Whether you are a fan of Apple or not, there is no denying their meteoric rise to success. Propelled almost entirely by a focus on industrial design, Apple’s market capitalisation (the total worth of their shares, 168.9B) is well on the way to catching age old rival Microsoft (247.6B), having exceeded that of Google (169.7B) recently*. Jonathan Ive describes the key to their success:
“Apple’s goal isn’t to make money. Our goal is to design and develop and bring to market good products,” he explained. “We trust as a consequence of that, people will like them, and as another consequence we’ll make some money. But we’re really clear about what our goals are.”
Jonathan Ive, BusinessWeek 2008
The reason I admire this insight is that I feel it reflects my own attitude to work. Deadlines and budgets are ignored at one’s peril: however, turning out mediocre work does not benefit anyone.
* As of writing Apple’s market cap is less than Google, owing to recent legal action by Nokia. Last week it reached an all time high of 187B.
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