Olivia
Online
Katy Dormer
@katydormer
Comms/Marketing by day, who knows what I come up with at night. My words are my own and do not necessarily represent the views of my company.
Santa Rosa, CA
Joined May 2008
555 Following
1K Followers
3K Posts
I love this so much.
🥹🫶
Shortly after Steve Jobs returned as the CEO of Apple in 1997, he met with Jony Ive, Apple’s Senior VP of industrial design.
Apple had 40 products on the market.
“Jony, how many things have you said no to?” Jobs asked.
Ive was confused.
“You have to understand,” Jobs said,
“There are measures of focus, and one of them is how often you say no.”
“What focus means,” Jobs taught Ive, “is saying no to something that you—with every bone in your body—think is a phenomenal idea, and you wake up thinking about it, but you say no to it because you're focusing on something else.”
Jobs walked up to a whiteboard and drew a 2 x 2 grid. On top, he wrote “Consumer” and “Professional.” Down the side, “Portable” and “Desktop.”
Four products—meet Apple’s new radically focused product line, Jobs said.
After that meeting, over the next two decades, Jobs and Ive—focused on making a few high-quality products while saying no to everything else—transformed a dying, near-bankrupt company into one of the most valuable companies in the world, worth over $2.9 trillion.
Takeaway 1:
The philosopher Marcus Aurelius pointed out that the focus of doing less “brings a double satisfaction.”
You get the satisfaction of having fewer things to do. And…you get the satisfaction of doing those fewer things at a higher level.
You get “to do less, better.”
During Steve Jobs’ first visit to Jony Ive’s design studio, he looked around, and then he said, “Fuck, you’ve not been very effective, have you?”
It was clear to Jobs that Ive was full of ideas and potential he wasn’t able to execute or fulfill under Apple’s previous leadership.
In the Jobs era of “doing less, better,” Ive was very effective.
Some products he designed include: iMac, iPod, iPhone, iPad, Apple Watch, and AirPods.
Takeaway 2:
Even though he slashed the product line down to four products, Jobs loved to have and hear ideas.
“Steve used to say to me,” Ive said, “and he used to say this a lot, ‘Hey, Jony, here’s a dopey idea.’ And sometimes they were: really dopey. Sometimes they were truly dreadful.
But sometimes they took the air from the room, and they left us both completely silent.”
It made me think of what Jerry Seinfeld identifies as the ultimate skill of the artist: “taste and discernment.”
“It’s one thing to create,” Seinfeld says. It’s one thing to have ideas.
“The other is you have to choose. ‘What are we going to do, and what are we not going to do?’” What are we going to add to the product line, and what are we not going to add?
“This is a gigantic aspect of [artistic] survival,” Seinfeld continues.
“It’s kind of unseen—what’s picked and what is discarded—but mastering that is how you stay alive.”
- - -
“Everything just got simpler. That’s been one of my mantras—focus and simplicity.” — Steve Jobs
Follow @bpoppenheimer for more content like this!
![bpoppenheimer's tweet photo. Shortly after Steve Jobs returned as the CEO of Apple in 1997, he met with Jony Ive, Apple’s Senior VP of industrial design.
Apple had 40 products on the market.
“Jony, how many things have you said no to?” Jobs asked.
Ive was confused.
“You have to understand,” Jobs said,
“There are measures of focus, and one of them is how often you say no.”
“What focus means,” Jobs taught Ive, “is saying no to something that you—with every bone in your body—think is a phenomenal idea, and you wake up thinking about it, but you say no to it because you're focusing on something else.”
Jobs walked up to a whiteboard and drew a 2 x 2 grid. On top, he wrote “Consumer” and “Professional.” Down the side, “Portable” and “Desktop.”
Four products—meet Apple’s new radically focused product line, Jobs said.
After that meeting, over the next two decades, Jobs and Ive—focused on making a few high-quality products while saying no to everything else—transformed a dying, near-bankrupt company into one of the most valuable companies in the world, worth over $2.9 trillion.
Takeaway 1:
The philosopher Marcus Aurelius pointed out that the focus of doing less “brings a double satisfaction.”
You get the satisfaction of having fewer things to do. And…you get the satisfaction of doing those fewer things at a higher level.
You get “to do less, better.”
During Steve Jobs’ first visit to Jony Ive’s design studio, he looked around, and then he said, “Fuck, you’ve not been very effective, have you?”
It was clear to Jobs that Ive was full of ideas and potential he wasn’t able to execute or fulfill under Apple’s previous leadership.
