Steve Jobs was a relentless entrepreneur.
Both an innovator and a visionary, he was also a legend during his life, which is a rarity. And with a net worth estimated to be more than $10 billion when he died in 2011, he was no stranger to making a business successful.
He was also en excellent storyteller, as this short videoclip with Steve Jobs and Bill Gates illustrates:
So, shouldn’t we all strive to be like Steve Jobs? There is no doubt that he was successful and that he used unconventional methods along the way in his path to success. Steve Jobs’ leadership style worked for him, but there are many methods he used that would likely not work for you in the same way.
The problem is there are only a handful of people who can visualize a future, play with it in their mind, and then go create it. A leader that smart can break all of the leadership rules. And sadly, most of us just aren’t that smart.
Looking back, there is much we can learn from his actions. Some good, some bad. The key, in my opinion, is to learn what you can from great leaders but be comfortable in your talents. Don’t try to “be” Steve Jobs.
Steve Jobs was quite opinionated. Never one to pull punches, his candid thoughts on business, entrepreneurship, and how to make the most of life are straightforward but often surprisingly wise.
Below are some Steve Jobs quotes which I hope can inspire, motivate and entertain. The quotes are grouped in tabs as "work", "life" and "inspiration". Click on the tab you prefer to read the associated quotes.
1. Get closer than ever to your customers. So close that you tell them what they need well before they realize it themselves.
2. Simple can be harder than complex: You have to work hard to get your thinking clean to make it simple.
3. There is a tremendous amount of craftsmanship between a great idea and a great product.
4. Be a yardstick of quality. Some people aren’t used to an environment where excellence is expected.
5. You’ve got to start with the customer experience and work back toward the technology – not the other way around.
6. Technology is nothing. What's important is that you have faith in people, that they're basically good and smart, and if you give them tools, they'll do wonderful things with them.
7. If you define the problem correctly, you almost have the Solution.
8. If you really look closely, most overnight successes took a long time.
9. You can’t look at the competition and say you’re going to do it better. You have to look at the competition and say you’re going to do it differently.
10. Great things in business are never done by one person; they’re done by a team of people.
11. The secret of my success is that we have gone to exceptional lengths to hire the best people in the world.
12. Let’s go invent tomorrow instead of worrying about what happened yesterday.
13. A lot of times, people don’t know what they want until you show it to them.