The Business of Life

Steven Jobs On Perspective: Thoughts for Better Relationships

I am in the process of writing a book that uses quotes from famous business leaders to provide an opportunity for me to reflect on how these may apply to our most important relationships. I have long thought that these leaders, with real, tangible and significant achievements, are often ignored while we search for the deeper implications of every utterance from the latest "flavor-of-the-month" movie star, musician or athlete. From time to time, I may post an installment dealing with a favorite quality of good relationships. Following is a quote from Steven Jobs that I believe illustrates well the value of having perspective in all of our relationships.


“Remembering that I'll be dead soon is the most important tool I've ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life.” - Steven Jobs

Talk about perspective! If any of my readers need a quick primer on Steven Jobs, here it is. Jobs is a product of the California public school system and a college dropout to boot. He co-founded and is today the Chairman and CEO of Apple Inc. He was smart enough to recognize that the company needed outside expertise when he recruited John Sculley from Pepsi in 1983 to be his CEO by asking him, “Do you want to spend the rest of your life selling sugared water or do you want to change the world?” He was tough enough to take back his company in a boardroom coup in 1997. Jobs' second reign at Apple started with a lot of fear as employees saw projects and colleagues eliminated but has steadily grown into respect and even reverence for his visionary leadership. His continuous improvement of the Mac, coupled with the humorous and creative TV commercials slamming the hapless PC, cemented his place as a hero to computer users everywhere. If that wasn't enough, he revolutionized consumer electronics and music distribution with the introduction of the iPod and iTunes and served up a must-have cell phone with a premium price in the iPhone. I have a feeling he is not even close to being done changing the world.

The perspective of “remembering I'll be dead soon” helps Jobs obviously in not getting trapped into assigning outsized relevance to transitory business conditions. I think it can also have significance in our relationships if we examine it more closely. When we take it apart, there is an overwhelming sense of perspective that we can use everyday with everyone we truly care for.

The whole prospect of our death is extremely powerful. It is the great equalizer and the in-your-face reality of all of our lives. We alternatively ignore it early in life and fear it as we get older. But what if that prospect of death was a motivator? What if we used our inevitable death to secure and anchor our relationships? Would we have a greater sense of urgency to share of ourselves with those who matter most? Would the difficult conversations actually take place? Would the praise and admiration flow more freely and unconditionally? Would smiles be more frequent and celebrations not be reserved for special occasions? Would advice not be laced with criticism and empathy be more apparent? I say ”Yes” to all of those and more.

It is an old cliche but living like today is your last really puts things in perspective. Not every choice is a big choice in that context. Priorities become more clear. This is not to say that life has to be a ponderous journey with continual rankings and limited spontaneity. What I think it brings into focus is the vitally important relationships we have with other people. Nothing is more sacred or more important. We can not neglect them and put it off for tomorrow. Whether it is a sibling, parent, spouse, child, co-worker, lover or friend, human interaction and reverence for each other is what really matters. Practice your concern for others as if today was the last day you'd be around. It won't always work but it's at least worthy of your best effort. That, after all, would be a big choice.

Labels: Apple Computer, choices, death, decision-making, perspective, priorities, Relationships, Steven Jobs

posted by Tom Hagerty @ 9:05 AM