Like many other corporations across America who benefit daily from the technology that he helped create, we were saddened to hear of the passing of Apple founder Steve Jobs.
As a foremost visionary, he led a mobile computer revolution with the creation of popular devices such as the iMac computer, iPod portable music player, the iPhone and the iPad tablet – all of which changed how digital content is consumed.
But in addition to teaching us better ways on how to use and implement modern technology, Steve Jobs will be remembered for teaching the world some hard-hitting lessons about the realities of life.
He Wasn’t Afraid Of Rejection
Steve Jobs was given away by his biological mother as a newborn infant and adopted by an Armenian family living in California. Later in his career, Jobs was ousted as the CEO from Apple by the very same Board of Directors that he brought in to help the company expand.
But despite these two life-changing forms of rejection, he didn’t let these setbacks get to him. Rather, he took an optimistic approach to it all. In fact, Jobs claimed that being fired from Apple was the best thing that could have happened to him.
“The heaviness of being successful was replaced by the lightness of being a beginner again, less sure about everything,” he said. “It freed me to enter one of the most creative periods of my life.”
He Believed In Following His Dream
Jobs gained a reputation as a driven and stubborn person who oversaw almost every detail of Apple’s products and rejected prototypes that didn’t meet his exacting standards.
But that wasn’t because he was a nasty human being; it was because he was brave enough to think differently, bold enough to believe he could change the world, and strong enough to follow his dream all the way through, despite the criticism and scoffing of naysayers.
His far-reaching visions created industries that many thought would never exist, including the iPod and iTunes which radically transformed the consumer electronics and music distribution industry; and the iPhone which completely changed the way consumers interacted with mobile phone devices.
He Didn’t Concede To Failure
The life of Steve Jobs life was marked by many successes – and numerous failures as well.
He enrolled in Reed College in Portland in 1972 but dropped out after six months. He was thrown out of Apple during the 1980s. His following venture, a pricey computing system called the NeXT Workstation, never caught on with consumers. His personal life was also fraught with failures including a divorce, a liver transplant and the lengthy battle with pancreatic cancer that ultimately claimed his life.
But despite it all, Steve Jobs forged ahead with his chin up and never let the failures of life extinguish his spirits. He went on to build the revolutionary Apple empire that has permanently changed modern technology and the world we live in.
What We Can Learn From Him
“Those of us who have been fortunate enough to know and work with Steve have lost a dear friend and an inspiring mentor.” Apple said in a statement on its corporate website.
As for the rest of us in the world of small business, we’ve lost a person who has shown what it means to make the most of every situation and utilize complex challenges to achieve the highest pinnacles of success.
Think different,
Meny Hoffman
