You think that any of those marketing decisions were hers? Or maybe they were the MARKETING team's decision. Marketing decided to give watches to Beyonce. Marketing decided that watches should be available in boutique stores. (Plus, Apple has ALWAYS given their gadgets to celebrities before launch. See Steven Colbert with his pre-release iPad at the Grammys.) Which is a whole separate department, headed by Phil Schiller. But you never see Phil blamed for marketing the watch. I've NEVER seen Phil blamed for the marketing of the watch. But Marketing decides that they want this to be an exclusive, fashion-y, affluent product, not the head of friggen retail.Would you call the Apple Watch rollout successful? The entire roll out? I'm talking, the sell only online, the reservation system to try the watch on, the putting watches in boutique shops before they are even available in Apple retail stores.. You think all of that was successful? Are you saying that she didn't have a giant seat at the table during all of this? I'm thinking that she did...
Or what about this dandy of a quote she sent to retail employees prior the Apple Watch launch:
"This is our moment to shine, this will be a launch unlike any we've ever had before... this is what you were born to do, this is why you are at Apple," Ahrendts told employees hoping to encourage them to re-review the Apple Watch training materials.
We could also get into a broader discussion about the choices that have been made in actually promoting the watch prior to launch.. The MASSIVE marketing campaign that was created by putting the watch on the wrists of celebrities, in fashion magazines, etc. All screaming exclusive, all screaming elite, all something we had never seen from Apple as a company before. Again, were these decisions made by her alone? Probably not.. But did she have a very large seat at the table? Obviously. She just so happened to head an overpriced fashion house prior to Apple offering her 100 million dollars for what purpose I do not know. It's some coincidence, wouldn't you say, that such a marketing direction was taken for the first major product she was a part of after being hired at the company? She seems out of touch to me for what the company has always stood for.
So no, it has nothing to do with her being a woman. It has to do with incompetence and not particularly liking the strategic choices she has made in regards to her very large position in the company.
Maybe the "this is what you're born to do" comment was a little much. But it's the typical "company rah rah" that happens before any kind of big event. Hell, Walmart makes all their employees sing a Walmart song in the mornings. It was a benign comment.
And the rollout. Obviously they couldn't ship the watches to every store. The roll out would be the worst in history if people lined up over night the store, then showed up and have a big giant guessing game for which watches they had in stock. Online-only was lightyears better than only having 2 or 3 of each model at any given store. This isn't anything Angela could have done. This would have been an operations problem, which would be Jeff Williams's problem. Or a supply chain problem, which would be Tim Cook's problem. Angela has nothing to do with supply chain. She was given X number of launch-day watches and told to sell them.
Regarding the reservation system: what do you honestly think would have been better than a reservation system? Showing up at your store of choice because maybe the watch you want is there? Apple has never sold a high-profile product with so many variants. So obviously they had to do things differently. I think Angela came up with a very pragmatic solution.