Why I fired Steve Jobs. - John Sculley

[PinkyMacGodess]

An article in The Daily Beast on what happened to the men that pushed Steve Jobs out at Apple. The comments are interesting...

Personally I feel that Steve had to go. If he hadn't, Apple would likely not exist at this point. The atmosphere was poison there at the time and both Apple and Steve had valuable lessons to learn.

I think that it is because Steve was fired that when he came back to Apple he was able to do what he's done since.

Firing Steve broadened his horizons and proved that there is a lot to be gained by working with others. He started looking in different directions, which was apparently the best thing...

 

[niuniu]

I'd believe it - most men mellow with age and become more reasonable. Jobs still displays his brattishness, I can only image what a nightmare he could have been in his younger days

 

[Rodimus Prime]

I have read things that even Steve Jobs agreed he needed to be fired back then and that he would of killed the company.

Mind you some of the same mistakes SJ made back then he is repeating. He has divisions that compete with each other and tend to screw over one another because of lack of communication between them.

 

[kernkraft]

An article in The Daily Beast on what happened to the men that pushed Steve Jobs out at Apple. The comments are interesting...

Personally I feel that Steve had to go. If he hadn't, Apple would likely not exist at this point. The atmosphere was poison there at the time and both Apple and Steve had valuable lessons to learn.

I think that it is because Steve was fired that when he came back to Apple he was able to do what he's done since.

Firing Steve broadened his horizons and proved that there is a lot to be gained by working with others. He started looking in different directions, which was apparently the best thing...

I get your point, however, I cannot help but feel that you are trying to justify an old decision from the future. Things could have turned out to be differently. For Jobs and Apple, it seems that by today, things turned out OK. But what actually made that possible was a long list of further decisions and aspects that neither Jobs or Apple could not control.

What would have happened if Jobs stayed there? If he couldn't return? If there was another company that came up with a good music player and a whole ecosystem (annyingly over-used term, I know) around it?

Nobody knows. Even Steve Jobs admitted that he was incredibly lucky and history could have taken a different turn easily.

 

[Bonch]

Coke would taste like dog poop if Scully never went to apple.

 

[Mousse]

Coke would taste like dog poop if Scully never went to apple.

How so? Scully was president of Pepsi when Jobs recruited him with the now famous, "Do you want to sell sugar water for the rest of your life, or do you want to come with me and change the world?" line. Maybe, just, maybe Scully leaving Pepsi made Coca-Cola decide to drop the New Coke for the Coke Classic. Coke Classic (the new Coke) is actually the old Coke, because the old Coke (New Coke) tastes like dog poop.

 

[Jaro65]

I'd believe it - most men mellow with age and become more reasonable. Jobs still displays his brattishness, I can only image what a nightmare he could have been in his younger days

I remember reading a magazine article (most likely a Fortune) in the early-mid 90's ranking the world's 10 worst CEO's. SJ was there. How time changes everything.

 

[MattSepeta]

How so? Scully was president of Pepsi when Jobs recruited him with the now famous, "Do you want to sell sugar water for the rest of your life, or do you want to come with me and change the world?" line. Maybe, just, maybe Scully leaving Pepsi made Coca-Cola decide to drop the New Coke for the Coke Classic. Coke Classic (the new Coke) is actually the old Coke, because the old Coke (New Coke) tastes like dog poop.

LOL thats a mouthful.

Old Coke or New Coke, still better than Pepsi

 

[barkomatic]

People change. Jobs would have made a terrible CEO back then. This just goes to show that its worthwhile to give people second chances.

 

[rdowns]

If Jobs wasn't fired, we wouldn't be where we are today. He was ill equipped to lead a growing, public company at that time. He went off, learned how to run a large business and let others share in his success (still needs work ) and made a triumphant return. He and Apple will be studied for years in business schools.

 

[Consultant]

If Jobs wasn't fired, we wouldn't be where we are today. He was ill equipped to lead a growing, public company at that time. He went off, learned how to run a large business and let others share in his success (still needs work ) and made a triumphant return. He and Apple will be studies for years in business schools.

Plus he made his fortunes in Pixar too due to his forward looking vision on technology ahead of its time.

Let's see:

Apple grew from the garage to a huge company under Steve Jobs
Apple failed under John Sculley and his various successors
Apple grew to exceed Microsoft in value under Steve Jobs

Steve Jobs became owner of Pixar and drove it into a multi-billion dollar business.

Therefore, Steve Jobs is definitely a poor business man and needs to be fired to learn his lessons. WTF are people smoking?

 

[Lord Blackadder]

Therefore, Steve Jobs is definitely a poor business man and needs to be fired to learn his lessons. WTF are people smoking?

