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Fifteen years after his passing, Steve Jobs\u2019s<\/a> thoughts on innovation, entrepreneurship, design, and leadership still make a meaningful impact. Since there\u2019s a Jobs quote for many situations, winnowing it down to five isn\u2019t an easy task.<\/p>\n Still: Here\u2019s my attempt. Here\u2019s Steve Jobs<\/a> on starting your own business, perseverance, leadership and responsibility, intelligence, and money.<\/p>\n Maybe you don\u2019t want to start your own company, much less build a thriving business. Even so, Jobs felt everyone should dip a toe in the entrepreneurial water, even if it\u2019s just a side hustle<\/a>. Why?<\/p>\n As Jobs said<\/a>:<\/p>\n I think that without owning something over an extended period of time, like a few years, where you have the chance to take responsibility for your recommendations, where you have to see your recommendations through all action stages, and accumulate scar tissue for the mistakes, and pick yourself up off the ground and dust yourself off . . . you learn a fraction of what you can. Start a business or a side hustle and you get to chart your own course, make your own decisions, make your own mistakes, be responsible for your own success: and learn from those decisions, mistakes, and successes.<\/p>\n And add another dimension to your skills, your personality, and your life.<\/p>\n If talent is the ability to learn a subject or gain a skill more quickly than most, I definitely lack talent.<\/p>\n But that\u2019s OK since, as Jobs said<\/a>:<\/p>\n I\u2019m convinced that about half of what separates successful entrepreneurs from the non-successful ones is pure perseverance. It is so hard. You pour so much of your life into this thing. While Jobs was referring to startup<\/a> founders, the premise is broadly applicable. For most of us, success is based on showing up, day after day, even when we don\u2019t want to.<\/p>\n While that might sound too simplistic\u2014perseverance is just one factor in achieving any worthwhile pursuit\u2014science says showing up every day carries outsize importance. A\u00a0meta-analysis published<\/a>\u00a0in\u00a0Review of Educational Research<\/em>\u00a0found that college students who consistently go to class get better grades.<\/p>\n While that might sound more like correlation than causation (maybe the smartest people tend to go to class more regularly?), there\u2019s more to it.<\/p>\n As the researchers write<\/a>:<\/p>\n Not particularly talented? Not particularly smart? As long as you show up, and keep showing up, you\u2019ll likely do well.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n If you don\u2019t have a talent for sales, sales skills can still be learned. If you don\u2019t have a talent for leading people, most leadership skills\u2014giving feedback, building teams, setting expectations, showing consideration for others, seeking input, focusing on meaningful priorities, etc.\u2014can be learned.<\/p>\n Success in most pursuits doesn\u2019t require talent. Success simply requires skill and experience you can gain.<\/p>\n As long as you\u2019re willing to keep showing up.<\/p>\n No one ever does anything truly worthwhile on their own. That means we\u2019re all, whether formally or informally, at times in a position to lead.<\/p>\n And to take responsibility.<\/p>\n Here\u2019s a story from John Rossman\u2019s book Think Like Amazon<\/a><\/em>:<\/p>\n Steve Jobs told employees a short story when they were promoted to vice president at Apple. Jobs would tell the VP that if the garbage in his office was not being emptied, Jobs would naturally demand an explanation from the janitor. \u201cWell, the lock on the door was changed,\u201d the janitor could reasonably respond, \u201cand I couldn\u2019t get a key.\u201d The janitor can\u2019t do his job without a key. As a janitor, he\u2019s allowed to have excuses. Many people feel success or failure is caused by external forces, and especially by other people. If I succeed, other people helped me, supported me, and were \u201cwith\u201d me. If I fail, other people let me down, didn\u2019t believe in me, didn\u2019t help me\u2014other people were \u201cagainst\u201d me.<\/p>\n To some extent, that\u2019s true. But also not totally within your control.<\/p>\n The only thing you can control? Yourself. So act as if success or failure is totally within your control: If you succeed, you caused it. If you fail, you caused it. As Jobs would say, \u201cReasons stop mattering.\u201d<\/p>\n Never make excuses. Never list reasons. And never point fingers.<\/p>\n Unless, of course, you point them at yourself, and resolve that next time you\u2019ll do whatever it takes to make sure things turn out the way you wish.