Steve Jobs, The Market Of One – His Opinion Is The Only One That Matters

Steve Jobs, the Only Opinion that Matters

I was listening to an interview with Peter Sims on Think, hosted by Krys Boyd.  (You can listen to the interview here).  Sims is the author of Little Bets: How Breakthrough Ideas Emerge from Small Discoveries.  The discussion moved into a conversation about the brilliance of Steve Jobs.  Specifically, just how does Apple decide to go forward with a specific design?  Is it a group decision, based on extensive market research, focus groups, testing in the marketplace?  Not quite:  Here’s what he said:

It’s “The Steve Jobs factor…The person who makes those decisions …is Jobs.  He’s the market – not users.  He’s the market of one, in the case of Apple…”

Andy with Nigel

It reminded me of that brilliant scene about another market of one.  This time the brilliant decision maker is the fictional Miranda Priestly in The Devil Wears Prada.  I could not find a clip of the scene, but here are the words from the script:

Miranda's Opinion Rules the Day

Nigel:
There’s a scale.  One nod is good.  Two nods is very good.
There’s only been one actual smile on record, and that was Tom Ford in 2001.
She doesn’t like it, she shakes her head.
Then, of course, there’s the pursing of the lips.

Andy:
Which Means?

Nigel:
Catastrophe.

Andy:
So because she pursed her lips, he’s gonna change his entire collection?

Nigel: 
You still don’t get it, do you?
Her opinion is the only one that matters.

And here is the business takeaway.

Well, there may not actually be a business take-away.

For most of us mere mortals, we are not smart enough to know just what the market wants.  But, there are a handful of absolute geniuses; geniuses who seem to know exactly what people want.  So, maybe the takeaway is this…  Identify those geniuses, listen to them, watch them, pay very close attention — and then, go and do likewise.

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You can read a review of Little Bets by Sims, written by Bob Morris, here.

The Innovator’s Solution: A book review by Bob Morris

The Innovator’s Solution: Creating and Sustaining Successful Growth
Clayton M. Christensen and Michael E. Raynor
Harvard Business Press (2003)

Note: I read and then reviewed this “business classic” when it was first published and recently re-read it. I am even more impressed now than I was then.

In a previous work, The Innovator’s Dilemma, Christensen examines why so many companies fail to remain competitive “when they confront certain types of market and technological change….the good companies — the kinds that many managers have admired for years and tried to emulate, the companies known for their abilities to innovate and execute….It is about well-managed companies that have their competitive antennae up, listen astutely to their customers….invest aggressively in new technologies, and yet they still lose market dominance.” According to Christensen, the innovator’s dilemma occurs when the logical, competent decisions of management which are critical to the success of their companies are also the reasons why they lose their positions of leadership. I wholly agree with Christensen that a given problem must first be fully understood before efforts to solve it are initiated. The challenge is even greater when the given problem poses a dilemma which (in essence) involves a paradox: Whatever has been essential to success can also cause failure. What to do?

In The Innovator’s Solution, Christensen and Raynor offer a wealth of strategies and tactics to solve such a dilemma, revealed by their rigorous research on hundreds of different companies. In their book, they summarize “a set of theories that can guide managers who need to grow new businesses with predictable success — to become disruptors rather than disruptees — and ultimately kill the well-run, established competitors.” More specifically, Christensen and Raynor suggest appropriate responses to situations such as these:

• When a disruptive foothold is needed which competitors “will be happy to ignore or be relieved to walk away from”

• When there are opportunities to help customers “get done more conveniently and inexpensively what they are already trying to get done”

• When a low-end disruption is feasible and a business model is therefore necessary “that can make attractive profits at the discount prices required to capture customers at the low end of the market”

• When determining the criteria for selecting members of a management team for a new venture

NOTE: Christensen and Raynor correctly suggest that among the most important criteria is sufficient prior experience with solving problems comparable with those the new venture seems certain to encounter.

• When disruption (and competing against non-consumption in particular) “requires a longer runway before a steep ascent is possible.”

Christensen and Raynor have no illusions whatsoever about the difficulties of creating and then sustaining successful growth, however “growth” may be defined and measured. Moreover, they observe “To our knowledge, no company has been able to build an engine of disruptive growth and keep it running and running.”

For many decision-makers who read The Innovator’s Solution, I think it will prove be the most valuable business book they ever read. Why? Because it will guide and inform their efforts with associates to design, activate, and then maintain “a well-functioning disruptive growth engine.” Even then, they must keep it mind that no such mechanism will keep “running and running” forever. Improvisation and adaptability are imperative. Eventually, a new “engine” will be required but at least they will possess the knowledge and experience needed to produce another one.

 

Joe’s Journal: Innovation Without Borders

Here’s a treat: A special edition of Joe’s Journal, featuring a talk that Joe Maciariello, the Drucker Institute’s academic and research director, delivered at the inaugural TEDxOrangeCoast event, “Innovation Without Borders,” on May 19 in Costa Mesa, Calif. To see it, please click here.

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“The empirical evidence is in,” Maciariello declares. “America is the greatest innovative machine in the world . . . The question, then, is why are we in such desperate straits? Why are we are carrying a $14 trillion deficit? Why are people putting us in the category of Greece?”

The answer, Maciarello suggests, is that while we’ve mastered innovation, we’ve neglected virtue. “I’ve concluded that it takes both virtue and productive innovation to shelter the fruits of innovation for future generations,” Maciarello says, drawing on lessons from Peter Drucker, cardiac-pacemaker inventor Wilson Greatbatch, former Citicorp Chairman Walter Wriston, French political thinker Alexis de Tocqueville and others.

Watch the video, and tell us: Do you agree with Maciariello? Is restoring America’s goodness the key to restoring its greatness?

To share your own thoughts, please click here.

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Joseph A. Maciariello is the Horton Professor of Management & Director of Research and Education, The Drucker Institute. You can contact him directly at joseph.maciariello@cgu.edu.