Personally I hope this comes true, I would like to see Steve get the "job".
http://www.macobserver.com/columns/thebackpage/2003/20031205.shtml
http://www.macobserver.com/columns/thebackpage/2003/20031205.shtml
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Steve Jobs for CEO?
- Thread starter jrriddle
- Start date
MrPromey
Well-Known Member
Well, Apple Computers has seen their desktop market share (which was about 5%) drop by more than 50% (despite their flashing marketing campaigns) since he has come back to the company and the success of Pixar could largely be attributed to him having pretty much no creative input whatsoever. In fact, the only two things I can see for which he was directly responsible for in Pixar’s success were getting Disney to sign with them in the first place and then letting Lasseter run just about everything that matters…
This, the head of the second largest media company in the world dose not make. Anyway, wouldn’t it seem kind of strange for all of those who don’t like Eisner to want someone who is known to be single minded, inflexible, and difficult to deal with put in charge of Disney?
This, the head of the second largest media company in the world dose not make. Anyway, wouldn’t it seem kind of strange for all of those who don’t like Eisner to want someone who is known to be single minded, inflexible, and difficult to deal with put in charge of Disney?
GaryT977
New Member
We could do far worse than Steve Jobs as CEO. Apple's desktop fate was sealed when the CEO at the time (The guy from Pepsi, his name escapes me), turned down an offer from Bill Gates to distribute the Mac OS to other hardware platforms as they had done with DOS. This was at a time that Microsoft was struggling to release Windows 1.0. If it wasn't for that short-sighted decision, we'd all be running OS-X, and not XP.
However, under Job's stewardship they have established themselves as leaders in the portable MP3 and On-Line Music markets. Plus, they are a profitable company again, and they lead the industry in new, creative techologies.
Under Jobs, Disney would have a CEO who embraces new technology and ideas, and isn't afraid to spend money to develop them. In other words, someone who understands the big picture as opposed to the bottom-line, short sighted, corporate cost cutting type.
However, under Job's stewardship they have established themselves as leaders in the portable MP3 and On-Line Music markets. Plus, they are a profitable company again, and they lead the industry in new, creative techologies.
Under Jobs, Disney would have a CEO who embraces new technology and ideas, and isn't afraid to spend money to develop them. In other words, someone who understands the big picture as opposed to the bottom-line, short sighted, corporate cost cutting type.
Testtrack321
Well-Known Member
Well, no, not at all, not even close. It's when he left is when the company whent down the tubes. It was Jobs that was the inspiration.
MrPromey
Well-Known Member
Apple had about 5% of the market when Jobs CAME BACK in 1997. Today, they have just over 2% and as far as I know, he didn’t leave again and come back again in that time period so this has happened while Apple has been humming along with their lovely muse to inspire them.
MrPromey
Well-Known Member
Ah yes, iTunes… Well, the online music industry as a whole has yet to prove if it will become a long term financial success and until about a month ago, Apple had almost no competition in their model but now there are at least two other companies who are more established brands with the Wintel folk (the most significant market) which are also coming out with similar portable music devices which are compatible with a competing format. Even if iTunes does survive this (which I think it probably will), Apple’s own executives have stated that their goal with the service and software is to break even financially because they make next to nothing on the downloads after the labels and credit card companies get their cuts and the bandwidth costs of the download are taken into account.
The iPod has been doing well (I own a 30 gig, myself) but recently, there has been a scramble for more competition in that sector with others offering larger storage at about the same physical size twice the battery life and with more advanced features (like color screens and the ability to play back video files) and to do things like tune into radio or record voice without the need for third party attachments… Oh, and they are all also generally quite a bit cheaper. This may not phase Mac users so much but the Wintel folk who Apple held off on offering support for (presumably because they at first perhaps thought the iPod would work as incentive for people to ‘switch”) and who are considerably less brand loyal will most likely go to where it looks like they will get the most bang for their buck.
Regardless of what should have and could have happened two decades ago with Apple it didn’t and when they had the chance to possibly gain back some of that ground with a new OS, they decided to take a pass on that opportunity as well (under Jobs) and only very recently has Apple begun to show signs of stable life… This still doesn’t help the fact that the just over 2% market share they have in the pc industry continues to erode which may have something to do with and will not be furthered helped by their new focus on consumer devices.
Apple creates expensive innovative products but that doesn’t make them a successful company. Not when someone else like Dell can come along six months or a year or two later and offer the same thing without the R & D costs and then undercut them in price.
