Tim Cook Visits Japan and Singapore to Meet With Developers and Employees [Updated]

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Apple CEO Tim Cook has been touring Tokyo, Japan over the last few days, meeting with local employees, developers, healthcare experts, and others. Cook has been documenting the trip on his Twitter account.

tim-cook-japan-800x534.jpeg

Cook has traveled to several countries for meets and greets during his eight-year tenure as Apple CEO, including France and Germany in September. He has also visited Canada, China, Ireland, Italy, and the United Kingdom.


Update: Cook has now arrived in Singapore and has met with local employees, developers, students, and photographers.

We'll keep this post updated as Cook continues his tour in Asia.

Article Link: Tim Cook Visits Japan and Singapore to Meet With Developers and Employees [Updated]
 
Article Link
https://www.macrumors.com/2019/12/09/tim-cook-visits-japan/
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This article finally made me realize why there have been so many negative comments about Tim Cook's leadership at Apple. Tim is very customer (outward) focused rather than process / product (inward) focused. He is also very good at being customer focused. That is NOT a bad thing as he has CXOs and VPs reporting to him who are more internally focused. I frequently disagree with him on politics but I still respect him as a leader and he is a great face / spokesperson for the Apple brand.
 
Tokyo is perhaps the best city in the world.

An amazing place with amazing people.
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DoctorTech said:
This article finally made me realize why there have been so many negative comments about Tim Cook's leadership at Apple. Tim is very customer (outward) focused rather than process / product (inward) focused. He is also very good at being customer focused. That is NOT a bad thing as he has CXOs and VPs reporting to him who are more internally focused. I frequently disagree with him on politics but I still respect him as a leader and he is a great face / spokesperson for the Apple brand.
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Tim Cook is probably the best operational guy in the world.

He is extremely focused on internal process, particularly in the supply chain.
 
DoctorTech said:
This article finally made me realize why there have been so many negative comments about Tim Cook's leadership at Apple. Tim is very customer (outward) focused rather than process / product (inward) focused. He is also very good at being customer focused. That is NOT a bad thing as he has CXOs and VPs reporting to him who are more internally focused. I frequently disagree with him on politics but I still respect him as a leader and he is a great face / spokesperson for the Apple brand.
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Say what you want about Tim Cook but he is good at this kind of stuff. And it’s something Steve Jobs never did. I wish the Apple board would promote Jeff Williams to run the company and let Tim Cook focus on this kind of stuff. He’s much better at this than product development.
 
I was in The Apple Store in Ginza today, I wondered why it was so busy, perhaps Tim was about or had been there already, there seemed to be as many staff in red shirts as there were customers, the place was packed.

Great store that is, 100% satisfaction as always.
 
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Rogifan said:
Say what you want about Tim Cook but he is good at this kind of stuff. And it’s something Steve Jobs never did. I wish the Apple board would promote Jeff Williams to run the company and let Tim Cook focus on this kind of stuff. He’s much better at this than product development.
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Whereas Jobs had a deep appreciation for (Japanese) culture, spirituality, innovation, design and aesthetics, Cook is typically all about the exposure and the goofy-two-shoes photo ops with kids.

I agree that someone else should take up product stewardship because it's clear Apple’s product design language, cadence and innovation have languished since 2011. Tim just doesn't care about product.

Is Jeff Williams the right person though?
 
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Cool story. Looks like it was a good trip.
That said... about healthcare...

Really hope Tim visited the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare during his visit to the city...

It's been over a year since ECG launched with the Apple Watch Series 4, we're on AppleWatch Series 5, and there's STILL no ECG support in Japan... :(
 
I'm sure that there were better pictures they could have picked.

Is the person next to Tim Cook measuring something with his hands ?
 
MacRumors said:

Coding is one of the most important skills you can learn. Loved celebrating Computer Science Education Week with students from Rikkyo Primary School at Apple Marunouchi!​
Tim Cook December 9, 2019​
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Bold: Really, Plenty of skills which are much more important than coding.;)​
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otternonsense said:
Whereas Jobs had a deep appreciation for (Japanese) culture, spirituality, innovation, design and aesthetics, Cook is typically all about the exposure and the goofy-two-shoes photo ops with kids.

