

Why Founders Should Emulate Wozniak, Not Jobs - trevor99
http://trevorowens.tumblr.com/post/12432238865/why-founders-should-emulate-wozniak-not-jobs

======
pg
Sadly, this is not one of the honeypots Wesley Tansey recently suggested I set
up ([http://www.nashcoding.com/2011/10/28/hackernews-needs-
honeyp...](http://www.nashcoding.com/2011/10/28/hackernews-needs-honeypots/)).

As someone who has seen dozens of Woz-founder-only startups march into the
meatgrinder of obscurity, I can tell you that if you have to be one or the
other, you're better off being Jobs.

Not that you have much choice about it though. If you're a natural Jobs you're
not going to have much luck trying to turn yourself into a Woz. And vice
versa.

More generally, I'm tired of these articles where people make up a straw man
version of Steve Jobs and then attack him. I feel like I know more about Jobs
than nearly everyone who writes this stuff, and I don't feel confident making
generalizations about his character.

~~~
trevor99
Thanks pg.

My intent was not to bash Jobs, quite the opposite as I called him "one of the
best CEOs ever to live" in the conclusion.

My goal is to reflect on what skills are really important in an early startup.
The Apple II wasn't a success because of Jobs's leadership or because of his
design focus like with the iPhone. Founders don't think about Markkula's role
in getting the Apple II mainstream. Furthermore, Jobs had to fail over and
over, wasting millions of dollars, before he tamed his bad habits and realized
what would work. Then again, I only know what I'm talking about from reading
Isaacson's biography and doing my own research. Thought this would make an
interesting discussion.

~~~
comedian
"I've missed more than 9000 shots in my career. I've lost almost 300 games.
Twenty-six times I've been trusted to take the game winning shot and missed.
I've failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I
succeed."

-Michael Jordan

~~~
redthrowaway
Was he the one who actually came up with that? It sounds suspiciously like
Nike ad copy. In fact, it would make a very _good_ Nike ad.

~~~
jimbokun
Yep.

<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=45mMioJ5szc>

------
dporan

      Steve Jobs played a minor role in Apple’s early success with the Apple II
    

I disagree. Here's what Isaacson writes (p. 73):

 _If it had not been for Jobs, [Wozniak] might still be handing out schematics
of his boards for free at the back of Homebrew meetings. It was Jobs who had
turned his ingenious designs into a budding business, just as he had with the
Blue Box . . . . To make the Apple II successful required more than just
Wozniak's awesome circuit design. It would need to be packaged into a fully
integrated consumer product, and that was Jobs's role._

For all of his foibles, Jobs was the quintessential founder, relentlessly
pushing the business forward -- recruiting great team members, signing up
investors, and polishing the product for a mass audience.

~~~
trevor99
I noted that Jobs's hustling was important. His product vision, design
aesthetic, and RDF were not, which is where most founders go wrong.

Not sure you read the book carefully--many investors laughed in Jobs's face
not because it was a bad idea, but because he had BO and they couldn't stand
him.

Also--Steve was lucky to be Wozniak's best friend, whom most talented
engineers came to Apple because of. Mike Scott (the CEO of Apple since it
launched the Apple II) is the person who built the team, not Jobs.

~~~
ez77
What's BO?

~~~
jwn
In the first half of the biography, it's mentioned numerous times that due to
his fruitarian diet, Jobs believed that he rarely needed to bathe.

------
ryandvm
This shit is beyond absurd.

How can anybody write an article with a straight face suggesting that you
should emulate any of these people who were notable chiefly because they
emulated no one?

Can we get special flagging functionality to deal with this personality cult
bullshit?

~~~
captainaj
second that

------
bradleyland
I cannot understand how you could read this biography and arrive at the
conclusion that any one person should be "emulated". What I took away was that
all components of Apple's success were mutually inclusive. It's unlikely that
it could have happened any other way. You can pick a thousand points along the
line wherein the events might have not come together as they did, and you do
not end up with the Apple that exists today.

