The Second Coming of Steve Jobs - Alan Deutschman [105]
Steve’s old Next colleague, Todd Rulon-Miller, telephoned and congratulated him.
Steve was silent on the other end of the line, which Todd took as a signal that Steve was enjoying the praise and wanted it to continue for a while.
“What’s your goal?” Todd asked.
“To match Compaq’s ship rate,” Steve said. Compaq was the No. 1 manufacturer of personal computers, and it sold several times as many as Apple did.
Steve wasn’t complacent with his saving a struggling company.
He wanted to be No. 1.
• • •
THAT MONTH, Laurene gave birth to Eve, Steve’s fourth child.
When Steve’s career was at a low only four years earlier, he spent more of his time at home with his family and he seemed to mellow somewhat and to become humbler and more mature. Now that he was at another professional high, even the arrival of a new baby couldn’t temper his egomania at work and his profane, abusive treatment of his employees.
Jeff Cooke had a sense of excitement when Steve recruited him away from a fifteen-year career at Hewlett-Packard to become Apple’s vice president of customer service and support. Jeff had used Apples since he was a college student in the late 1970s and had long admired Steve’s accomplishments. When a headhunter called and promised an interview with Steve, Jeff thought that at the very least it was a chance to meet a legendary figure.
Steve showed up for the interview in shorts and sandals. He hadn’t shaved in several days. Stains from a fruit smoothie were streaked over the belly of his black shirt. But no matter how slovenly he looked, Steve was charismatic and engaging as soon as he began describing his vision for the future of the personal computer. He said that the PC was only just at the beginning of the impact it could have on society, but to get the rest of the world to use it, the machines had to be cute and pleasant and as easy to use as a toaster.
Jeff was excited by Steve’s talk and the idea of working together with the great man. He interviewed with the other members of Apple’s executive team, who all seemed confident and enthusiastic. And Apple offered the chance to make a lot of money in a very short time, mainly from stock awards and bonuses tied to achieving certain milestones.
Jeff took the job.
From his first week at Apple, the shocks began. At HP, Jeff had been used to coming up with his own ideas and running with them. At Apple, he found that Steve had to approve every decision. Nothing could be done without Steve’s green light. Steve wanted to be the one who came up with the plans, and he wanted the others to be implementers.
At Jeff’s first meeting with his team, Steve walked into the room and said: “Everybody in service and support is fucking brain dead.”
Jeff was taken aback but he thought to himself: this guy is a genius, he must know what he’s doing, so just watch.
Steve went into a tirade about how Apple’s service and support was the laughingstock of the industry. “It’s up to you to prove me wrong,” he said. Then he slammed the door and left.
“I don’t know about you, but I found that highly motivating,” said one of the managers with a tone of heavy irony.
Jeff had trouble reconciling Steve’s bullying and intimidation on the job with the image of the charming “perfect gentleman” that Steve had presented in the job interview.
At another meeting of Jeff’s department, Steve walked into the room and danced around, waving his arms in the air pompously in an imitation of Gil Amelio.
“I have arrived, I am Gil, and I am fat!” Steve said.
It was a funny display, implying a lighthearted tone for the meeting, Jeff thought.
Then all of a sudden Steve went to the head of the table and said: “Service in this company is all fucked up and the people running