Steve Jobs – By Walter Isaacson

Steve Jobs is a biography about Apple founder (Apple is an American multinational technology company) Steve Jobs. Everything Steve Jobs did was always with perfection so he wanted only Walter Issacson to write his biography, and was behind him to convince to write his biography until he said yes. Steve Jobs ensured to share every aspects of his life from his birth to his death with upmost transparency so world can know his true personality.

Steve Jobs was not an easy man, not at all but he saw the world the way not anyone could see. And that’s the reason behind Apple’s success. His behavior with his employees, colleagues was miserable at some point but he knew how to get the best out of the person. He dealt with people very well to get the work done. His vision was sometimes unrealistic but he mesmerized people and made them believe in his vision, people called it “His reality distortion field”. By using his reality distortion field, he was always pushing his team to come up with higher projections.

Steve Jobs was born in 1955 and was abandoned by his real parents and was adopted by Clara and Paul Jobs. The reason behind his cold personality was the reason of knowing being abandoned by his real parents somehow. But for him Clara and Paul were only his parents. He went to Reed college and dropped out. Steve Jobs was a very spiritual person and to find the secret of life he visited India to meet monk who could give him the wisdom about life. He started Apple with Woznaik and became billionaire in his 20s. When he thought it’s time to enjoy in his 30s, he is thrown out of his own company, Apple. He started new company NeXT and he also helped to develop visual effects industry when he funded in Pixar. Jobs returned to apple and became CEO after the acquisitions of NeXT with Apple. He was the reason behind reviving apple from bankruptcy in 1997. After his come back he developed many revolutionary products.

This book gives details about the journey of Apple, the journey of Steve Jobs as a leader and it was not always the good sides but both good and bad. This book also gives details about his personal life and his health related issues, his spiritual beliefs, and his family life.

Why should you read this book?

1. Every aspiring entrepreneur should read this book.
2. It provides every little details about Steve Jobs as a leader.
3. To learn the journey and success story of Apple.
4. To learn about the risks Steve Jobs has taken.
5. To learn the vision of apple as a company and how Steve had converted Apple into public company and multinationals.
6. To learn about Steve’s attention to every little details from every department in the company.
7. To learn about Steve’s marketing strategies which played important role in the success of the company.
8. To learn Steve’s vision about making product simple and user friendly which sometimes gave hard times to his team.
9. To learn Steve’s’ passion for creating.
10. To learn about getting best out of people.
11. To learn Steve’s stage presence at time of new product launch, his mesmerizing personality!
12. To learn about the grand unveiling of Apple’s new products.
13. To learn about so many creative, intelligent people Steve met and worked with.
14. To learn about getting only the best people in his team.
15. To learn about Simplification to everything.
16. To Believe in your vision as Steve jobs did and make the world believe in.

What I learnt from Steve Jobs.

1. Believe in your dreams and make the world believe in by working hard.
2. Simplification is the ultimate sophistication.
3. To be truly simple, you have to go really deep.
4. The spiritual aspect plays an important part in your life, it helps you to grow.
5. Give attention to every little details of your work even if it’s unseen to the world.
6. Be precise what you want.
7. Focus on your first three priorities.
8. Less is more.
9. Great art stretches the taste, it doesn’t follow tastes.
10. Your product should be user friendly.
11. Invest in only best people to get the best result.
12. You can start at any age, at any time if you are passionate about your work.
13. People do judge book by its cover, so make sure you present your work best way possible.
14. Listen to your intuitions.
15. You have to be rebellious and willful to keep following your dreams.

Interesting Facts About Steve Jobs

1. Steve jobs always parked his car to the handicapped parking space. According to him rules don’t apply to him.
2. Steve Jobs’ house in Cupertino was almost empty. He was such a perfectionist that he had trouble buying furniture.
3. During arguments Steve Jobs gets too emotional that he starts crying.
4. Steve Jobs was so sensitive so he knew exactly how to hurt people.
5. Steve Jobs had hundreds of black turtlenecks t-shirt designed by Issey Miyake which he started using as his 24/7 attire. The reason behind it was daily convenience and ability to convey a signature style.
6. Steve Jobs has been awarded over 140 patent since he died in 2011.
7. Steve Jobs would stare people with a burning and wound intensity during discussion or argument until he/she got scared or uncomfortable or loss of words.
8. There is no one who did not fall to “his reality distortion field” and always got successed in mesmerizing people.
9. Steve jobs had paid 100,000 dollars over a logo of NeXT.
10. Steve Jobs got his team redo the title bar atop windows and documents twenty times before he was happy.
11. Steve Jobs got his team redo the packaging of Macintosh fifty times before he was happy.
12. Steve Jobs got the production unit painted in all white.
13. When one very early didn’t voice opinions, Steve Jobs would mow him/her down. He takes contrary positions to create more discussion, because it may lead to better result. So if one doesn’t feel comfortable disagreeing, then he/she will never survive.
14. When the design for Macintosh was finally locked in, Jobs called the Macintosh team together and had all of them sign their name on a paper sheet. And these signatures were engraved inside each Macintosh. No-one would ever see them, but the members of the team knew that their signatures were inside. He believed that real artists sign their work and for him his team were real artists.
15. Steve Jobs was the first to provide users with a wide assortment of digital fonts to choose from. He was the first to give users the real choice of fonts, he introduced typefaces designs in computer.

Reading and knowing about people who did revolutionary things in his/her lifetime makes you believe you can too do anything and everything what your heart desires. The journey will start with you taking first step. And their learnings, experiences and knowledge helps you in making decisions in your life. We always should read or try to know about people who followed their hearts, lived their dreams and made a difference in this world, the story will always inspire.