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27 years ago, Steve Jobs said the best employees focus on content, not process

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Re: 27 years ago, Steve Jobs said the best employees focus on content, not process

#181

Post by orochimaaru »

iwontberude wrote: post #117
glitchc wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Actually, that's how the world works most of the time. Superstars also know it and are used to it from early childhood. They are expected to carry the load and equally importantly, the team is expected to listen to them. It works like this in all walks of life, because simply put, human beings are not equal in ability. Things break down when the team and management stop listening. That's when the superstar actually g…

Superstars are why I don’t try harder and am less engaged. They take all of the interesting ownership and inject themselves into every process and space for communication. I wait for these people to burn out and want to actually be a team member instead of a productivity bully hoarding opportunity for themselves. They want to be the first on everything so they can influence it to be more how they like, the rest of te…

Actually, a superstar will welcome and mentor other capable "superstars". She or he will not have patience for one that expects to be taught everything. One thing they understand very well is while everyone won't be at the same level as them, helping other people skill up leaves them space to go do other interesting things as well

So what you have isn't a superstar. That's a jerk who will burn out fast and your management isn't responsive enough.

Re: 27 years ago, Steve Jobs said the best employees focus on content, not process

#182

Post by [deleted] »

anonreeeeplor wrote: post #3

Corporations, at their root, are an arbitrage on the fact that other corporations follow the bell curve. The entire goal of salaries and “teams” in my experience, is to ENSURE that high performers get diluted and averaged in with mediocre performers so the company can pretend the high performers don’t exist. This was my experience in (large co). I have seen situations where a single IC is dragging a division of 30 pe…

[deleted]

Re: 27 years ago, Steve Jobs said the best employees focus on content, not process

#183

Post by [deleted] »

wiseowise wrote: post #173
asveikau wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This seems like something between a conspiracy theory and your own ego going unchecked. I observed something like this, or at least I thought I did. With many more years of reflection, and there were hints along the way as it happened in realtime, I came to realize that the contribution of those I had written off as non-performers and dead weight was actually higher than I had estimated and difficult to actually quan…

How would you suggest to reward people who strive for more?

[deleted]

Re: 27 years ago, Steve Jobs said the best employees focus on content, not process

#184

Post by oceanplexian »

wiseowise wrote: post #169
chii wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's several types of "carrying". You have the type where one person is the visionary, is capable, but doesn't have the patience to do the grunt work and only wants to do the most prestigous or "important" shit. They do it well, but expect the rest of the team to do the thankless stuff. This is the type i hate, and i rather not have them. The other type is someone who is self-less, and just does the work regardles…

> The other type is someone who is self-less, and just does the work regardless of self-interest or agenda. They will do both prestigious work, and will also do thankless work, as long as it contributes to the success of the project. They will stay late, fix up other's mistakes, etc, without complaints or expectation that others do the same. Been there, done that, it's a career dead-end.

I used to be that person, but the problem is that you’re creating an incentive structure that doesn’t enable the management chain to identify and correct problems. A company should not be standing on the shoulders of a single engineer doing thankless work to prevent catastrophe.

Re: 27 years ago, Steve Jobs said the best employees focus on content, not process

#185

Post by signatoremo »

elzbardico wrote: post #131
signatoremo wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> but he got very, very lucky first. Which period are you referring to? Because he got fired from a company he founded, that’s the ultimate humiliation. It’s hard press to say Jobs was given free passes. Compaq piggybacked on IBM’s success. Not much of vision there, and ended up being swallowed by HP. Apple is the most valuable company today, in large part thanks to Jobs’s vision and execution (iMac, iPod, iPhone, iP…

Being fired at that time was the best thing that could happen both to Apple and Jobs. If it didn't happen, our business mythology today would full of tales about Jobs, the lose cannon that destroyed apple with his megalomanic and narcissistic ego. The Steve from the Second Advent of Jobs was a dramatically improved version of him, seasoned in no small part by this "humilliation".

> Being fired at that time was the best thing that could happen both to Apple and Jobs.

Easy to say in hindsight. Canion, who was worshipped by the GP, also got fired by Compaq but never bounced back. Or may be that’s a testament to Jobs’s ability to learn and adapt.

> the lose cannon that destroyed apple with his megalomanic and narcissistic ego.

I doubt it. Apple was Jobs’s number one priority, even to the detriment of its employees, including himself. He literally worked until his death. He has been labeled many things. Apple destroyer wouldn’t be one.

Re: 27 years ago, Steve Jobs said the best employees focus on content, not process

#186

Post by NickC25 »

ksec wrote: post #54

Except Tim Cook's Apple focuses much more on process and forget about the content. It is also strange this being brought up now in 2024. Because from 2014 to 2021 or 2022, the only sentiment allowed was every employees are roughly equal. There are no high performer. No such thing as 10x programmers etc.

>Except Tim Cook's Apple focuses much more on process and forget about the content.

