Below is an article I wrote in conjuction with a class on innovation.  I had forgotten about it until I recieved the above video from internet networkmarketing trainer Mike Klingler at Marketing Merge.  A little off my normal spout but pertinent just the same.  What does it take to make it in internet marketing?  Much the same as any other business.  One factor for sure is tenacity.  Below may be some insight into a billionaires mindset.

Apples, Bombs and Billionaires. What’s a Dent in the Universe got to do with Innovation?

Ok, you got me.  You got me.  As a marketing geek I couldn’t resist pulling some pieces from the text to formulate a headline.  The article I scrubbed is, “Never Settle! Secrets of an Innovator. Apple CEO Steve Jobs exemplifies lifelong learning and creativity.”  I have been a Jobs fan for 20 years so thought an article about one of the undisputed Kings of innovation would prove enlightening.  Alexandra Starr, the author of this piece took a different approach in talking about innovation.  In fact, she didn’t cover was I was hoping for which was a peep into the slight disarray of various synopsis called “his brain”.  While I found it an inspiration I truly would not have had to go further than the headline to realize one of  Steve Jobs “secret”; never settle. 

I like Alexandra’s writing style.  She slammed me in the very beginning with a very cool thing about innovation and Jobs that many may subconsciously realize but most haven’t verbalized. Jobs is a contrarian.  “Don’t waste time living someone else’s life” (1) is wise council to anyone.  Those power packed words were spewed to students at a Stanford commencement address a few years ago.  I love it; I can see parasitic corporate gurus squirming all the way to the sound board to silence his mic lest the wayward independent collegiate get the wrong take on conformity.  Hail the white shirts and red ties! Ok, so maybe that was uncalled for. Truly though,  a great point in that if one must fit into a specific box specific to social moiré’s for business dress where that does leave an open mind for innovation?  Just a thought. 

Failure; Another area common to serial entrepreneurs and to most innovators.  Eddison comes to mind. Two of my favorite Thomas Edison Quotes are, “I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work” and “Many of life’s failures are men who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up.”(2)  So Steve Jobs is a failure?  Yeah right.  But truly at several points in his life he failed.  There is a difference though.  He is not afraid to fail and even after a failure such as getting fired from the company he founded, in this case Apple, he bounced back.  It took some tenacity to continue especially as Nextel really didn’t fly like I am sure he had hoped. Still, Jobs plodded on.  You get the idea, very cool.  To get an overview of the timeline of Jobs and Apple check this out. http://news.cnet.com/2009-1041-6054524.html

The next real point that I grabbed is down a few paragraphs and hidden in the gobbety gook of “inner sensibility”.  Whatever.  Jobs point is you have to have some sort of foundation, true North, from which you can bounce your goals and aspirations.  There has to be a congruency there, something that you can trust in that doesn’t change.  The author seemed to gloss over that point perhaps because she was writing for a “politically correct” editor or she didn’t want to broach one of the deadly sins of non-biased journalism with even a hint of an opinion that could cause a flurry; There is a God.  So with a simple statement one of the potentially more important aspects to Steve Jobs’ incredible insights to innovation was dropped without further testament.  I was left with the question where does he stand spiritually? 

From that juncture I can see the next bullet point in my note taking blitz, commitment to excellence.  Evidently he is a difficult taskmaster according to some research our author found. “Jobs didn’t just cajole and inspire, but also harangued and occasionally abused underlings. In 1993, he nabbed a spot on Fortune magazine’s list of toughest bosses ever.”  (3) But having said that I can also point out that Apple currently ranks number one in its industry for people management according to CNNMoney.com (4).  Perhaps the difference is a “then and now” scenario alluded to further in the article.  Jobs mellowed with age, marriage, and children to become one of the top CEO’s that can inspire creativity and has built a culture of excellence.

As a recap I picked out words that can be used as positive affirmations; driven, committed, visionary, inspirational, determined, just to name a few. I would like to have gotten an inside perspective of what fueled the drive but that was not readily apparent.  Overall though a nice article with some specific take away points that can be used as comparative study.  “Make a dent in the Universe” is a saying Jobs used to encourage his Apple team with, sage advice for all of us contrarians.(5)

References

(1) http://www.aarp.org/aarp/live_and_learn/Cover_Stories/articles/Never_Settle__Secrets_of_an_Innovator.html?CMP=KNC-360I-GOOGLE-LAL&HBX_OU=50&HBX_PK=apple_innovation, para 2

(2) Thomas Edison Quotes, h1 = document.getElementById(“title”).getElementsByTagName(“h1″)[0];h1.innerHTML = widont(h1.innerHTML); By Simran Khurana, About.com, http://quotations.about.com/od/stillmorefamouspeople/a/ThomasEdison3.htm

(3) http://www.aarp.org/aarp/live_and_learn/Cover_Stories/articles/Never_Settle__Secrets_of_an_Innovator.html?CMP=KNC-360I-GOOGLE-LAL&HBX_OU=50&HBX_PK=apple_innovation, para 20
(4) http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/mostadmired/2008/snapshots/670.htmlJobs, Standford Commencement
(5) http://www.aarp.org/aarp/live_and_learn/Cover_Stories/articles/Never_Settle__Secrets_of_an_Innovator.html?CMP=KNC-360I-GOOGLE-LAL&HBX_OU=50&HBX_PK=apple_innovation