How Steve Jobs Helped Guarantee Tim Cook’s Success At Apple

Jobs’ lack of management skills was a big part of why Apple’s board forced him out, although there were other issues that caused this rift. History shows that removing Jobs at that time, was the right decision.

When he started NeXT, his management style was still confrontational. However, towards the end when it became clear that his vision for NeXT would not be successful, his management style calmed down significantly. A few friends who worked for NeXT until its demise have told me that in a way, Jobs’ was humbled by this defeat, and believed he learned some serious life lessons he would need in his second career at Apple.

When Jobs came back to Apple as iCEO or interim CEO as he called it in 1997, I met with him on his second day in charge of his old company. We talked about what he would do to save Apple, which included going back and taking care of their core customers as well as putting a big emphasis on industrial design. I had interacted directly with Jobs since 1982, but the 1997 Jobs was very different compared to the one I knew when he was last at Apple. He clearly had matured and had a much calmer demeanor. He seemed to be more focused.

I remember walking away from that meeting shaking my head and questioning who was the guy I just met with at Apple HQ. He was 100% different than the last time he and I had met in person in 1988.

It turned out that one of the life lessons Jobs learned while he was in his wilderness period at NeXT and the years between the closing of NeXT and going back to Apple, was the importance of mentoring and preparing his management team to be less dependent on him. While at Apple in the early days, he micromanaged just about everything related to running the company.

However, when he returned to Apple, he was more willing to delegate responsibility, and more importantly, learned to rely on and trust his top managers.

One particular manager he leaned on was Tim Cook.