Just Be Amazingly Different and Insanely Great | From the Bell Tower

In deciding what to write about this week I sought to stay true to the guiding philosophy behind FTBT, which is to think differently when it comes to each column and to make an effort to come up with something truly original. That's when I got a great idea for this week's column - write about Steve Jobs. I can assure you that my decision was in no way influenced by Steve Jobs announcement that he was resigning as Apple's CEO. Nor was I swayed by the 2,473 essays and opinion pieces written about Jobs since his resignation on August 24, 2011. All of that is mere coincidence. Despite the massive amount of text dedicated to Jobs, not a single one of the essays attempted to put Jobs' career into the context of what academic librarians can take away from his legendary achievements. It was clear someone needed to do that.

Leadership Lessons
For me this is the most paradoxical element of Jobs. On one hand he demonstrates an unbelievable capacity for creating and sharing a vision for his organization. Not only is his workforce inspired by the vision, but the community is as well. They believe what he believes, and in that way Apple is more than a company - it is a culture to which we can choose to belong. That's powerful leadership. On the other hand, Jobs is hardly a role model for a sensitive, empathic, understanding leader. According to many sources, he was rather difficult to work for, and had no patience for subordinates who failed to meet his high standards for quality. Still, the company had its share of failures over the years. One of them was a service called MobileMe. It was buggy and got terrible reviews. Jobs was furious and got rid of the team that developed it. It makes him sound sort of dictator-like, and those of us who are outsiders will never really know, but these are hardly the qualities you want to emulate as an academic librarian leader. The best advice I can give is to study Jobs like you would any leader, and adopt those qualities that will help you to be the best possible leader.

Create a systemic experience
Perhaps the most powerful thing I've learned from Jobs and the way he structured Apple and its products is the system experience concept. That's one of the things that really creates passionate users. Sure, the products are great, but there is a much fuller experience beyond the product. Consider an early success, the iPod. There's an entire system built around using it. You become a user at the iStore. You use iTunes to contain and manage your content. You can go to the iStore if you need technical support - or just want to hang out and be cool. When you're on a network with others you can see what songs are in their libraries. Even though Apple is a target because of their closed systems, no other company does a better job of creating the systemic experience. Buying an iPhone is just the beginning. The owner creates what his or her own experience is through the App system. It becomes more than a phone. It's a life management system. How could we design library experiences so that they were more systemic? We need to envision an academic library that is more than just books and other content, but which is integrated into the entire system that is a higher education learning experience.

Design as inspiration
Although I was in no way influenced by any of the past week's essays about Jobs I would have to say one piece I really enjoyed said nothing about Jobs as a business leader. Instead it connected his early exploration of design as a major influence in his role as a technology innovator. According to this Chronicle blog post, Jobs spent a short amount of time at Reed College, and while there he took a course in calligraphy. It may seem like a minor event in retrospect, but it appears this one course had a major influence in Jobs appreciation of elegant design. Apple's products may be less technically formidable than the competition, but no one can argue against them setting the gold standard for beautiful design. That's why some people just want an iPhone (caution - strong language alert). I've advocated in the past that adopting a design approach in the academic library can actually help us to improve the quality of the user experience. While designing an experience is not quite the same as designing a product, the principles of being intentional about design and creating something that exceeds user expectations is transferable.

Teams Make it Happen
While Jobs is a great visionary he understood the myth of the lone creative genius. It's true that he surrounded himself with amazingly talented individuals who brought strengths to Apple that Jobs himself did not have. Take the iStores. Jobs knew nothing about opening and operating a retail store. What he had was a vision for a unique type of store, but it was up to a team led by Ron Johnson and his team to make it happen. While Jobs was known to ask lots of questions and critique his teams' ideas (supposedly he was quite critical of the Genius Bar), he offers a good example of the necessity for assembling good teams and empowering them to complete projects. This is an important lesson for academic library administrators. You may have a great vision, but you don't have all the ideas or the knowledge that can get your organization there. Put together teams of the right people, and let them do their thing. Of course you should ask questions and demand they take responsibility for the outcome, but avoid micromanaging at all costs.

Presentations as art form
How many business leaders or innovators have dozens of articles and videos - and even a book dedicated to their presentation style? I'm not certain but I am reasonably sure the answer is one - and that would be Steve Jobs. Jobs was not always such a great presenter. You can even go back and find some of his old presentations. Some are not so impressive, but what is impressive is that Jobs demonstrates it is possible to hone your skills, practice with fierce dedication, get coaching where you need it and evolve into a speaker with great style and power. I'm not suggesting that academic librarians need to measure themselves by Jobs' standard. Don't even try. But you can learn some valuable lessons by studying his technique, and applying that to your own presentations. Pay attention to how he starts by telling you the three or four things you'll learn in the presentation. Watch the way he uses pauses, and moves about the stage? Do you ever see Jobs standing behind a lectern clutching it for dear life? That's a simple move anyone can try. Does Jobs ever start a presentation with a couple of slides with pictures of Apple's headquarters and campus, the number of employees and other boring details? Of course not. He knows no one in the audience cares. If you want to improve your presentations, Jobs should be one of your inspirations.

It all comes back to the WHY
The hardest part of dealing with the avalanche of information about Steve Jobs is simply trying to process all the ways in which his career is dissected, and extracting all the valuable lessons from which to learn: disruptive innovating; risk taking; deal making; rule breaking. If I had to say I've learned any one thing from following Jobs throughout the years, it would be the importance of focusing on the WHY. I believe that Jobs was masterful at understanding and communicating what he was passionate about, what he personally believed and why he cared about creating beautifully designed products that are easy to use and deliver great value to the user - even when they cost more than the competition and offer fewer features. For Jobs it was always about those two things that defined Apple from the beginning: think differently and challenge the status quo. He always stayed true to these values. As admirable as those qualities are, it doesn't mean you need to think and act like Steve Jobs. It should inform us of the importance of taking the time to discover and articulate our own personal sense of WHY. If you fail to start there, its strikes me that trying to emulate Jobs' many admirable leadership qualities would simply be a waste of time. Jobs, no doubt, would hate to see that happen.