<\/p>\n Jobs spent a lot of time thinking about the nature of intelligence, if only because it\u2019s hard to surround yourself with smart people if you can\u2019t identify smart people. So what did he feel was the best indication of high intelligence?<\/p>\n According to Jobs:<\/a><\/p>\n A lot of it is memory. But a lot of it is the ability to zoom out, like you\u2019re in a city and you could look at the whole thing from the 80th floor down at the city. And while other people are trying to figure out how to get from point A to point B, reading these stupid little maps, you can just see it in front of you. You can see the whole thing. No matter how much information you\u2019re able to retain, memory doesn\u2019t necessarily help you make decisions. (I know plenty of smart people who sometimes struggle to make simple decisions.)<\/p>\n Jobs felt the smartest people excel at making connections. But you can\u2019t make connections unless you collect a variety of experiences you can connect. As Jobs said<\/a>:<\/p>\n One of the funny things about being bright is everyone puts you on this path. To go to high school, go to college . . . Try new things. Learn new things. Do things that aren\u2019t comfortable; that\u2019s a sure sign the experience\u2014and what you may later draw from the experience, and be able to connect it to\u2014is unique to you.<\/p>\n Because it\u2019s easy, even comforting, to learn more about something you already know. But then you\u2019ll have the same \u201cbag of experiences\u201d and make the same street-level connections as everyone else.<\/p>\n Wealth isn\u2019t a proxy for intelligence. And definitely not for success.<\/p>\n As Jobs said<\/a>:<\/p>\n When I was 25, my net worth was $100 million or so. I decided then that I wasn\u2019t going to let it ruin my life. There\u2019s no way you could ever spend it all, and I don\u2019t view wealth as something that validates my intelligence. Easy to say when you\u2019re worth $100 million, but still. While money does a lot of things (one of the most important is to create choices), after a certain point research shows money doesn\u2019t make people happier<\/a>.<\/p>\n To Jobs, the goal was to make a living by doing what he loved. How you define a \u201cliving\u201d is up to you, but once you\u2019ve reached that level of financial success, make sure you also work hard to include at least a little of the \u201clove what you do\u201d part.<\/p>\n Because then you\u2019ll be living the life you want to live.<\/p>\n On your terms.<\/p>\n \u2014Jeff Haden<\/em><\/p>\nJobs\u2019s thoughts on starting a business<\/h2>\n
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Coming in and making recommendations and not owning the results, not owning the implications, [provides] a fraction of the value and a fraction of the opportunity to learn to be better.
Without the experience of actually doing it, [you] never get three-dimensional.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\nJobs\u2019s thoughts on perseverance<\/h2>\n
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There are such rough moments . . . that most people give up. I don\u2019t blame them. It\u2019s really tough.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n
Jobs\u2019s thoughts on responsibility<\/h2>\n
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\u201cWhen you\u2019re the janitor, reasons matter,\u201d Jobs told his newly minted VPs. \u201cSomewhere between the janitor and the CEO, reasons stop mattering.
\u201cIn other words, when the employee becomes a vice president, he or she must vacate all excuses for failure. A vice president is responsible for any mistakes that happen, and it doesn\u2019t matter what you say.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\nJobs\u2019s thoughts on intelligence<\/h2>\n
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And you can make connections that seem obvious to you, because you can see the whole thing.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n
[But] the key thing that comes through is they had a variety of experiences which they could draw upon in order to try to solve a problem, or attack a particular dilemma, in a unique way.
What you have to do is get different experiences. To make connections which are innovative, to connect two experiences together, you have to not have the same bag of experiences as everyone else . . . or you\u2019ll make the same connections.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\nJobs\u2019s thoughts on money<\/h2>\n
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My favorite things in life don\u2019t cost any money.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n
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