Sure that kind of thing may make Apple seem more (to quote many, many Mac hardliners) “$exy” than the competition but in many cases, their competition is laughing all the way to the bank…
Under Jobs’ Disney would have an individual who has had no experience running a company of even a quarter of that size as well as no experience doing most of what Disney actually does. Part of what Eisner is faulted for is his difficulty with working with others. Jobs has a well established reputation for being both a hot head and for refusing to compromise on his own personal vision when others disagree. Does this honestly sound like what the Disney Co. needs? Someone who doesn’t know how to run it but who by their very nature isn’t all that open or agreeable to others… even when they might know better?
Don’t get me wrong. Jobs’ is a cool guy. His staged events never fail to get the crowd (many of which are already in love with him and whatever he’s got to sell them) going. In the last year or two he has been on the cover of Newsweek and other major magazines but the head of Disney doesn’t need a rock star. They need a real person who has real experience in their industries. Heck, he runs Pixar which inked a deal with Disney because it couldn’t make and market and distribute its own movies. Today they can financially afford to make them on their own but Mr. Jobs still has yet to run a company that has any sort of experience doing two of the things that Disney is one of the best in the world at doing, marketing and distributing.
The truth is that finding ANYONE to replace Eisner at the drop of a hat today without causing more damage to the company will be extremely difficult. I know it is sac religion on these forums to say it but Walt if he were to be magically brought back to life probably couldn’t cut it. At the time Eisner came in, Disney was valued at around $1.5 billion. Today the company is valued at over $50 billion. For everything that he has done both right and wrong, the company has grown quit a few times more in the last two decades than in all of the previous history of the Disney Co. That isn’t opinion. It isn’t speculation. It is fact. The truth of the matter is that there really is almost nobody in the world who is anywhere near as qualified to run the Disney Co. as Mr. Eisner which I personally think has a lot to do with why they have been so reluctant to consider getting rid of him. He of course is to a great degree to blame for this since he has never actually gone to the trouble of making any known effort to look for or prepare anyone to replace him so I’m not trying to suggest that he is a wonderful guy who is so special that nobody else can do his job. Maybe it would be better to compare him to a master craftsman who for whatever reason (be it simply neglect, fear of competition, or a belief that he would be great at doing it forever) never bothered to teach anyone else his trade who now perhaps finds himself not in his prime but hard to get rid of because nobody else really knows how to do what it is he does.
I think Jobs would probably be a good spokesman for Disney (of course, he would have to shave more regularly) and as a “front man” he might not be a bad stand-in for Walt but as far as the lead executive of the Disney Co. I think they could do far better.
Jobs may be great behind the wheel of high performance speed boats but Disney isn’t a speed boat. It is more like an aircraft carrier. It is too big to make sudden turns. There is a lot more to consider than just steering the boat and there are a LOT more lives at stake.
A lot of people in their idealistic thoughts fail to consider this but Disney is a mature company. By the nature of their age and size they can’t take big risks. The executive who does risks loosing power quickly through the ire of institutional shareholders which are collectively Disney’s largest “owners” and who tend to have little faith in anything that doesn’t fit on a chart or a spreadsheet (sad but true). The company in taking big risks takes a serious gamble not only with the livelihood of the high flying executives and rich shareholders but also with the lives and futures of those who are employed by the company (over 50,000 in the Orlando area alone) and who are invested in them through financial institutions in the form of college funds, IRAs and 401k programs.
Disney today simply can’t bob and weave the way it once could in the same way that no other company even half their size really can. In fact, a large part of Pixar’s success probably stems from the lack of responsibility the company actually has (similar to the Disney Co. when Walt was in his prime) but give them another 50-60 years and see if they are still the innovative kid. If they remain a small company they might be able to but that is unlikely, especially if they do take on the roles of financing and marketing their own productions. It is a natural process for successful companies to grow over time and in that respect, Disney is in many ways a victim of its own success. To this end, Eisner is very much responsible. Maybe it is time to replace him. Maybe they can just stick someone else in his place to fix everything… Somehow I just don’t think it is going to be that easy.
GalacticGobbler
New Member
Steve Jobs,
And everyone here thinks Eisner is arrogant
And everyone here thinks Eisner is arrogant
GaryT977
New Member
Good point, and Mr. Promey had several too. As far as arrogance goes, ask the employees at Apple and Pixar if they like their jobs. Have you seen the extras on the Pixar DVD's that show their studios? Compare that with the closing of the Florida animation studio.
I'm a WDW fanatic. I've been hooked since my first visit as a child. The idea of a CEO that revels in new technology and isn't afraid to spend money to develop it just gives me the tingles. We've seen, with Tokyo DisneySea, what the Imagineers can do without a measly, penny pinching budget.