I don't seek to "emulate" Jobs. I look at his life, and I hope to learn from
his mistakes, as well as his successes. You should do the same from Wozniak's
life. Likewise with your family and other mentors.

Reading "Steve Jobs" reminded me of reading Watchmen because he is often cast
as the "American Entrepreneurial Hero". But underneath, Steve Jobs was as
deeply flawed as any of us, and that is the truth of our humanity. None of us
are perfect, yet we are all capable of greatness.

~~~
trevor99
Article is just trying to expel the misconceptions around Jobs and say that
brilliant engineering is more important than design & reality distortion field
in a startup.

~~~
comedian
Woz was the engineering genius. Jobs was the visionary entrepreneur. They both
needed each other.

~~~
trevor99
He was not a visionary entrepreneur, that's the whole point. His vision led
him to create product flops for 20 years. Markkula on the other hand got it
correct with the Apple II from having the right industry knowledge.

~~~
comedian
Let's see. Bill Gates, Warren Buffet, Barack Obama, Bob Iger, Rupert Murdoch,
Michael Dell, Larry Page, Sergey Brin, Steve Spielberg, Michael Bloomberg,
Stephen Wolfram, Jeffrey Katzenberg, Dick Costolo, Steve Case, Marc Andressen,
etc. They all think he's a visionary. Should I believe them or you?

~~~
Sandman
You should believe neither them nor trevor99. Look at the facts and draw your
own conclusions.

~~~
comedian
Thanks for answering my rhetorical question.

------
dy
According to Steve, you shouldn't be emulating anyone - be yourself. You'll
never be a better Steve Jobs than Steve was - or a better Woz than Woz was.

The key thing I got out of the article is how important your co-founder is -
one thing Steve seems to have is that he recognized talent very quickly (Woz,
Ive at the age of 29) and developed them.

~~~
trevor99
Or he just got lucky and was Wozniak's best friend from High School. Which is
the true story.

~~~
keiferski
Ive is much more responsible for Apple's current renaissance than Wozniak.

------
Samuel_Michon
_"Wozniak had no desire to run any part of the company, he just wanted to be a
mid-level engineer (he initially wanted to give plans for the Apple I away for
free)."_

 _"[Jobs] who was mainly given no authority up until this point, was obsessed
with (proving) himself and was able to get an opportunity to lead the
Macintosh team. [...] He grabbed the best engineers from around the company
and put them on the Macintosh team."_

So the only logical conclusion can be that founders should emulate Woz, not
Jobs. Clearly...

------
peteypao
I'm getting tired of these YOU SHOULD EMULATE X INSTEAD OF Y stories...

You should emulate Bill Gates instead of Steve Jobs...

You should emulate Wozniak instead of Jobs...

Who cares?? I would be proud to emulate any of these great men.

~~~
trevor99
Sorry you don't like the title. Article is about the misconceptions
surrounding Jobs.

------
microtherion
Having read the same biography, I came to rather different conclusions: True,
without Wozniak, there wouldn't have been an Apple I and II. However, without
Jobs, the Apple I and II would never have SOLD. A company needs good
engineering AND hustle.

~~~
trevor99
All Jobs did was get Wozniak to quit his job. Markkula was the one who got the
Apple II beyond the hobbyist market which Jobs could never have done.

------
rmason
Take Jobs, Wozniak or Markula out of the picture and Apple fails. You needed a
hustler/product guy, a brilliant engineer and a great business mind for
success.

Jobs legend was created because he built upon his skills. He enhanced his
ability to spot and aquire great talent and learned (the hard way) how to
become a great businessman.

~~~
trevor99
True, but the least important in the mix was Jobs.

~~~
lparry
Take a step back from being the author of this article, take a deep breath,
and read through the whole of this comments page and try to get a feeling for
the big picture.

From an non-vested point of view, I see an article presenting a point of view,
95% of comments disagreeing with the article, and the remaining 5% are you
telling them they're wrong.

