We all know Steve Jobs was a hugely successful visionary and innovator. But what exactly made him so? Of course, leadership is not like a recipe, you don’t add a bit of this and a bit of that, nor are we all the same. It is in fact that difference that makes leadership special. I do, however, believe that some of the items below are learned and some you are born with. Paranoia in particular is one missing from the list below [Read more about paranoia and leadership here.] and to know where not to go OCD on the traits below which can kill teams. Knowing how to inspire while driving teams is essential. So, let me know what you think?

In “The Real Leadership Lessons of Steve Jobs” (Harvard Business Review, winter 2013), Jobs’s bestselling biographer, Walter Isaacson, distills the keys to Jobs’s success for us to take away and apply to our own executive practice:

1. Focus

• Channel your energy into a few great products, instead of a lot of average ones.

2. Simplify

• Overcome complexity by really understanding the underlying problems and finding creative ways around them.

3. Integrate all aspects of customer experience

• Be with the customer from the beginning of the process to the end (i.e. hardware, software, associated devices, and everything in between).

4. Jump ahead when you’re behind

• See being behind not as a failure, but as an opportunity to leap ahead of others and fundamentally transform the industry in unexpected ways.

5. Prioritize product over profit

• Making an innovative product should be your primary motivation, and then profits will follow. Focusing primarily on profits will get you to mediocrity, not innovation.

6. Intuit (rather than analyze) what customers want

• Use your instinct – based on professional and personal experiences – to gauge what customers want before they even know it themselves.

7. Believe the impossible is possible for YOU

• The rules don’t apply to you or the amazing people you work with. Use empowering self-delusion to unlock your creative potential.

8. Take presentation into account

• The cover matters as much as the book when it comes to people’s impressions of a product.

9. Strive for perfection

• Push to make the product perfect on all levels, even those unseen by the customer.

10. Tolerate only the best from the people you work with

• Push people to their peak potential, but remember that it is loyalty – engendered by inspiration and passion – that keeps people around.

11. Connect face-to-face with people

• True creativity and collaboration comes from spontaneous personal encounters and discussions, not dry conference calls.

12. Combine grand vision with detail orientation

• Be able to hone in on the details and step back to the big picture

13. Bridge the humanities and the sciences

• Connect the arts to engineering: make technology poetic. This is the direction technology is headed.

14. Maintain a non-conformist, rebellious edge at all times

• Always challenge the established ways of doing things. Remember, it’s when people start labeling us as “crazy” that we know we’re truly disrupting.

Some of these principles may be more imitable or relevant than others. We may not agree with all of them. It’s up to us to decide how we choose to learn from the story of Steve Jobs and Apple. But, it’s indisputable that all of these components were necessary for Jobs’s distinct personality and path to success.

Would love to hear what you think. Please email me at info@StraTerraPartners.com or talk to me on social media channels!