7 Life lessons from the life of Steve Jobs

Steven Paul “Steve Jobs” (February 24, 1955 – October 5, 2011) was an American computer entrepreneur and inventor. He was Co-founder, Chairman, and Chief Executive Officer of Apple Inc. Jobs also previously served as Chief Executive of Pixar Animation Studios.

He became a member of the board of directors of The Walt Disney Company in 2006, following the acquisition of Pixar by Disney. He was credited in Toy Story (1995) as an executive producer.

In the late 1970s, Jobs, with Apple Co-founders Steve Wozniak, Mike Markkula and others designed, developed, and marketed one of the first commercially successful lines of personal computers, the Apple II series.

In the early 1980s, Jobs was among the first to see the commercial potential of Xerox PARC’smouse-driven graphical user interface, which led to the creation of the Macintosh.

After losing a boardroom power tussle with the board of directors in 1985, Jobs resigned from Apple and founded NeXT, a computer platform development company specialising in the higher-education and business markets.

Apple’s subsequent 1996 buyout of NeXT brought Jobs back to the company he Co-founded, and he served as its CEO from 1997 until 2011.

In 1986, he acquired the computer graphics division of Lucasfilm Ltd which was spun off as Pixar Animation Studios.

He remained CEO and majority shareholder at 50.1% until its acquisition by The Walt Disney company in 2006.Consequently Jobs became Disney’s largest individual shareholder at 7 percent and a member of Disney’s Board of Directors.

On August 24, 2011, Jobs announced his resignation from his role as Apple’s CEO.

On October 5, 2011, Apple announced that Jobs had died.

Life Lessons:

1. Your background does not determine how far you go in life: Steve jobs was born out of wedlock, given up for adoption at birth, he dropped out of college and the list goes on. Today the world mourns him because he is a world changer. He changed the face of technology, and made an indelible mark in the sands of time.

2. Success is in you and not in a place: Once again his genius came into play, after losing a power struggle with the board of directors in 1985, Jobs resigned from Apple and founded NeXT, a computer platform development company specialising in the higher-education and business markets.

Apple’s subsequent 1996 buyout of NeXT brought Jobs back to the company he Co-founded, and he served as its CEO from 1997 until 2011. If NeXT was not successful, Apple would not have bought it.

3. Your health matters: When Steve Jobs announced on August 24 2011, that he was resigning, the world was shocked and some said he was not supposed to do that, but the man knew he needed time to deal with the health crisis in other to gain more momentum to continue to impact the world. Sometimes we almost want to work ourselves to death, even when our body system signals us to have rest.

4. Make out time to take stock: It was widely circulated that Steve was a deep thinker, he was always ready. It will take a man who meditates on current events and trends to look into the future and bring out an iPhone or an iPad.

5. Know when to walk away. He knew when to bow out.

6. Success has a pattern:

i. Chairman, and Chief Executive Officer of Apple Inc,

ii. Jobs previously served as Chief Executive of Pixar Animation Studios;

iii. He became a member of the board of directors of The Walt Disney Company in 2006, following the acquisition of Pixar by Disney. He was credited in Toy Story (1995) as an executive producer, and the list of successes go on.

7. What you wear does not make you who you are: Steve Jobs the billionaire, most of the time put on a pair of jeans and a shirt, looking simple always during his public launch of any Apple product. Your worth is determined by your impact.