In the Jobs era of “doing less, better,” Ive was very effective.
Some products he designed include: iMac, iPod, iPhone, iPad, Apple Watch, and AirPods.
Takeaway 2:
Even though he slashed the product line down to four products, Jobs loved to have and hear ideas.
“Steve used to say to me,” Ive said, “and he used to say this a lot, ‘Hey, Jony, here’s a dopey idea.’ And sometimes they were: really dopey. Sometimes they were truly dreadful.
But sometimes they took the air from the room, and they left us both completely silent.”
It made me think of what Jerry Seinfeld identifies as the ultimate skill of the artist: “taste and discernment.”
“It’s one thing to create,” Seinfeld says. It’s one thing to have ideas.
“The other is you have to choose. ‘What are we going to do, and what are we not going to do?’” What are we going to add to the product line, and what are we not going to add?
“This is a gigantic aspect of [artistic] survival,” Seinfeld continues.
“It’s kind of unseen—what’s picked and what is discarded—but mastering that is how you stay alive.”
- - -
“Everything just got simpler. That’s been one of my mantras—focus and simplicity.” — Steve Jobs
Follow @bpoppenheimer for more content like this!](https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FzeinZYWYAEzlYI.jpg)
I love this for the dog, but also because David Letterman's laugh sounds especially like Johnny Carson here.
Who to follow
Gregg Johnson 
@gregg_johnson
business leader @Invoca, technology enthusiast, dad of 3. opinions are all mine
Todd Enders
@toddenders
Cheerful & bearded Coastie, coaches product marketing leaders & teams. Listens to those who see it differently.
Writer at: https://t.co/pD56Jr08su
Kendall Collins
@kendallcollins
CEO GovCloud @Salesforce
Creativity is not a talent. It is a way of operating. #CreativityDay
Nice update to Facebook Reels! Better personalization controls and easy access to Reels from Facebook Watch. Check it out...
A busy life is not a symbol of status. It's a symptom of trying to do too much for too many people.
A full calendar brings a surplus of stress and a shortage of energy. Reflecting and relaxing should be top priorities.
Unscheduled time isn't wasted. It's invested in well-being.
Never seen this before, but thats a good day at the office
Muhammad Ali dodges 21 punches in 10 seconds (1977)
no this is what every interaction with another man secretly wants to become
People who subscribe to Merriam-Webster Red™ will get exclusive access to the real definitions.
The rainstorm was right ... she was running toward her baby.
Rest in peace, Maggie and Paul 💛☀️
Well this absolutely floored me, absolutely worth a watch.
Do not skip ahead.
I asked OpenAI to write a letter to my son explaining that Santa isn’t real and we make up stories out of love. This is making me slightly emotional 🥹
How do you make a small fortune in social media?
Start out with a large one.
and they're all waiting in a ticket queue right now https://t.co/gJvwg2aQfx
Stock declines from the peak of the dot com bubble to the bottom:
Adobe: -56%
Microsoft: -56%
Amazon: -75%
Nvidia: -75%
Apple: -78%
Stock gains over the next 19 years:
Apple: +58,746%
Nvidia: +33,818%
Amazon: +19,405%
Adobe: +6,250%
Microsoft: +1,240%
The banned "Dead Loop" of Olga Korbut, 1972. It was the first and last time the trick was documented.
This delights me to no end.
These are the sounds we heard 40 years ago 🔈
Trends for you
Most Popular Users
Elon Musk
@elonmusk
241.5M followers
Barack Obama
@barackobama
119M followers
Cristiano Ronaldo
@cristiano
113.8M followers
Donald J. Trump
@realdonaldtrump
111.8M followers
Narendra Modi
@narendramodi
107.2M followers
Rihanna
@rihanna
98.6M followers
NASA
@nasa
92.4M followers
Justin Bieber
@justinbieber
91.7M followers
KATY PERRY
@katyperry
89.7M followers
Taylor Swift
@taylorswift13
83.6M followers
Lady Gaga
@ladygaga
75.1M followers
Virat Kohli
@imvkohli
72.8M followers
Kim Kardashian
@kimkardashian
70.7M followers
YouTube
@youtube
68.8M followers
Neymar Jr
@neymarjr
65.8M followers
Bill Gates
@billgates
64.9M followers
Selena Gomez
@selenagomez
62.7M followers
The Ellen Show
@theellenshow
62.3M followers
CNN
@cnn
61.8M followers
X
@x
60.7M followers