I have a feeling that's partially due to how much money a lot of those people (and Apple shareholders) have made under Cook's leadership. The growth has been nothing short of incredible. IIRC Apple shares have grown like 8x or 9x under him (when accounting for inflation).

That said, Apple products no longer really have that magic that they had under Jobs (IMO). That could be because they focus now on processes and operations much more than creative technologies. Besides the watch (which was a natural continuation/evolution after the creation of the iPhone), I can't really think of projects created and developed under Cook that are game-changers or come from left field.

Process people are great in times where you need to focus on doing the same thing, day in day out...or improve on those same things. In other words, operational execution. However, don't ever trust a process person to do any creative or abstract thinking - it's impossible for them. They have tremendous value for certain types of companies at certain key phases of growth. They are "how" people, not "why" people...and certainly not "what if" people.

Re: 27 years ago, Steve Jobs said the best employees focus on content, not process

#187

Post by whstl »

glitchc wrote: post #16
anonreeeeplor wrote: post #3

Corporations, at their root, are an arbitrage on the fact that other corporations follow the bell curve. The entire goal of salaries and “teams” in my experience, is to ENSURE that high performers get diluted and averaged in with mediocre performers so the company can pretend the high performers don’t exist. This was my experience in (large co). I have seen situations where a single IC is dragging a division of 30 pe…

Actually, that's how the world works most of the time. Superstars also know it and are used to it from early childhood. They are expected to carry the load and equally importantly, the team is expected to listen to them. It works like this in all walks of life, because simply put, human beings are not equal in ability. Things break down when the team and management stop listening. That's when the superstar actually g…

It is interesting to see this dynamic playing in music bands, in situations where one person writes the songs, and the others just follow along.

Then the talent gets fed up and leave, leaving a mere "cover band" behind, unable to replicate the magic beyond what an average amateur band could do.

Re: 27 years ago, Steve Jobs said the best employees focus on content, not process

#188

Post by AdrianB1 »

jwrallie wrote: post #68
glitchc wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Actually, that's how the world works most of the time. Superstars also know it and are used to it from early childhood. They are expected to carry the load and equally importantly, the team is expected to listen to them. It works like this in all walks of life, because simply put, human beings are not equal in ability. Things break down when the team and management stop listening. That's when the superstar actually g…

If management is listening to the superstar and translating it to the team to support them it is great. If management expect people to just listen to the superstar directly it’s terrible, as the superstar has no time to do the actual work and is expected to lead instead. That is the easiest way to kill talent, and strange enough most people are encouraged to go this way to grow within the company.

A long time ago I was the superstar in 3 teams, 2 different companies. In the first one, 25 years ago, the management made me the team lead, it worked well. The second case, 10 years ago, the company was a huge corporation but not yet rotten, my manager put me in charge of the rest of the team went well for time time I was there, when I was moved to another team unexpectedly everything crashed and burned (most of the team left the company). In the last case the management did nothing, it was pretty bad, after a while most people were listening to me because they trusted me, but some (career driven) were constantly sabotaging everyone else and it got worse. It was the same corporation going DIE and the E rule was that everybody is equal at all cost, the dumbest idea was the same value as the best idea and everyone was paid the same. We had no above average people since.

The best thing management can do is to listen to Steve Jobs: "the best managers are the great IC who never, ever want to be a manager but decide they have to be a manager because nobody else is going to be able to do as good as jobs as them". [Youtube ID QplyFXgIx7Q].

Re: 27 years ago, Steve Jobs said the best employees focus on content, not process

#189

Post by kevin_thibedeau »

signatoremo wrote: post #19
smackeyacky wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nobody else got to fail as much as Jobs and kept getting free passes though. I feel like he eventually got smart but he got very, very lucky first. We could all be Jobs level if we had the sandboxes he was gifted in the 1980s Rod Canion from Compaq was always a better CEO

> but he got very, very lucky first. Which period are you referring to? Because he got fired from a company he founded, that’s the ultimate humiliation. It’s hard press to say Jobs was given free passes. Compaq piggybacked on IBM’s success. Not much of vision there, and ended up being swallowed by HP. Apple is the most valuable company today, in large part thanks to Jobs’s vision and execution (iMac, iPod, iPhone, iP…

Getting Woz to design something for Atari he could take credit for was the first free pass.

Re: 27 years ago, Steve Jobs said the best employees focus on content, not process

#190

Post by AdrianB1 »

anonreeeeplor wrote: post #93
whatshisface wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That makes sense until you consider that the world (and any team) is "sprinkled" with a lot more narcissists and know-it-alls than geniuses!

I personally have known several people. They are not narcissists. They are literally 100x talent. One of them built out a half dozen hit games, doing all the art and programming for one employer which represented half the companies profit. Then he left, started a 30 person company, got frustrated, quit and built another game entirely from scratch doing all the art direction and sold millions then retired. One person.

I met a small number of exceptional people. Most were very good people, smart and very passioned and that made them very productive. Unfortunately not all of them were positive additions to the team, one was counterproductive as he was creating a lot of tension and conflict.
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