Return to the Little Kingdom_ Steve Jobs and the Creation of Apple - Michael Moritz [5]
At the front of the group, sitting on the edge of a steel table, was a tall, slight figure in his late twenties. He was dressed in a checked shirt, bleached jeans, and scuffed running shoes. A slim digital watch ran around his left wrist. His long, delicate fingers had nails that were chewed to the quick, while glossy black hair was carefully shaped and sideburns crisply trimmed. He blinked a pair of deep, brown eyes as though his contact lenses were stinging. He had a pale complexion and a face divided by a thin, angular nose. The left side was soft and mischievous while the right had a cruel, sullen tint. He was Steven Jobs, chairman and co-founder of Apple Computer and general manager of the Macintosh Division.
The group waiting for Jobs to speak worked for Apple’s youngest division. They had been bused from the company’s headquarters in Cupertino, California, across a range of pine-covered hills for a two-day retreat at a resort built for weekenders on the edge of the Pacific. Sleeping quarters were wooden condominiums with stiff-necked chimneys. The wood had been bleached gray by the wind and the spray and the buildings were set among sand dunes and spiky grass. Collected together in the clear morning light, the group formed the footloose confection typical of a young computer company. Some were secretaries and laboratory technicians. A few were hardware and software engineers. Others worked in marketing, manufacturing, finance, and personnel. A couple wrote instruction manuals. Some had recently joined Apple and were meeting their colleagues for the first time. Others had transferred from a division called Personal Computer Systems, which made the Apple II and Apple III computers. A few had once worked for the Personal Office Systems Division, which was preparing to introduce a machine called Lisa that Apple intended to sell to businesses. The Macintosh Division was sometimes called Mac but the lack of an official-sounding name reflected its uncertain birth. For the computer code-named Mac was, in some ways, a corporate orphan.
Jobs began speaking quietly and slowly. “This,” he said, “is the cream of Apple. We have the best people here and we must do something that most of us have never done: We have never shipped a product.” He walked with a springy step to an easel and pointed to some plain mottos written in a childish hand on large, creamy sheets of paper. These he converted into homilies. “It’s Not Done Until It Ships,” he read. “We have zillions and zillions of details to work out. Six months ago nobody believed we could do it. Now they believe we can. We know they’re going to sell a bunch of Lisas but the future of Apple is Mac.” He folded back one of the sheets of paper, pointed to the next slogan, and read: “Don’t Compromise.” He mentioned the introduction date planned for the computer and said, “It would be better to miss than to turn out the wrong thing.” He paused and added, “But we’re not going to miss.” He flipped another page, announced, “The Journey Is the Reward,” and predicted, “Five years from now you’ll look back on these times and say, ‘Those were the good old days.’ You know,” he mulled in a voice that rose half an octave, “this is the nicest place in Apple to work. It’s just like Apple was three years ago. If we keep this kind of pure and hire the right people, it’ll still be a great place to work.”
Jobs pulled a torn white plastic bag along the table, dangled it by his knee, and asked in the tone of someone who knows what the answer will be: “Do you want to see something neat?” An object that looked like a desk diary slipped from the plastic bag. The case was covered in brown felt and fell open to reveal a mock-up of a computer. A screen occupied one half and a typewriter keyboard