Ask HN: Boss with Steve Jobs Complex

I worked with a guy as a contractor where he swears he was a Steve Jobs. Realistically, all he was is a guy with lots of ideas and no follow thru. So he wasn't a Steve Jobs at all and most all his visions totally violated good design principles. When I would point that out he would say because his thoughts were visionary and not yet known.

Yea, and I fart unicorns dancing and rainbows.

In the end, you have to evaluate for yourself, but in general if people don't have a loyal following, but expect that type of respect they are no Steve jobs. I have had some AMAZING leaders, and they inspired us to do great things. They would never spend only 4 hours on a project they believed in, and they would expect more from us. I am not saying you should quit tomorrow, but I personally refuse to help feed anyones ego like this.

And I am sorry, the idea of just doing it without getting some design guidance seems really stupid. I know the stuff we read about Jobs says he didn't need mock ups etc, but I totally think that is BS. He was a smart ass guy who likely had tons of mock ups before he ever said go to the next step. Reading his book, he commissioned projects and prototypes that showed design but weren't yet functional (IIRC), so no that isn't a Jobs type mentality, that is a God mentality and is just idiotic.

BTW no real leader publicly humiliates his team, it is counter productive. Yes some great visionaries have done it, but in todays world we know that is a bad idea and to nurture not humiliate people, so its just BS. BUT that doesn't mean you don't push them hard (which can be a fine line) and demand better from everyone.

My experience: you wind up constantly iterating, hoping for small "wins" - where the expectations of your PM matches something you've produced. But these are far and few in-between.

You need world-class people who've lead projects to save and push things forward. The success of the project depends on whether you have someone on the team who's willing to stand up and push their own vision, and whether your PM is willing to budge. You WILL have to do mockups to some fidelity, just realize that your PM won't appreciate the work and the complexity that goes into it.

So yeah, his method is not _that_ wrong. But there's a catch: in the beginning he was really interesting in pico-iterations. So not only I was doing, but every hour or so we were discussing what the screen looked like, going to the lengths of adding fake buttons that did not do anything, but helped to reason about the application.

After few years (you read it right), we no longer needed to talk a lot about what the company needed. Usually he would point to a problem to be solved, what he would like to see, and the development team managed to fill the gaps.

More recently, in another company with another boss, at a certain point she appraised the team for not really having to fill the gaps of understanding for the team: she spit a vision and we do it in our way. Every iteration she validates it, and of course ask for changes. Pretty average.

I think the real problem in your case is the attitude : public scolding and humiliation. For this, I have two alternatives.

If you are vested with stocks or somehow protected by some strong contract, and believe in the idea, the solution is to bark back. Abusive behavior are always multiplied by lack of balance and checks.

If you are just a developer, with zero personal benefits than compensation, the solution to your problem is quitting. Suddenly. Even if you do not have another job in sight.

The reason of this sudden quit is to ensure you halt the damage to you well being while staying in this company. The damage is and will be there: days you don't feel like working, arriving very late and leaving very soon, avoid opportunities, apathetic feedback when approached by people etc etc. In the right intensity, even depression. (well if you're in US you might want to actually get depressed and ask for compensation in court. Probably will give you more money).

Good luck.