Is it possible that great founders can be different types of people (engineers, professionals, visionaries or some combination of the three)? Weird.
Why Founders Should Emulate Wozniak, Not Jobs
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Re: Why Founders Should Emulate Wozniak, Not Jobs
#72I think , if startup founders were to emulate anything from Apple's early days, it would be to emulate THE TEAM.
Founder-teams should consist of one brilliant engineer (Woz), one business guy (Markkula) and one design guy (Jobs).
Everyone should be themselves, but for a company to truly succed, a perfect combination of people is needed. And a perfect timing. Apple had both.
Re: Why Founders Should Emulate Wozniak, Not Jobs
#73Earlier quoted context omitted.
Woz was the engineering genius. Jobs was the visionary entrepreneur. They both needed each other.
He was not a visionary entrepreneur, that's the whole point. His vision led him to create product flops for 20 years. Markkula on the other hand got it correct with the Apple II from having the right industry knowledge.
Can you elaborate on what his flops were?
LISA? kicked off the team
Macintosh? I'm typing from one right now
NEXTStep? considering the technology forms the foundation for OSX and iOS doesn't look like it flopped.
AppleTV? it's doing better than it's competition, maybe.
Apple Hifi? definitely.
Pixar? I think other animation studios wish they could as good as their worst films.
Over the course of his career most of his "flops" have turned out successful. He pumped millions of dollars over a decade to keep Pixar afloat. And it was him and his technical team at NEXT that turned the Mac into what it is today.
Re: Why Founders Should Emulate Wozniak, Not Jobs
#74Take Jobs, Wozniak or Markula out of the picture and Apple fails. You needed a hustler/product guy, a brilliant engineer and a great business mind for success. Jobs legend was created because he built upon his skills. He enhanced his ability to spot and aquire great talent and learned (the hard way) how to become a great businessman.
What is a product/hustler guy? Thats not clear to me at all
Re: Why Founders Should Emulate Wozniak, Not Jobs
#75Apple would not exist had Jobs not had the insight to turn Wozniak's hobby into a marketable product. Indeed he had much help to grow the company, but that help is a commodity far easier to find than a man like Jobs who could spy potential and lead those resources toward his vision.
In his early days, Jobs was a terrible manager, a tedious perfectionist, a narcissistic autocrat, and an emotional child - yet he had the passion, charisma, and vision to see potential and make it happen. Because of that, all his negative qualities become charming quirks instead of causing him to be kicked to the curb for good at 20. He was probably rightfully booted from Apple for those characteristics, and it was far easier for him to tame those demons than it would have been for Wozniak to take on Jobs' charm.
There's a reason there is only one Jobs and one Apple, yet thousands of Wozniaks and still one Apple - Jobs is a rarer and more essential talent. Wozniak was quickly replaced when he became disengaged - Jobs still can't be.
Re: Why Founders Should Emulate Wozniak, Not Jobs
#76Earlier quoted context omitted.
Not to mention that Woz had an equal amount of failures.. What we have is really several different Founder styles: 1. Young Woz 2. Old Woz 3. Young Jobs 4 Old Jobs
Could you be more specific about Wozniak's equal amount of failures? Not quite sure I agree.
Re: Why Founders Should Emulate Wozniak, Not Jobs
#77Earlier quoted context omitted.
He was not a visionary entrepreneur, that's the whole point. His vision led him to create product flops for 20 years. Markkula on the other hand got it correct with the Apple II from having the right industry knowledge.
Let's see. Bill Gates, Warren Buffet, Barack Obama, Bob Iger, Rupert Murdoch, Michael Dell, Larry Page, Sergey Brin, Steve Spielberg, Michael Bloomberg, Stephen Wolfram, Jeffrey Katzenberg, Dick Costolo, Steve Case, Marc Andressen, etc. They all think he's a visionary. Should I believe them or you?
You should believe neither them nor trevor99. Look at the facts and draw your own conclusions.
Re: Why Founders Should Emulate Wozniak, Not Jobs
#78Earlier quoted context omitted.
Thanks pg. My intent was not to bash Jobs, quite the opposite as I called him "one of the best CEOs ever to live" in the conclusion. My goal is to reflect on what skills are really important in an early startup. The Apple II wasn't a success because of Jobs's leadership or because of his design focus like with the iPhone. Founders don't think about Markkula's role in getting the Apple II mainstream. Furthermore, Jobs…
"I've missed more than 9000 shots in my career. I've lost almost 300 games. Twenty-six times I've been trusted to take the game winning shot and missed. I've failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed." -Michael Jordan
"Only those who dare to fail greatly can ever achieve greatly." ― Robert F. Kennedy
Re: Why Founders Should Emulate Wozniak, Not Jobs
#79Sadly, this is not one of the honeypots Wesley Tansey recently suggested I set up ( http://www.nashcoding.com/2011/10/28/hackernews-needs-honeyp... ). As someone who has seen dozens of Woz-founder-only startups march into the meatgrinder of obscurity, I can tell you that if you have to be one or the other, you're better off being Jobs. Not that you have much choice about it though. If you're a natural Jobs you're not…
I think I'm going to start flagging every Jobs story from now on. This has gone on long enough.
Don't bother you just lose your ability to flag.
Re: Why Founders Should Emulate Wozniak, Not Jobs
#80Earlier quoted context omitted.
Let's see. Bill Gates, Warren Buffet, Barack Obama, Bob Iger, Rupert Murdoch, Michael Dell, Larry Page, Sergey Brin, Steve Spielberg, Michael Bloomberg, Stephen Wolfram, Jeffrey Katzenberg, Dick Costolo, Steve Case, Marc Andressen, etc. They all think he's a visionary. Should I believe them or you?
You should believe neither them nor trevor99. Look at the facts and draw your own conclusions.
Thanks for answering my rhetorical question.