Remember John Sculley? You know, the ex-Pepsi guy who helped run Apple and eventually forced Steve Jobs out of the company. Yeah, that guy.
Leander Kahney, editor of Cult of Mac and a former Wired.com news editor, has an exclusive interview with Sculley who offers an intriguing explanation of Jobs’ methodology for building great products.
Some of Jobs’ key strategies include beautiful design, minimalism, looking at a product from the customer’s perspective as opposed to relying on focus groups, hiring only the best and rejecting bad work, Sculley told Kahney.
“Steve said: ‘How can I possibly ask somebody what a graphics-based computer ought to be when they have no idea what a graphic based computer is? No one has ever seen one before,’†Sculley said when explaining Jobs’ refusal to use focus groups. “He believed that showing someone a calculator, for example, would not give them any indication as to where the computer was going to go because it was just too big a leap.â€
Sculley provides rare insight into Apple’s extremely secretive CEO, who only speaks to a handful of mainstream journalists on occasion. Catch the rest of the interview over at Cult of Mac.
See Also:
- How John Sculley Saved Apple From Steve Jobs
- The End of Innocence at Apple: What Happened After Steve Jobs Was …
Photo of Sculley on a cruise boat: Edyson/Flickr.com