It feels like you've got a bit of an axe to grind. You've said your piece, now
it's time to just accept that not everyone (or in fact most hacker news
readers this morning) agrees with you

------
kstenerud
So what I'm hearing is that tenacious Steve failed a bunch of times before he
finally hit one out of the park.

Sounds like an entrepreneur to me.

~~~
trevor99
"Founders today will not have the opportunity to learn the lessons Jobs did
because they don’t have the resources and klout that Jobs had."

Jobs was a millionaire when he failed a bunch of times and lost all his money.
Are you a millionaire?

~~~
kstenerud
Nope. But I've certainly failed a bunch of times. And now I'm going for the
brass ring again.

Work within your means, but reach for things that are out of your means.

~~~
trevor99
I agree failure is important. It's easy to start with a large fortune and end
with a smaller one though.

~~~
kstenerud
Basically what I'm getting at is: He had greater means and so could take
higher value risks, but the basic mechanism is the same; it's just at a
different scale.

In the end it comes down to having the vision and taking the risk. And one of
his risks finally paid off. That is the essence of entrepreneurship, and
something to emulate.

~~~
trevor99
Your stretching pretty far here. "Vision" was what led Steve Jobs wrong for 20
years of his life. Markkula knew the industry and knew what would work,
Wozniak had the best engineering ability of anyone. This was the magic
combination and what founders should try to emulate.

It's not just scale either. Jobs was also famous and perceived as successful.
He could be a complete asshole to people and they would still work with him.
You should try that in your next startup...

~~~
kstenerud
Steve's "vision" failed him time and time again. He risked his own money and
lost it. He risked other peoples' money and lost it. And then eventually he
made it work. It doesn't matter that he leveraged other peoples' genius and
vision. It doesn't matter that he stole everything. It doesn't matter that he
was a little self-delusional or that he was an asshole. Under his direction,
his "vision" finally materialized, and was wildly successful.

Now I wouldn't say that being a narcissistic asshole is a good strategy or
something to emulate (after all, nobody's perfect), but pursuing a vision
through all manner of trial and tribulation is a worthy goal, and something to
emulate.

The people who make the biggest impact tend to be those who spend years, even
decades in the harsh wildnerness, taking hits and taking falls, but never
giving up because they refuse to believe that it can't be done. And then one
day they do it, or die trying.

These people look at a territory and say "I'm going to conquer that." Most
people will tell them they're crazy to even try, and that it would already be
conquered if it were worthwhile or even possible to do so. "Just till the land
like everyone else does" they'll say. And then these would-be conquerors get
some other key people to see the vision and the possibility. They all work
hard, doing what nobody else is doing, or would even try doing. They fail
campaign after campaign, but keep going, eventually seeing some success. And
then one day the visionary stands on the tallest hill, surveying their newly
acquired "unconquerable" territory, and suddenly they're not crazy, but
genius.

------
gallerytungsten
re: "if anything his most important contribution was just general hustling."

If you don't have "general hustling" going on your company isn't going
anywhere.

~~~
wes-exp
Even if we assume that Wozniak was much more essential than Jobs, the fact is
that Jobs persuaded Wozniak to do the startup in the first place. And if I
recall correctly from the biography by Isaacson, it took quite a bit of
convincing on Jobs' part to get Woz to leave his secure job at HP.

~~~
trevor99
You're right it did take a lot of convincing and hustling. It didn't take
product vision from Jobs to make the Apple II a success however. Look at all
the products Jobs tried to produce through his "vision," they all failed until
the iPod.

~~~
forensic
The Apple II would not have had a keyboard or power supply without Jobs'
vision though.

You're probably right that it wasn't the design aesthetic that counted, but
Jobs' customer focus was still very important.

~~~
watmough
It's highly likely that without Jobs, we wouldn't have had the awesome velcro
that holds the top cover of an Apple II closed.

For those that haven't had the privilege, first move the monitor and Disk II
units off, then grasp the back of the top cover of the Apple II, and lift up.
There will be a ripping of Velcro.

