From the biography of Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson, one of my favorite stories is what he did when he came back. When he came back to Apple, Steve Jobs had presentations of the current Apple lineup of products to have an idea what Apple was offering. Reputedly, he was frustrated with what he was seeing, that at a meeting, he stopped the presentations, went to a whiteboard, and started writing. What he wrote was a box, quadrant of four. The columns are Consumer and Pro, the rows were Desktop and Portable.
For Jobs, “Deciding what not to do is an important as deciding what to do “, he said. That’s true for companies and it’s true for products.” (336, Isaacson).
For me, this scene was the beginning of Apple’s renaissance to their current success. What he taught us at this moment is simply this – once you what to do, focus on it and execute it well. Focus is important, no doubt, but focusing on too many things does not work as well.
