JOB(S) WELL DONE! : A tribute to Steven Paul “Steve” Jobs

JOB(S) WELL DONE! : A tribute to Steven Paul “Steve” Jobs

6 October 2011

More than just a national personality, Steve Jobs, the late Co-Founder of Apple McIntosh, was a global Icon.  Even his parentage and birth into this world was testimony to this fact. Born to a Muslim Syrian Father,  and an American mother of Swiss and German descent, out of wedlock, who gave him up for adoption, with the first proposed surrogate parents refusing to adopt him on the last day because they wanted a girl, Steve, stenciled his belonging there and then. He would be that person, who didn’t really belong to anyone, but would have connections to so many. His multi-cultural biological parents and their multi-national heritage were to be the nature of the company that he would build, the cross cultural connections it would make, and the emergence of Steve, not as an American business leader, but as a global innovator, genius, leader, performer and global citizen.  By the time he died, Steve was the global leader not just of a company but an international tribe of Mac People, whose population continues to grow, shrinking the numbers of PC people.  It is a global tribe that is denoted and driven by the notion of cool. Cool phones, cool apps, cool Macs, Cool tablets, and cool music players. From amongst the number that still belong to the PC tribe, millions aspire to be part of the Mac Tribe, and most eventually join it at different levels.

For many, Steve Jobs was considered the last living genius on earth. Whether this is true or not, is neither here nor there, one fact that is not in dispute is that the man was a living legend.  Outside the serious machines or toys that Apple and Steve Jobs brought to us, we also have him  to thank for some of the laughs that he helped to give us through Award winning animated movies like Toy Story, Wall-E,  Finding Nemo, Ratatouille and others. Steve was the biggest single share holder of Disney Pixar/ The Walt Disney Company, credited with bringing us these great movies and  first brought us Toy Story.

     

His untimely death, one hopes, will be like the end of Toy Story 3. If Steve, is Andy, and has left for college, one hopes that Tim Cook, is that little girl, Bonnie, entrusted with treasured friends and memories in the toys, who showed the potential to take good care of them.  In Tim Cooks case, the imac, iphone, ipad, Macbook, Macair, itunes, and ipod are the toys ( woody, Buz Lightyear, lotsofhugging-bear, and Mr and Mrs Potato Head). We wish him well as he takes care of them hopefully, in the words of Buzz Light Year,  “to Infinity…… and beyond”.

While we mourn this great global loss, we are thankful to Steve and his team at Apple for making our lives better, making us cooler, our lives easier and more enjoyable through his beautiful, innovative and visionary products. As stated atop, being the owner of a  Mac product, is different from anything else that one might own, it is a rite of passage to a tribe serviced by geniuses. Steve Jobs once said

 “Great things in Business are never done by 1 person; they are done by a team of people”.

While we appreciate Steve’s genius and brilliance, we retain confidence in the team that he has left behind. The Global tribe of Mac People will live on, with

“his spirit forever being the foundation of Apple”

At 56, Steve had engineered and been part of achievements that could have taken Hundreds of years. It would seem that,  though the death is early, Steve had served his purpose

– “ a stable and generalized intention to accomplish something that is at once meaningful to the self, and of consequence to the world beyond the self.”

Apple products have brought joy to our lives, delivered efficiency to our work, and helped parcel information and sponsor revolutions. No matter what you do or where you live this giant of a man, has touched and influenced your world in one way or the other.

Job(s) well done and rest iNpeace, Steve.