Yes, there are competitors to the iPod now that are cheaper. And there are other online music stores now. But the point is, Apple did it FIRST. They create new markets and rush to fill them with innovation. The idea of that kind of spirit running Disney just sounds like a dream come true to me.
Dammit.
Testtrack321
Well-Known Member
Here's the lovely Apple Time line for those who don't know, Jobs was kicked out in 1985 and replaced by John Scully. He screwed the company into the ground, then he was replaced by another nuckle-head Michael Spindler, and then Gil Amelio. FINALLY Jobs was back and he is currently setting things back to normal.
Take any look at the Macs offered a decade ago overs those you can now buy, and it's obvious that he's made a huge improvement.
What Disney needs is someone who can pump the imagination back into the company and who can spur more inspiration and newness, something Jobs can do. I'm not saying to keep him there for 20 years, but just for a few to get things going.
I own a 20gig iPod, I buy songs off of iTMS, and I go to Disney. Which one is different and why? Going to Disney, because it lacks the imagination in it's products the last few years. Now look at the new iMac, and you cannot tell me that this guy can't invest in rebuilding the imagination of the Disney company.
Woody13
New Member
Apple Missed The Boat!
A perfect example of open vs. closed systems is the ongoing battle of Apple vs. PC computers. PC's have captured 98% of the computer market because they allow thousands of manufacturers to compete for product features and pricing. Conversely, Apple has attempted to control the entire system, from hardware to software, creating a closed market that while some may argue is a better product, will never have the global impact of the PC.
If Jobs ran Disney he would run it into the ground.
A perfect example of open vs. closed systems is the ongoing battle of Apple vs. PC computers. PC's have captured 98% of the computer market because they allow thousands of manufacturers to compete for product features and pricing. Conversely, Apple has attempted to control the entire system, from hardware to software, creating a closed market that while some may argue is a better product, will never have the global impact of the PC.
If Jobs ran Disney he would run it into the ground.
Testtrack321
Well-Known Member
Re: Apple Missed The Boat!
Much less than 98%, sorry. Cound in Linux, Unix, FreeBSD, and some others, and the Windows pie is much smaller.
Anyway, as for you Mac debate, it isn't the closed system that many people have said cuases it's small market share, but Windows relyance on serving to the $400 PC market. Quality comes at a price, just like another company I know, oh yeah, DISNEY.
Much less than 98%, sorry. Cound in Linux, Unix, FreeBSD, and some others, and the Windows pie is much smaller.
Anyway, as for you Mac debate, it isn't the closed system that many people have said cuases it's small market share, but Windows relyance on serving to the $400 PC market. Quality comes at a price, just like another company I know, oh yeah, DISNEY.
MrPromey
Well-Known Member
Woody is exactly right. One of Apple's problems that many of the companies defenders never seem to realize is that it isn't Apple against Microsoft. It is Apple against nearly everyone else in the personal computer industry and Apple has actually chosen to have it this way.
When Apple only has a 2% market share, that means that the rest of the pc industry as a whole makes up the other 98%. When you pay Apple's inflated prices you aren't paying them because of a high commitment to quality (though I will not argue that the Mac is not a quality product), you are paying that high price because they have absolutely no direct competition in their ever shrinking corner of the PC industry.
The $199 Walmart PC didn't come to exist because people said we can sell the masses crap and they will buy it (in fact that $199 PC is over 10 times faster than the $2000 one I bought back in 95). It came because of something called competition.
Apple was starting to see competition in hardware when they began allowing clone hardware companies to license their OS and the cost of entry in the Mac market began to fall as well... Then Jobs came back and Apple quickly yanked that market...
My point which you continue to ignore is that in the last six years that Jobs has been at the head of Apple, they have continued to loose market share in their primary industry.
Sure, you now have the iMac that looks like it could have been a desk lamp in the movie A Clockwork Orange and a new OS that uses a lot of resources to operate a spiffy GUI (which incidentally is just a GUI shell running on top of a command line environment - something the Mac faithful used to deplore about windows) along with some entertaining commercials but a lot of the Mac culture is centered around hype and you are living proof of it. Just look at your tagline. You say you have an iPod with 10,000 songs in your pocket. You have a 20 gig, right? That means in reality you have somwhere around half that figure. I have a 30 gig iPod and I know mine won't hold that many.
But this isn't supposed to be a debate about Apple and the rest of the PC industry. It is about Steve Jobs as the boss of Disney and while you may be very happy that he is the head of Apple and think he is god because he is the head of Pixar, this doesn't mean that he is somehow magically savvy in the ways of hollywood, network oppearation, merchandising and vacation recreation.