It's surprising that no one else ever seemed to copy this, and not something
that'd ever occurred to me until now.

------
far33d
Jobs without Woz would have found another company to run and another great
idea to build.

Woz without Jobs would just be some really good engineer inside some gigantic
company no one has ever heard of. He even is quoted in the book as having
aspired to that.

~~~
trevor99
First statement is completely up for debate. Jobs did continue without Wozniak
and he failed every product in the next 18 years and spent millions of
dollars. Not something founders here can emulate.

~~~
mh_
It's worth checking out how many of Jobs' "failures" eventually came to pass.
Crazy ideas like the stability of Unix with an Apple GUI..

------
jritch
It really all depends on what your trying to do yourself. Im not naive enough
to think Apple would have worked without BOTH Woz and Jobs. Every company
needs an innovator/inventor, but then what good are they if they have no clout
with regards to how to get the product to market, or what exact product the
consumers would want? Thus the title is completely incorrect.

The company would not be what it is today if either of them had went solo,
FACT.

These constant articles/opinions etc regarding Jobs are now getting pretty
tiresome. Love him or hate him, he was amazing at what HE done.

Whatever happened to letting someone Rest In Peace

------
pbreit
This article and the author's subsequent attempts to defend it demonstrate a
colossal misunderstanding of valuable founder attributes. The role of the
hustler is being horrendously under-appreciated. It would be easier to make
the case that Jobs was the quintessential founder. Jobs basically willed the
company into existence dragging Woz along and installing Markkulla for
credibility. From the get go, Jobs had an impeccable talent for finding the
very best employees, convincing them to join the crusade and then getting the
best out of them.

The downvoting is warranted because the author doesn't seem to think there's a
chance he's wrong.

------
ofca
I think , if startup founders were to emulate anything from Apple's early
days, it would be to emulate THE TEAM.

Founder-teams should consist of one brilliant engineer (Woz), one business guy
(Markkula) and one design guy (Jobs).

Everyone should be themselves, but for a company to truly succed, a perfect
combination of people is needed. And a perfect timing. Apple had both.

------
vorg
A lot behind success has to do with luck (quote from pg's "How to make
wealth"). Perhaps Jobs was unique in that he was lucky in business twice, not
just the once like most who succeed in business (e.g Microsoft Windows &
Office), then can't do it again no matter how hard they try, even with a
fortune to help.

------
raganwald
I’ll say it again: Don’t follow in the footsteps of Woz, Jobs, or Gates: Seek
what they sought.

------
jaequery
Steve Jobs was one of the hardest working man in the industry. Enough said.

------
AdamFernandez
Is it possible that great founders can be different types of people
(engineers, professionals, visionaries or some combination of the three)?
Weird.

------
slimshady
a better piece for an argument on jobs ethos <http://goo.gl/yHRct>

------
dickersonjames
There wouldn't have been a Markkula there without Jobs' ability to bring him
on to the team. Ability to bring together great engineering with great
industry expertise is more valuable than solely Woz's engineering talent on
it's own.

------
aneth
Apple would not exist had Jobs not had the insight to turn Wozniak's hobby
into a marketable product. Indeed he had much help to grow the company, but
that help is a commodity far easier to find than a man like Jobs who could spy
potential and lead those resources toward his vision.

In his early days, Jobs was a terrible manager, a tedious perfectionist, a
narcissistic autocrat, and an emotional child - yet he had the passion,
charisma, and vision to see potential and make it happen. Because of that, all
his negative qualities become charming quirks instead of causing him to be
kicked to the curb for good at 20. He was probably rightfully booted from
Apple for those characteristics, and it was far easier for him to tame those
demons than it would have been for Wozniak to take on Jobs' charm.

There's a reason there is only one Jobs and one Apple, yet thousands of
Wozniaks and still one Apple - Jobs is a rarer and more essential talent.
Wozniak was quickly replaced when he became disengaged - Jobs still can't be.

