The New York Times has a very interesting piece on Apple’s current CEO Tim Cook, which looks back at his childhood in Alabama to his current position at Apple. Despite not contributing directly to the article, Tim Cook’s chief of design at Apple – Jony Ive had some very nice and fascinating things to say about his boss.
From the NYT:
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Jonathan Ive, the head of design at Apple and a name nearly as adored by its followers as Steve Jobs, says Mr. Cook has not neglected the company’s central mission: innovation. “Honestly, I don’t think anything’s changed,” he said. And that includes the clamor for some exciting new thing. “People felt exactly the same way when we were working on the iPhone,” Mr. Ive added.
“It is hard for all of us to be patient,” Mr. Ive said. “It was hard for Steve. It is hard for Tim.”
[….]
Almost daily, employees would spot Mr. Jobs having lunch on Apple’s campus with Mr. Ive. These days, Mr. Ive said, he meets three days a week with Mr. Cook, generally in each other’s offices. But Mr. Ive said the design processes are essentially unchanged.
“Steve established a set of values and he established preoccupations and tones that are completely enduring,” Mr. Ive said. Chief among them is a reliance on small creative teams whose membership remains intact to this day. The philosophy that materials and products are intertwined also continues under Mr. Cook. For instance, when the company decided to use titanium to build a laptop, Mr. Ive said, he and Mr. Cook and Mr. Jobs thought about how to push the boundaries of the metal to get the look and feel they wanted. And Mr. Ive pointed to another enduring value: a complete focus on the product.
If Mr. Jobs was maniacal about design, Mr. Cook projects “quiet consideration,” Mr. Ive said. Mr. Cook digests things carefully, with time, which Mr. Ive said “testifies to the fact he knows it’s important.”
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