A Tribute to an Icon: Steve Jobs

I can’t think of writing something about Steve Jobs that the world already doesn’t know. He was a visionary, a force to be reckoned with as he said once, "Nobody has tried to swallow us since I've been here. I think they are afraid how we would taste." (ref At the annual Apple shareholder meeting (22 April 1998).

 He was a man that believed, pursued and materialized his ideas. Each time he gave the world something unique that became a necessity in every man’s life as soon as it hit the market. He never gave what consumers wanted or demanded and never believed in Think Tanks but always made something the consumers would later get addicted to. He was a leader and his products led the world.


He always wore simple clothes, a black turtle-neck to most of his conventions but the impact was tremendous. He just didn’t wear brand names to make impressions…..He himself was an impressive figure. He was a minimalist. His home had just enough furniture for use but evident of his good taste. A friend notes how Steve loved being ‘simple’ with an unmistakable eye for aesthetics. His aim was to be simple yet pleasing to the eye but at the same time sophisticated in application; something he infused in the Apple brand all along. “We’ve gone through the operating system and looked at everything and asked how can we simplify this and make it more powerful at the same time.” – ABC News, Jobs on Mac OS X Beta

At the company, they cared not for competition or to be rich but to lead. In “Being the richest man in the cemetery doesn’t matter to me … Going to bed at night saying we’ve done something wonderful… that’s what matters to me.” –  The Wall Street Journal (Summer 1993).

He was a difficult boss always demanding perfection in all stages of the product from conception to completion. He made sure every employee was pushing ahead of themselves.  He admitted he was tough. “My job is not to be easy on people. My jobs is to take these great people we have and to push them and make them even better.” Talking to CNNMon he said, “I mean, some people say, ‘Oh, God, if [Jobs] got run over by a bus, Apple would be in trouble.’ And, you know, I think it wouldn’t be a party, but there are really capable people at Apple. My job is to make the whole executive team good enough to be successors, so that’s what I try to do.”

Steve went through some tough episodes in his life. But he always referred to each episode as a dot that had a pivitol role in shaping his future. He said, “Again, you can't connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards.
So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something — your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life.” (ref: Steve Jobs’ Stanford Commencement Address)

In 2004 he was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. He didn’t slow down or pause his love and dream of innovating.“Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma – which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of other’s opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.” - (ref: Steve Jobs’ Stanford Commencement Address).

Many tributes have flooded the internet via blogs, twitter, facebook, via iphone, ipad etc to pay tributes to this wonderful innovator. One person wrote, “An apple falls to the ground to become a shade-giving tree…”

He will be sorely missed by the entire world. In his own words, Steve once said, “I want to put a ding in the universe.”

He just did…….
May you rest in peace Steve.