Jobs didn't personally invent any of the devices that have made Apple famous - that honor is proably shared between people like Steve Wozniak and Jonathan Ive.

Jobs at his best is a visionary, a big-picture idea man with business accumen...he is also an uncompromizing primadonna. His time at the helm of Apple has seen success and failure, and it's only right for him to assume responsibility for both.

 

[NT1440]

Jobs wasn't even really in charge before he left. He pissed off too many people with and he was taken off managing anything, moved into a nearly empty building, then eventually sacked. Anyone that wants to know what Apple was really like back in the day check out this awesome site:

http://www.folklore.org/index.py

 

[HyperZboy]

How so? Scully was president of Pepsi when Jobs recruited him with the now famous, "Do you want to sell sugar water for the rest of your life, or do you want to come with me and change the world?" line. Maybe, just, maybe Scully leaving Pepsi made Coca-Cola decide to drop the New Coke for the Coke Classic. Coke Classic (the new Coke) is actually the old Coke, because the old Coke (New Coke) tastes like dog poop.

This is off topic, but technically the current Coke is not the original Coke since it's not made with sugar anymore. When they dumped new Coke to go back to the old, they also dumped the sugar, but few people noticed since it tastes similar.

And if you want to go back even further, Coca-Cola no longer has kola nuts or extract of Coca leaves (COCAINE!) in it either!

And it was originally marketed in the late 1800s for it's medicinal purposes!
LOL

 

[ldkaplan]

Jobs wasn't even really in charge before he left. He pissed off too many people with and he was taken off managing anything, moved into a nearly empty building, then eventually sacked. Anyone that wants to know what Apple was really like back in the day check out this awesome site:

http://www.folklore.org/index.py

That's a really interesting site.

Here's a first hand account of what happened:

http://www.folklore.org/StoryView.py?project=Macintosh&story=The_End_Of_An_Era.txt

Lots of other stories on that site worth reading.

 

[HyperZboy]

Jobs didn't personally invent any of the devices that have made Apple famous - that honor is proably shared between people like Steve Wozniak and Jonathan Ive.

Jobs at his best is a visionary, a big-picture idea man with business accumen...he is also an uncompromizing primadonna. His time at the helm of Apple has seen success and failure, and it's only right for him to assume responsibility for both.

Plus he made his fortunes in Pixar too due to his forward looking vision on technology ahead of its time.

Let's see:

Apple grew from the garage to a huge company under Steve Jobs
Apple failed under John Sculley and his various successors
Apple grew to exceed Microsoft in value under Steve Jobs

Steve Jobs became owner of Pixar and drove it into a multi-billion dollar business.

Therefore, Steve Jobs is definitely a poor business man and needs to be fired to learn his lessons. WTF are people smoking?

Gee, I learned a new trick, I never knew how to multi-quote. LOL

Steve Jobs IS the person who visited the Palto Alto Research facility of XEROX and learned what they were doing with graphical user interfaces in test labs back when everyone like me was using an Apple ][e, NOT Steve Wozniak or anybody else at Apple. So while he doesn't deserve credit for creating the GUI, he does deserve credit for taking it out of the test labs and perfecting it to the point where Microsoft wanted it so bad that they invested money in Apple Computer, Inc. to prevent a lawsuit over stealing it. Some would say that was a bad decision by Apple, but at the time, without it, Apple would have gone under and I'm sure Steve Jobs knew that.

It leads to the question, what is the difference between Bill Gates and Steve Jobs?

ANSWER: One was a better visionary and creator of new ideas/tech concepts (Jobs) and the other was a shrewd businessman and geek programmer who was ruthless at winning in business deals (see IBM).

I absolutely believe Jobs when he says market share was never important to him.
That is EXACTLY WHY he almost ran Apple into the GROUND! LOL

So, it's important for people to note that without Sculley and Amelio, Apple wouldn't be around today and Steve Jobs wouldn't have had a huge comeback like he has. Sure, they were both corporate hack CEO's with no tech experience, but they kept the company afloat.

Face it, as much as I love Apple, Jobs and Woz were going down a road where Apple would have gone under. Jobs has almost admitted it, but he often lays blame elsewhere to deflect his responsibility just like he didn't admit he had a kid for how many years?

 

[Signal-11]

This is off topic, but technically the current Coke is not the original Coke since it's not made with sugar anymore. When they dumped new Coke to go back to the old, they also dumped the sugar, but few people noticed since it tastes similar.

Really only applicable in North America and a few other markets. Coca Cola is still made with real sugar in many parts of the world. Heck, right now I'm in Texas and I just bought a Coke made with real sugar last week at the local Cesar's Tacos. In fact, most of the convenience stores down here carry real Coke from Mexico.

Hrm. I just realized I used the phrase "real Coke from Mexico" without a hint of irony. Interesting.