Assignment task:
Steve Jobs has been one of the most inspirational role models whom many has regarded as an icon of visionary, innovator, and a genius (Beheshti, 2019). According to Mike Slade, Strategic advisor to Steve Jobs, market shares and market forces did not particularly concerned Steve Jobs as he was more concerned with how much he accomplished. Steve Jobs was asked to step down in 1985 by Apple's board of directors due to a power struggle with John Sculley. The board of directors favoured John's proposal to price the Macintosh at a higher price to cover Apple's research and previous losses (Mohamed, 2022).
Apple's conventional structure of divisional business units was based on its company's capacity and the nature of its work setting (Podolny & Hansen, 2022 Steve Job's management style was seen as an authoritative, vertical, top-down approach (Verganti, 2014) which mirrors that to a projectised organisational structure. Being a visionary, Steve Jobs had been known to micromanage his people in areas of product design and marketing to accomplish his vision (Henson, 2011), attention to details, perfectionism and to have full control over his people. Leaders with such authority give direction and vision; they approach tasks and objectives with assurance. As their team members work toward the objectives of the company, they provide them with clear guidance and helpful criticism based on their clear picture of what success looks like. With this style of organisation, business units are empowered to perform the best with the skillsets in their respective fields albeit compromising on some of the employee's great ideas. Steve Jobs believed that "good ideas can kill productivity". His emphasis was having the courage to reject 1,000 great ideas to focus on achieving one major goal, even if doing so would anger some people in the process (Mejia, 2018).
As an authoritative leader, Steve Jobs brought clarity and transparency to the team. He is successful because of his capacity to influence, inspire, and encourage his team. This drive frequently results from their capacity to comprehend and effectively explain a company's strategic aims. It is simple to make sure everyone is on the same page when everyone is aware of what the company is trying to achieve. There were clear directions to the team members in which organisational objectives and line of responsibility are clearly defined (Alexander et al., 2019).
Apple's Macintosh development team lead by Steve Jobs become its own entity and this led to friction between the team and the rest of the organisation. When the team experienced such rifts in divisions, it is more difficult to achieve the project's goals. This caused tension and created disparities in the organisation because of the stark difference in special treatment given to Job's team. This, however, creates a psychological mechanism in encouraging staff to be competitive and performing their best. Despite him being called a tyrannical leader and an autocratic one, he was able to build powerful teams and encouraged the greatest ideas and instil a sense of loyalty in its employees. He had ingrained the staff to think differently, which was what made the Apple culture so successful at delivering innovative, and creative products (Allworth et al., 2014).
Apple's market shares and profitability fell dramatically without Steve Jobs (Doll, 2022). Upon his return as Apple's CEO in 1998, and due to his belief that conventional management hampered innovation, Steve Jobs fired his general managers from all the business units and consolidated these divisions into one functional organisation. The fundamental issue faced by Apple at that time was that the exciting works done by its engineers led the company into many different directions. He focused on its core competencies and trimmed Apple's expanding product line-up to address the problem. The heads of Apple's product divisions have less competition for resources than those of many other significant businesses. Furthermore, the internet behemoth may overlook short-term financial goals while creating new products that need significant investments due to its functional organizational structure (Dudovskiy, 2021).
Steve Jobs was ousted due to a power struggle and a boardroom coup which failed. His personal temperament, arrogance and being a perfectionist trait was the epitome of his leadership style. However, uniquely, Apple's success to date through its innovative culture that Steve Jobs has inculcated through the fabrics of its organisation structure is the testament to Apple's success to date.
Question based on the reply to the article:
Q1. Did the reply provide enough explanation to help you understand their point(s) of view?
Q2. Did they provide strong evidence to support their viewpoint(s)?
Q3. What argument(s) or counter-argument(s) could you use to respond to their position(s)?
Q4. Does all this make sense together?
Q5. Have you ever considered the same views? Are you agreeable to their position(s)?