One Year Later: Remembering Steve Jobs
I may have come late to the Apple party, but nonetheless I still showed up. I’ve had an iPhone for just under a year now, and every day I interact with this device I see why Apple and more specifically Steve Jobs had legions of fans devoted to its products and just about anything they did. Apple created an experience unlike any other.
When I finally gave up my BlackBerry, and opened that iPhone box for the first time, it felt like I had been reborn. It felt like I had finally been let in to this secret group and this party that had existed for a while that I had missed out on. The funny thing is, I’m not the only one who feels like that. Most new Apple converts get the same exact feeling.
So how do you explain how Apple is able to achieve this? Recent missteps aside with the maps app on the iPhone 5, Apple has achieved something that no other company that I can think of ever has.
Millions will wait in line for days for a phone they can walk into a store and get the very next week. The media hangs on every word and every announcement that comes out of Cupertino.
So how do you explain it? Apple has the same access to the same resources and the same talent that any other company has. The answer is really simple. They focused on their Why.
The reason they and Steve Jobs got out of bed every morning was to literally change the world, and they never lost site of that. They did this by keeping things simple and focusing in on those legions of fans and early adopters that would literally go to war for Apple if they had to.
They didn’t try to sell to everyone who needed what they had. They sold to the individuals who believed in what they were doing. The more Apple and Steve Jobs talked about what he believed in, the more they attracted those that held the same beliefs and you have one of the most successful companies in American history.
As I sit here, I feel a little cheated because I didn’t get to know Steve Jobs the way many others did. I was late to the party. However, his legacy continues to live on. I once read that Steve Jobs had the ability to paint a picture of a future so bright that you could literally touch and feel it.
As I remember Steve Jobs in my own way, that is what we should all be challenged to do. Make a difference in at least one person’s life and paint a picture so bright that someone else can feel it and be a part of your vision. We lost a great visionary, but we can all inspire others and be a visionary to those that are around us.
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October 5, 2012
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