Steve Jobs - Leadership Style

LEADERSHIP LESSONS DRAWN FROM STEVE JOBS CASE STUDY IIM Lucknow – Noida / WMP-Group 2 –B / Presentation by / Anuvinder Chauhan

Agenda 2

WMP 2012-2015 Group2

Speaker

Time Start Time:0 Summarized View – Steve Jobs Leadership Styles Implications Limitations

Conclusions

End Time: 25min

But before we go further ? 3



Leadership Who are Effective Leaders ? is easily confused with

status, title, charisma or celebrity.  Model desired behaviors But more than 25 years of research and practical experience  Unite colleagues through common vision have shown that true leadership effective leadership - is based on  Challenge existing processes a shift in thinking and a set of  Empower employees behaviors' that can be learned, practiced and improved  Open and genuine  Focused

 Promote

open communication

Snapshot 4

Steve Jobs cofounded Apple in his parents’ garage in 1976, was ousted in 1985, returned to rescue it from near bankruptcy in 1997, and by the time he died, in October 2011, had built it into the world’s most valuable company. Along the way he helped to transform seven industries: personal computing, animated movies, music, phones, tablet computing, retail stores, and digital publishing.

He and Apple had had a string of hits over the past dozen years that was greater than that of any other innovative company in modern times: iMac, iPod, iPod nano, iTunes Store, Apple Stores, MacBook, iPhone, iPad, App Store, OS X Lion—not to mention every Pixar film. And as he battled his final illness, Jobs was surrounded by an intensely loyal cadre of colleagues who had been inspired by him for years and a very loving wife, sister, and four children

Jobs Leadership Strengths 5

Strengths led to the journey from Blue Boxes to Apple

Personality Traits 6  

Courage Passionate and Enthusiastic  

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Internal locus of control is applicable to Steve Jobs b’coz people with internal locus of control believe that their personal actions directly effect the outcome of the event

Emotional Intelligence 

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He was a micro manager and possessed a high degree of passion for his work Clear vision and goals to energize and motivate apple employees

Locus of control 

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Reality Distortion Field

Lack empathy towards his employees

Control 

He degraded a considerable authority to the teams but he also established strict timetables and challenging stretched goals “..my job is not to be easy with people, but to make them better..”

Memorable quotes reflective of his beliefs 7

Push for perfection – ―We’re all going to have to work nights and weekends, and if you all want, we can hand out some guns so you can

Self Actualization – Business and

Intense desire to change the world

kill us now‖

engineering aspect of his personality complemented by a hippie nonconformist side

Put Products before Profits

Focus & Simplification

Composite Leadership Styles 8

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Transactional Leadership style  Emphasizes

getting things done within the umbrella of the status quo  Performance based reward systems 

Transformational Leadership style  Facilitate

multiple levels of transformation  Alignment of vision and core values with a unified purpose  Creates and sustains a context that maximizes human and organizational capabilities

- Implications 9

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Doesn’t bring out the best in people Driven by top management Little understanding about the needs of enterprise customers Presumption – the customer is wrong Abnormal working hours Inward focus

“Reportedly, employees working at Cupertino, CA headquarters even avoided getting into elevators with him lest they be fired by the time the ride ended. And Apple colleagues have described his assessment of employees as the “hero or shithead roller coaster” and where anyone was on that roller coaster could shift in a nanosecond “

Limitations - Limitations 10

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Impatience, relentless quest for perfection Dominant presence, and obsessive need to control He had over 100 direct reports “The controlling obsession was reflected to the extent that he ensured that there is no provision of expansion slot to add new features while developing Macintosh. Also, ensuring that the Mac can only be opened by Mac engineers using specialized tools” 

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Outspoken 

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Raised as much fear within the Apple culture as it did admiration and respect for his genius Exhibited stormy and abusive behavior

Jobs’s tantrums, maniacal pressure to realize his visions, and evangelistic oratory could embolden others’ best efforts but there were people costs within the culture as well. 

the human resources dimension of leadership was never a focus for Jobs

Conclusions 11

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Steve was both a Transactional and a Transformational Leader 

He was a composite Leader in an extreme way, someone to be both greatly feared and greatly admired and we all believe that his rare blend of the charismatic and tyrannical has been the key to Apple success.

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Also, the embodiment of both these qualities to the extreme degree was evidenced in Steve is rare in other Leaders, perhaps we as team now believe ― how this bundle of conflicting behavior can coexist in Steve Jobs ( in a single human being )

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We believe that Transformational leadership is an extension of transactional leadership As per our study , we advise organization should maintain base of transactional leadership while moving their organizational culture towards one of Transformational qualities.

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Takeaways 12

S.No

Topics

What Steve’s exhibited

Application for other leaders

For effective leadership

1

Persuasion of bold ideas

Organizations must have the patience, courage, and foresight to encourage, provide resources, and remove barriers to pursue and realize break-out ideas. Don’t push ideas at the expense of forming and maintaining relationships with key stakeholders

2

Ego Maniac

Leaders need to restrain caution, efforts needs to be fundamentally channeled in the service of making organizations successful

3

Don’t confuse activity with results

4

The 3 Rs (right people, right jobs and right conditions)

Strong leaders ensure that the right people are in the right jobs and that the right conditions have been created for them to succeed. 1R-Getting the people right

5

Truth Telling

Don’t tolerate mediocre ideas, and be willing to take decisive action when people are not cutting it in their assigned roles. Avoid excessive negative feedback that gets personal

6

Communication

Provide frequent and intensely motivational communication about compelling objectives, and the importance of speed to market. and/or failure to help employees see their place in the journey leaves workers uninspired and lost.

People will feel trampled, unnecessarily stressed, pushed beyond what is reasonable, neglected, or otherwise dehumanized in the name of achieving results.

Steve as Transactional Leader 13

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Quickly judging and categorizing employees as genius or bozos and quickly firing those who fall in the latter camp. 

Fear and reprisal tactics are not the tactics of the transformational leaders

As per the Stanford research on Steve jobs he was almost right and even when he was wrong, he creatively connect to almost right  Control freak 

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Steve as Transformational Leader 

His power of persuasion, qualities defines him a charismatic leader

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On his comeback to Apple, he inspired that all employees are actually going to change the world and hence justified 90 hr. a week ( U.S and not India)

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He also believe in their own vision , and his genuine enthusiasm is tangible and transfers easily to others – A Transformational Leader.

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As Charismatic leader – He aligned himself with his Macintosh team by describing them with attributes he personally imbibed, he described them as poets, musician, artists zoologists who happened to the best computer engineers, sometimes he does it with his clothes He uses impression management as a strategy to project himself as morally worthy and exemplary , thus differencing himself enough to warrant his leadership. ―on his return to Apple he stated that Sculley destroyed the company he had spent

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Thanks

Varying Leadership Style 17



Factors that influence which leadership style to use.  The

manager’s personal background

 What

personality, knowledge, values, ethics and experience does the manager possess

 Staff 

The style will vary depending upon the individual staff.

 The 

being supervised

organization

the traditions, values, philosophy, and concerns of the organizations influence how a manager acts

Determining the Best Leadership Style 18

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Should leaders be more task or relationship oriented  Leaders

have a dominant style, one they use in a wide variety of situations  No one best style – leaders must adjust their leadership style to the situations according to the people being led  Many different aspects to being a great leader – a role requiring one to play many different leadership styles to be successful