting that Jobs is involved with many of the innovative technologies and computers invented in the 70s and 90s, but it was the Macintosh that laid the foundation for a new technological era. Subsequent projects diversified the concept of creativity in hardware and provided new horizons for multi-million dollar corporations.
Recognition & Awards
Steve Jobs is recognized all over the world even almost ten years after the death. The man is called a pioneer of technology and a specialist who combined digital and visual products presentation. The most significant award is the National Medal of Technology by President Ronald Reagan in 1985, which recognized the contribution of a genius to technology development (Santisi, n.d.). This reward is a tribute to the people who have transformed their fields by integrating an innovative perspective on existing things. Jobs’ contributions are not only improvements, however, as Apple and other businesses significantly changed the sphere of technology and provided unique products with radically different philosophies. Thus, acknowledging a leader lies in the public understanding of the contribution to the given industry and memory even after death.
Strengths & Weaknesses
Leadership through the integration of personal vision into innovation enables market and cultural success, which Apple has become. The benefits of Jobs as a leader have been described previously and include offering a particular example in work, attention to detail, and a deviation from traditional daily routines. However, the man was not invulnerable and had several weaknesses that could conflict with a healthy team atmosphere. It is a well-known fact of the cardinality of the decisions and communication difficulties, in which Jobs could be disrespectful to the charges. The specialist had a unique vision of production and design, which could conflict with the philosophy of other people. Disobedience and disputes could be suppressed decisively, and a person could be fired for no apparent reason.
Qualities Most Admired
A detailed analysis of Jobs’s personal qualities showed that the leader was the team’s ideological inspirer. However, it can be controversial due to overly drastic decisions, intolerance on the way to the goal, and an overemphasis on details. These seemingly negative features of management have become the hallmark of a specialist who was famous for expanding the boundaries of technology. Being a pioneer of innovative vision and a reorientation of values in the segment has become the man’s most revered traits.
Lasting Contribution to the World
Jobs contributed to doing business by opening boundaries to individual vision. In other words, the specialist has shown by his example that non-standard thinking and details as the key to success can be the most reliable ways to compete with enterprises. Besides, the subjective concept of value began to prevail in psychology and business, as feelings become more significant than owning a physical product. It changed both the trend among suppliers and buyers’ preferences, looking for products with philosophy and subjective value.
Knowledge and Lessons Gained
Understanding the business’s goals is variable based on the mission and vision that a particular company is promoting. The technological field seemed far from creativity, as specialists strive to create products without much differentiation. Jobs’s contribution to this industry is colossal from a psychological point of view, as a smartphone or laptop has become the subject of self-expression and non-verbal transmission of values. The CEO’s lesson covers understanding business as a communication and philosophy, not just selling a quality product. This analysis showed that Steve made unexpected decisions as Apple evolved that looked mysterious but proved to be effective. Thus, the knowledge gained shows leadership as an inspiration and a departure from routine to create an innovative and legendary product.
Conclusion
Steve Jobs was a legendary leader who transformed the business paradigm by integrating a personal vision into the technology landscape. First of all, the specialist was the pioneer of this industry, as the Apple II and Macintosh were the breakthrough products for that time. By combining an individual passion for digitalization and attention to detail, the man sought to change the customer experience. It covers the psychological desire to buy a product that outperforms competitors in conveying values and philosophy.
Jobs was attentive to detail and extravagant in the approach to device aesthetics, which was a new round in the sphere’s development. The leader was eccentric and autocratic at the same time, which was characterized by strictness in communicating with the charges and unpredictable decisions. However, this vision has helped Apple and other companies become cultural phenomena and recognize their leader as one of the most visible specialists of modern time.
References
Kassim, N. (2020). Steve Jobs’s leadership style and what we can learn from it. Idea Drop. Web.
Santisi, J. (n.d.). Steve Jobs. National Science and Technology Medals Foundation. Web.
Steve Jobs and Reed. (n.d.). Reed College. Web.
Steve Jobs. (2020). AppleInsider. Web.