You seem to think that he could somehow go into Disney and "shake things up" maybe with a keynote presentation and somehow, sparks of inspiration and magic would fly through the company... Well, I know at least one ex-Apple employee "Mac Genus" who from first hand experience could tell you otherwise...
In any event, this isn't a debate that is ever going to be settled. I'm just going to keep saying he has no experience with a company anywhere near the size of Disney, he has no experience in Disney's main fields of operation, and that he is just as single minded as Eisner and a lot more egotistical and difficult to deal with and you are going to keep thinking that his mind altering powers somehow extend beyond the world of the Mac faithful.
Apple is an innovative company. They have a lot of firsts under their belt which if pride can pay the bills is a good thing but historically they are lousy at dealing with competition once they are no longer the only kid on the block and I have serious doubts about Mr. Jobs ability to deal with it as well. The iPod has done very well up to this point but now there is real competition. Same for iTunes... The Mac was a best seller till someone else came along to compete as well... Pixar has been at the top of the pile with animation over the last few years but CG animation is no longer in their exclusive domain and their success suddenly looks less spectacular when you consider how well poorly animated and scripted films such as Ice Age are now doing...
Disney was first to market a long, long time ago but now other people have animated movies and theme parks in Orlando and merchandising deals with cereal companies and they are too big of a company to be turned around by any single product.
The iPod may be a saving grace for Apple but it is going to take a lot more than the next big thing to keep Disney going. They need someone who can manage what they already have just as much if not more than someone who can also promote innovation. While Eisner may not be the guy to do it anymore, I hardly see where Jobs has the experience or the right kind of attitude to do it either. In 1984 when they were a company 1/50 the size they are today and about to go under, they needed a maverick and at that time, Eisner was such a guy. Today they are a much larger player in a lot more markets. What they need now more than a maverick is someone who won't $crew things up. The company may need some fixing but what most people seem to think is wrong with it is a lack of respect for its own roots.
Tell me, what has Jobs ever done in business that would suggest he holds much respect for anything he hasn't had a hand in doing? Disney needs to be fixed - not reinvented.
Testtrack321
Well-Known Member
Now, I'm not a huge fan of the quoteing wars. What people think Disney needs is anothe good money person and everything will be all good. Frankly, I think the oposite. On no part did I say, and actually stated otherwise, that Jobs should be there for the long term. NEVER. Also, your attaching the low market share of Apple to Jobs is insane, Sculley was the one who screwed that one up big time, not Jobs. And what in history is saying that Jobs can't handle competition? From what I've seen he's pushing everthing farther.
Now you may joke about how a keynote from Jobs every January, June, and August would cure Disney's woes, but it's better than the press releases Eisner pushes out, where the focus isn't on development, but on the investors.
Will Jobs be the solution? NO. He's an answer.
Now off topic, but the reason why Apple has such high prices isn't that it's a monopoly (it's not, you can go PC or Mac, can't you?), but it's quality of the product. It's the BMW vs. Pinto argument again.
Now you may joke about how a keynote from Jobs every January, June, and August would cure Disney's woes, but it's better than the press releases Eisner pushes out, where the focus isn't on development, but on the investors.
Will Jobs be the solution? NO. He's an answer.
Now off topic, but the reason why Apple has such high prices isn't that it's a monopoly (it's not, you can go PC or Mac, can't you?), but it's quality of the product. It's the BMW vs. Pinto argument again.
MrPromey
Well-Known Member
Actually, I wasn't referring directly to one of Jobs' little speeches when I said "keynote". I was talking about this:
As for pretty much the rest of my argument, including Mr. Jobs monopolistic closed system mindset and Apple's historical inability to compete once other companies enter the markets they create can be summed up in an article that was coincidentally just published in the January, 2004 edition of FastCompany (got mine in the mail today, I'm guessing it is probably also on newsstands at this point). The coverage story featuring a big picture of Mr. Jobs with a sort of reflective gaze is titled "If He's so smart... : Steve Jobs, Apple, and the limits of innovation"
As for your BMW, Pinto analogy... That would make sense except for the fact that in this case, that would mean that Pintos were made by dozens of competing manufactures and were the best selling car in the history of the automobile industry; that BMW's required special fuel and could not easily drive the same roads that were designed primarily with the Pintos in mind; that there were literally over 7 million people developing things for the pintos while as there were only around 300 thousand (actual industry figures for the personal computer industry) for the BMW... and that because the Pintos were constantly being refined and updated (on a near monthly basis - driven almost entirely on competition) there would often be cases where they would be higher performance vehicles until BMW decided to make major updates to their vehicle lines every few years.
