

Sculley: Apple’s Big Mistake Was Hiring Me As CEO - ajdecon
http://www.cultofmac.com/apple%e2%80%99s-big-mistake-was-hiring-me-as-ceo-sculley-interview/63323

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siglesias
This headline makes for a misleading soundbite. The context is that Sculley is
saying that Apple's biggest mistake was making Sculley CEO _instead of Steve_.
The board "wasn’t prepared to make [Jobs] CEO when he was 25, 26 years old."

Thankfully that kind of thinking has changed in today's tech world.

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slantyyz
Has that kind of thinking really changed though? Apple was already a sizeable
company with real revenue making real, physical products at that time.

Outside of online businesses, do you really see a lot of young CEOs?

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siglesias
That's an interesting point, and my question is why is there a distinction to
be made between a hardware company and a software company in terms of
management? I think that for various reasons related to barriers to entry and
maturity of market, young people aren't _founding_ hardware companies today
like they were in the 80s, it may be difficult to compare. However it's pretty
clear that young entrepreneurs command much more respect today from investors
and boards than they did even a decade ago.

~~~
slantyyz
In addition to worrying about software, Apple had to worry about supply chain,
inventory, logistics, etc. And, unlike the Compaqs and Dells of the world,
Apple was not in the business of making commodity hardware.

In any case, I think Steve was too busy in those days being a micromanager for
the Macintosh team to even think about running the company. Don't forget he
spent a lot of time alienating the Apple ][ team, who was responsible for most
of the company's revenue at the time.

Getting fired, running a relatively unsuccessful company (NeXT) and nurturing
a company into massive success (Pixar) probably gave him more valuable
experience than if he had somehow managed to stay at Apple in the first place.
And for all we know, the world would have never had the opportunity to see Toy
Story or the Incredibles. Clearly, I see Job's firing from Apple as a win for
the world. ;)

Also keep in mind that while at NeXT, they switched from a hardware and
software company to a software company (and so did Be, which was the other
company Apple considered buying).

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stuhacking
This is a good summary, and I agree that NeXT contributed a lot to what Apple
is today.

I don't understand your final sentence though... To whom are you referring
when you say "They switched from being a H/w S/w company to a S/w company" ?

I thought that both NeXT and Apple continued to produce their own machines and
software.

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arnemart
NeXT stopped making hardware a few years before Apple bought them, and was
renamed "NeXT Software Inc".

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larryfreeman
I think that this says a lot about John Sculley's character. He has the
strength to admit the realities about Apple. I find it surprising that so many
former-CEOs are unable to admit the obvious.

I used to own his book Odyssey which describes his view of the world in 1987.

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flomo
I have read a number of interviews with Sculley over the years, and it seems
he has the wisdom to understand that he will be remembered as "the guy who
fired Steve Jobs", and this has brought about a certain humility not seen in
most ex-CEOs from major companies.

And contrary to the usual simplified narrative, Apple was quite successful
with Scully running it:

\+ they built the Mac from a toy computer into a real platform

\+ the "sales and marketing" was top-notch with brand-loyalty singlehandedly
kept the company alive for years

\+ the company did some great R&D producing huge wins like QuickTime

\+ he correctly understood that Apple was locked-out of the broader PC market,
but had a shot at dominating handhelds

Plus the the consensus view in ~1998 was that Sculley had failed Apple by not
moving MacOS to Intel and licensing it out to PC vendors. I imagine very few
people hold that opinion today - as Sculley said, the company ran according to
Jobs' basic business plan.

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rimantas

      And contrary to the usual simplified narrative,
      Apple was quite successful with Scully running it
    

From article I got an impression that these were benefits of Jobs'
"methodology".

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mloc
Even Steve Jobs was not trusted by his board because of lack of "experience".
Those with experience tend to always overvalue it and rarely see their own
limitations.

~~~
slantyyz
But those without experience tend to undervalue it.

Getting turfed from Apple was the best thing that happened to Steve Jobs. If
you read the folklore, he was bit of an enfant terrible, and I'm of the view
that the _experience_ of running NeXT and Pixar gave him the insight to turn
around Apple.

I'm not nearly convinced that Apple would be the same company it is today if
Steve Jobs had not been forced out.

~~~
mloc
My emphasis was on the fact that even Steve Jobs was not trusted by the board
of Apple because of lack of experience. Being turfed from Apple might have
been the best thing that happened to him but I don't think it was the best
thing that happened to Apple. The company almost died. So, again, without
diminishing the value of experience, I think those who have some, tend to
overvalue it.

~~~
slantyyz
And again, I'll say that it is also true that those who don't have any
experience, tend to undervalue it.

Your statement and my statement are not mutually exclusive.

The same goes with education. Those who have one can overvalue it. Those who
don't have one can undervalue it.

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aspir
I'd like to have been a fly on the wall for these infamous board meetings
where Jobs and Sculley began to move apart. There were probably more
idiosyncratic lessons there than any of the biographies or interviews lead on.

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SkyMarshal
Iirc, some of the inside stories on that topic are covered at folklore.org.

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andrewljohnson
It would be nice to see these guys mend their relationship before it's too
late.

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jonpaul
I admire his humility. I believe it's Jim Collins (Good to Great book) who
describes these types of CEOs as Level 5 leaders. I don't know Sculley's
career, but maybe he would have been more successful being in an industry he
was familiar with?

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ESchmidtSeesYou
The best comment is definitely:

"What about the Newton?? I actually bought one. I still can’t believe that I
did."

