Overview of Steve Jobs
Steve Jobs, the co-founder, chairman, and former CEO of Apple, is considered one of the most outstanding and visionary business leaders that the world has seen. Jobs was born in 1955 to a Syrian father and a German mother but was adopted as a young child (Yanzhen, 2020). He studied for one year at Reed College before withdrawing in 1972 to pursue personal interests. In 1976, four years after leaving college, he and his friend Wozniak co-founded Apple, and the company produced one of the most sold microcomputers in the late 1970s, the Apple II (Ndoro & van Niekerk, 2019).
The company also produced the Macintosh in 1984, the most-sold microcomputer with a graphical user interphase. However, Jobs was removed from the firm he co-founded in 1985 after a disagreement with the board and the then-CEO, John Sculley. In 1997 Jobs returned to Apple and played a crucial role in creating iconic products associated with Apple, such as the Macintosh, iPod, iPhone, and iPad, that completely revolutionized how the world operates.
Steve Jobs’s Influence on Other People’s Behavior
Steve Jobs was capable of impacting other people to act in a particular manner. He was a perfectionist, and people who worked under him said he relentlessly pursued people to be like him, making them work harder than they had planned (Kim, 2020). Jobs inspired, motivated, and even threatened his employees to push themselves beyond their limits, thus resulting in innovations that seemed impossible in the technology world. As stated, Jobs was a visionary leader and made it clear to his workers what he expected, when, and how they were supposed to ensure that Apple designed visually appealing and functional products. He encouraged his team by telling them they were supposed to design great products, a phrase he often overused.
Jobs was outstanding at communication both on stage and on a face-to-face basis. During his iconic product launches, jobs would regularly make the audience by telling them that there was one more thing about the product that he had not shown them. Jobs had a substantial passion for design, making Apple products visually appealing and distingusshed in user interphase (Podolny & Hansen, 2020). Jobs was also an exceptional innovative thinker and encouraged his employees to take risks and develop new products, which resulted in Apple disrupting the market significantly.
Characteristics of a Leader Displayed by Steve Jobs
According to trait and behavioral theories texts, Steve Jobs displayed several characteristics expected of a leader. There was something about Steve Jobs that made people automatically drawn towards him, listen, and follow what he had to say. Job’s leadership style fits the definitions of charismatic leadership theory, which argues that followers are drawn toward a leader whom they believe has extraordinary attributes and thus fit to be imitated (Robbins & Judge, 2018). Jobs had a strong vision for Apple and knew where the company was supposed to be, the process to reach that end, and the people needed for that vision to be achieved. This fits a characteristic of a visionary leader, a theory that states that leaders should have a purpose, main goals, and objectives that they set for their team to meet (Robbins & Judge, 2018). Jobs was also brilliant, demonstrated by his inventions, highly agreeable based on how he commanded the stage, and extraverted since he spent most of his time out marketing his products.
As many of his former employees confess, Steve Jobs exhibited transactional leadership traits. These leaders guide their followers towards a specific goal by defining their roles and task expectations, allocating rewards for finishing the tasks, or punishments for the failure to meet specific targets (Robbins & Judge, 2018). Employees were terrified of failure and happy to succeed, knowing that Jobs would either reward or punish them appropriately. The Technology industry in which Jobs was a leader favored the transformational leadership style, where there is no observable difference between the leaders and their subordinates at the workplace. Jobs worked hand in hand with his employees and could directly influence their behaviors.
However, Jobs’ most critical behavioral trait was being an authentic leader. These leaders are self-aware, and their actions are anchored by their mission, consider all relevant opinions before acting, and display true values when interacting with their employees (Robbins & Judge, 2018). Jobs was a genuine leader who, when he discovered that a particular product was not working as expected, was willing to stop its production in pursuit of more beneficial inventions.
Fielder Contingency Model and Steve Jobs
Steve Jobs was known to be very good with employees during good times and harsh when things were not falling into place. The fielder contingency model states that for a leadership style to be successful, it must fit the situation (Larson, 2020). Accordingly, Jobs was very disagreeable during his first tenure since he did not have absolute power. However, he was accommodating during his second occupancy (Larson, 2020). This shift of character reveals that Jobs was capable of changing his leadership behaviors according to situations thus fitting the principles of the Fielder Contingency Model. Jobs made his communication style match the technology available, leveraging it to reach broad audiences.
Contemporary Leadership Theory Displayed by Steve Jobs
Based on the concept of transformational and transactional leadership theories, it is clear that Steve Jobs’s leadership leaned towards transformational leadership. While these two leadership approaches are complementary Jobs seemed to favor motivation and innovativeness among his workers over setting rigid job roles. He had a clear and inspiring vision for Apple, which made the firm develop groundbreaking technologies (Johnson & Suskewicz, 2020). Admittedly, Jobs displayed the transformational leadership aspect of innovation, making his company challenge the status quo of smartphone operations.
References
Johnson, M. W., & Suskewicz, J. (2020). Lead from the future: How to turn visionary thinking into breakthrough growth. Harvard Business Press.
Kim, H. (2020). Comparison of strategic leadership: Steve Jobs and Tim Cook. Business and Management Studies, 6(3), 17–25. Web.
Larson, R. (2020). Bit tyrants: The political economy of Silicon Valley. Haymarket Books.
Ndoro, T., & van Niekerk, R. (2019). A psychobiographical analysis of the personality traits of Steve Jobs’s entrepreneurial life. Indo-Pacific Journal of Phenomenology, 19(1). Web.
Podolny, J. M., & Hansen, M. T. (2020). How Apple is organized for innovation. Harvard Business Review, 98(6), 86-95. Web.
Robbins, S., & Judge, T. (2018). Essentials of organizational behavior: Global Edition (14th ed.). Pearson.
Yanzhen, C. (2020). A report comparing and contrasting two entrepreneurs–Steve Jobs and Jack Ma. Frontiers in Educational Research, 3(15), 137-143. Web.