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In pursuit of perfection

Last Updated 08 March 2012, 12:17 IST

If Steve Jobs were around, he would have turned fifty seven last week.  Jobs, one of the most famous men who walked our planet, began his rendezvous with computers in the garage of his humble home in California. His passion for electronics and his understanding of the arts found their culmination in the unique creations of his company.

 It is said that if one takes care of the details, the big picture will take care of itself. Young Jobs learnt this mantra from his dad who was a car mechanic. His dad insisted that one should work carefully on every aspect of a project and use parts of good quality even if they were not visible to the naked eye. Later on in life, he ensured that even the screws of his Apple products were well plated though no one was likely to see them with the exception of the repairman! One can well imagine the pride he took in his work when he made the entire team sign on a sheet of paper and enclosed it in the Macintosh!

‘Never judge a book by its cover’, goes a popular adage. Mike Markkula, a father figure to Jobs, made him believe otherwise. Jobs understood the importance of presentation in a competitive market. He not only started paying attention to the packaging and the labelling of his products but also shed his hippie looks and gave up on barefooted jaunts at work!

It would surprise you to know that Jobs never really cared for power point presentations because he thought if a person is thorough with the subject, then there would be really no need for any electronic prompting.

His company had its share of failures and setbacks. None of it would faze Jobs and he would not hesitate to begin from scratch. He possessed the art of turning every setback into an opportunity.

There was a time when he was alienated from his company because of his temperamental nature. It was during this time that he translated his dream of uniting the sciences and the arts by venturing into film making and making ‘Toy Story’, a fabulous animated film.

Later on he also paid a rich tribute to the world of music by launching the iPod, which could hold innumerable songs, and an iTunes store to sell music legally at a nominal price.

Jobs set great store by simplicity and simplifying. He got the best compliment ever for his implicit faith in Zen-like simplicity when Noer of Forbes wrote about a six-year-old illiterate stable boy in Colombia who used the Apple iPad without any kind of initiation. His belief that “simplicity is the greatest form of sophistication” guided him in his journey which has made the world tarry a split second to ensure the context and meaning of the word Apple, whenever it is mentioned.

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(Published 01 March 2012, 12:51 IST)

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