Assignment 13A - Reading Reflection No. 1

Steve Jobs

1.     What surprised you the most?
- I think what surprised me the most about Steve Jobs is that he never really went to college. Although, I do know of many successful individuals whom never attended college. However, the level of success that Steve Jobs achieved is quite impressive.

2. What about the entrepreneur did you most admire?
   - I really admire Steve Jobs persistence and desire for greatness. He said, “The people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world, are the ones, who do.” I admire his intensity, passion, commitment to success, his artistic mindset and expertise in design, his simplicity, and his vision. As brought out in the book, Friedland taught Jobs the “reality of distortion field.” This basically implied that perceived reality can become actual reality. For Steve, this was a personal refusal to accept anything that stood in the way of his ideas or what he wanted to accomplish. With this “field” he was able to convince others of his reality too.
   
3. What about the entrepreneur did you least admire?
   - What I least admire about Steve Jobs was his denial of his daughter for the first few years of her life. Even after a test proved she was, he was still in denial. Things such as this I will never understand.
   
   
4. Did the entrepreneur encounter adversity and failure?

- Steve Jobs certainly experienced his fair share of product failures and adversities to overcome. However, despite his failures and uncertainty at times, he persevered. In fact, it is those very failures and the lessons he learned from them that most of his success was based on.

5. What competencies did you notice that the entrepreneur exhibited?

- Steve Jobs exhibited many competencies. He was an innovator, inventor, and talented designer. He was determined, driven, charming (when he wanted), fearless, passionate, challenging, and a risk-taker. He certainly had an entrepreneurial mindset and he was a perfectionist. More than that, his way of thinking and how he saw things was fascinating!

6. Identify at least one part of the reading that was confusing to you.
   - There was nothing about the book that was really confusing. I will say, the one part of the reading, and of his life, that I didn’t understand was why he didn’t accept the position of CEO once back at Apple. He was offered the position, yet he refused… Why?

7. If you were able to ask two questions to the entrepreneur, what would you ask? Why- The following two questions I would ask because I have seen first-hand the sacrifice that is involved in being an entrepreneur. I would be curious to hear his personal thoughts on this.

·      What is your biggest regret?

·      Was all the hard work, time and commitment you put into your success worth the personal sacrifice?

** For fun: what do you think the entrepreneur's opinion was of hard work? 

It was clear that Steve Jobs understand the value of hard work and the benefits one could reap from it. I agree.