Even if he were able to "fix" Disney, history would strongly suggest that he would be no more willing to step down than Eisner is now... though he would probably be a lot easier to forcibly remove once his shortcomings began to hurt the company in completely different ways that anyone understand his brand of business could plainly predict...
BTW, I see you are still touting those 10,000 songs in your pocket. Are you carrying around two 20 gig ipods these days or have you since traded in the model you had for a new 40 gig which actually dose hold that many?
(You may take that as an insult or a slap but is meant more as an example of the reality bending enthusiasm, that Apple attempts to foster in its customers which seems to be where the Jobs-can-walk-on-water belief seems to have stemmed from since most of the rest of the world a.ka. the vast majority, tend by and large not to agree.)
Anyway, I'm done. I wasn't even going to bother with a response till I saw that article. If you don't want to spring for the magazine or stand in the store and read a six page article (only slightly longer than my posts at this point ), it should be available on their website ( www.fastcompany.com ) in the archive in a few weeks. I don't imagine you'll find a lot of agreement with wht they say but these are business people looking at why Apple has had so much trouble over the years and continues to be anything but a sure thing... I guess it could just be bad luck or that the world has in in for them or that someone else messed it up even worse than Jobs even though the slide started before Jobs was removed back in '84 to such a horrible degree that he with all his special powers has been unable to turn things around but the explanation that they give is a lot more logical and a lot of it has to do with a culture and a mindset that Jobs has fostered. Call it too much of a good thing or whatever, but I don't see how anyone with a clear head could honestly think this is what Disney actually needs... I've said my peace and I'm done, though I welcome your thoughts and the reasons for them when and if you ever do come across that article.
As for pretty much the rest of my argument, including Mr. Jobs monopolistic closed system mindset and Apple's historical inability to compete once other companies enter the markets they create can be summed up in an article that was coincidentally just published in the January, 2004 edition of FastCompany (got mine in the mail today, I'm guessing it is probably also on newsstands at this point). The coverage story featuring a big picture of Mr. Jobs with a sort of reflective gaze is titled "If He's so smart... : Steve Jobs, Apple, and the limits of innovation"
As for your BMW, Pinto analogy... That would make sense except for the fact that in this case, that would mean that Pintos were made by dozens of competing manufactures and were the best selling car in the history of the automobile industry; that BMW's required special fuel and could not easily drive the same roads that were designed primarily with the Pintos in mind; that there were literally over 7 million people developing things for the pintos while as there were only around 300 thousand (actual industry figures for the personal computer industry) for the BMW... and that because the Pintos were constantly being refined and updated (on a near monthly basis - driven almost entirely on competition) there would often be cases where they would be higher performance vehicles until BMW decided to make major updates to their vehicle lines every few years.
Even if he were able to "fix" Disney, history would strongly suggest that he would be no more willing to step down than Eisner is now... though he would probably be a lot easier to forcibly remove once his shortcomings began to hurt the company in completely different ways that anyone understand his brand of business could plainly predict...
BTW, I see you are still touting those 10,000 songs in your pocket. Are you carrying around two 20 gig ipods these days or have you since traded in the model you had for a new 40 gig which actually dose hold that many?
(You may take that as an insult or a slap but is meant more as an example of the reality bending enthusiasm, that Apple attempts to foster in its customers which seems to be where the Jobs-can-walk-on-water belief seems to have stemmed from since most of the rest of the world a.ka. the vast majority, tend by and large not to agree.)Anyway, I'm done. I wasn't even going to bother with a response till I saw that article. If you don't want to spring for the magazine or stand in the store and read a six page article (only slightly longer than my posts at this point
), it should be available on their website ( www.fastcompany.com ) in the archive in a few weeks. I don't imagine you'll find a lot of agreement with wht they say but these are business people looking at why Apple has had so much trouble over the years and continues to be anything but a sure thing... I guess it could just be bad luck or that the world has in in for them or that someone else messed it up even worse than Jobs even though the slide started before Jobs was removed back in '84 to such a horrible degree that he with all his special powers has been unable to turn things around but the explanation that they give is a lot more logical and a lot of it has to do with a culture and a mindset that Jobs has fostered. Call it too much of a good thing or whatever, but I don't see how anyone with a clear head could honestly think this is what Disney actually needs... I've said my peace and I'm done, though I welcome your thoughts and the reasons for them when and if you ever do come across that article.