I agree that someone else should take up product stewardship because it's clear Apple’s product design language, cadence and innovation have languished since 2011. Tim just doesn't care about product.

Is Jeff Williams the right person though?
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I think they are doing a much better job lately, they might have been preoccupied with that spaceship, now it's finished and we see...New MacBook Pro 16", iMac Pro, Mac Mini, new MacBook Air, Mac Pro, AirPods and more to come.
There's only one gripe here, prices went up considerably last 5 years.
 
DoctorTech said:
This article finally made me realize why there have been so many negative comments about Tim Cook's leadership at Apple. Tim is very customer (outward) focused rather than process / product (inward) focused. He is also very good at being customer focused. That is NOT a bad thing as he has CXOs and VPs reporting to him who are more internally focused. I frequently disagree with him on politics but I still respect him as a leader and he is a great face / spokesperson for the Apple brand.
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It's 100% a good thing. These people are ultimately part of the target audience. I know people aren't familiar with how the design process works (I work as a graphic/ui/ux designer) but being in touch with the people you are designing for is so ****ing important.
 
otternonsense said:
Whereas Jobs had a deep appreciation for (Japanese) culture, spirituality, innovation, design and aesthetics, Cook is typically all about the exposure and the goofy-two-shoes photo ops with kids.

I agree that someone else should take up product stewardship because it's clear Apple’s product design language, cadence and innovation have languished since 2011. Tim just doesn't care about product.

Is Jeff Williams the right person though?
Click to expand...
well I didn’t say that and I don’t agree with it. I think the innovation out of Steve Jobs’ Apple is overrated. And design language is subjective. I was never a fan of Aqua or any of the skeuomorphism Jobs liked.
 
DoctorTech said:
This article finally made me realize why there have been so many negative comments about Tim Cook's leadership at Apple. Tim is very customer (outward) focused rather than process / product (inward) focused. He is also very good at being customer focused. That is NOT a bad thing as he has CXOs and VPs reporting to him who are more internally focused. I frequently disagree with him on politics but I still respect him as a leader and he is a great face / spokesperson for the Apple brand.
Click to expand...

Yeah, he's definitely great at the supply chain. We will never have any problems getting an iPhone at every new release. Unfortunately, innovation has taken hit. I used to upgrade my iPhone every 1-2 years. Now I upgrade every 4-5.
 
DoctorTech said:
This article finally made me realize why there have been so many negative comments about Tim Cook's leadership at Apple. Tim is very customer (outward) focused rather than process / product (inward) focused. He is also very good at being customer focused. That is NOT a bad thing as he has CXOs and VPs reporting to him who are more internally focused. I frequently disagree with him on politics but I still respect him as a leader and he is a great face / spokesperson for the Apple brand.
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Job's insight about this context.
 
123 said:
I don't think grandpa reading books to kids makes for a great spokesperson for the brand.
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That’s not an iBook it’s an iPad!

But Tim Apple isn’t even 60. You might want to get used to seeing him, Grandpa Timmy 👨‍🍳 could be the face of Apple for another 20 or 30 years.
 
Lalatoon said:

Job's insight about this context.
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Thank you for posting the Steve Jobs video. That is exactly what I was trying to get across in my comment. I know Tim Cook's background is heavy on process and supply chain management (I teach Operations Management and Data Analytics for a Big 10 University). But since becoming CEO, Tim has been shifting his focus more toward the customer. I never meant to suggest he was ignoring products and processes, just that his focus was shifting.

A lot of people were criticizing him a year or two ago when there was a photo of him and Jony Ive looking at a new Apple product and it appeared that Jony Ive was explaining the product to him. A lot of comments suggested Tim was "out of touch" with Apple products but that was not my take on it (he may have just had a specific question that Jony was explaining to him). I think Tim is doing the right thing getting some direct, personal customer feedback rather than purely relying on the marketing department to tell him what customers are thinking / wanting.
 
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