Question: Apple Inc. - the case continues
Apple is credited with putting Silicon Valley on the map, and creating Silicon Valley's hard-working yet corporate-casual environment. Even as the company grew, Jobs worked hard to maintain Apple's rebel spirit. Apple's corporate culture is characterised by its intense work ethic and casual dress code. Staff surveys regularly refer to a ‘relaxed', ‘casual', ‘collegial' environment with ‘long hours, weekends included' and ‘no end to challenges and cool projects'. When Jobs returned in 1997 he was known for walking around the Apple campus barefoot in cutoff shorts and a black shirt. Jobs' commitment to casual wear is so thorough, he reportedly showed up barefoot to meetings with Microsoft executives. Many trend-watchers credit Jobs and Apple with spawning the corporate casual philosophy that has affected the business culture of Silicon Valley, and greater American corporate culture in general.
The LA Times quotes employment specialists John Challenger and Miriam Wardak, saying, when Gen X and Y workers see ‘T-shirt-and-jeans donning Steve Jobs, chief executive of Apple Computer Inc.', they realise they can ‘doff their suits and still get rich'. Michael Moritz, who has observed Jobs for many years notes: Steve is a founder of the company [and the best founders] are unstoppable, irrepressible forces of nature . . . Steve has always possessed the soul of the questioning poet - someone a little removed from the rest of us who, from an early age, beat his own path. [He has a sharp] sense of the aesthetic - that influence is still apparent in all Apple products and advertising. Jobs's critics will say he can be wilfull, obdurate, irascible, temperamental and stubborn [which is true, but he is also a perfectionist]. There is also . . . an insistent, persuasive and mesmerizing salesman.
Case questions:
· What features of the transactional and transformational leader does Jobs display?
· How well do you think they fit the type of staff which the company employs, and the tasks they do?