Fortune Feature Highlights Tim Cooks Influence on Apple Since Becoming CEO

[Phillip Swanson]

Small bits and pieces of news have hinted at Tim Cook’s influence on the corporate culture within Cupertino. But, a new Fortune story examines at length how much Cook has influenced Apple since taking the reigns from the late Steve Jobs.

A 14-year veteran of the company, Cook is maintaining, by words and actions, most of Apple's unique corporate culture. But shifts of behavior and tone are absolutely apparent; some of them affect the core of Apple's critical product-development process. In general, Apple has become slightly more open and considerably more corporate. In some cases Cook is taking action that Apple sorely needed and employees badly wanted. It's almost as if he is working his way through a to-do list of long-overdue repairs the previous occupant (Jobs) refused to address for no reason other than obstinacy. — Fortune

The story lauds Cook for his operational efficiency, while noting some of the small things that make him a completely difference CEO than Jobs. Outside of Apple now issuing dividend, committing to tougher labor standards for its suppliers and increasing the company’s philanthropic efforts, Fortune highlights and investor meeting that took place back in February. The meeting featured 15 or so investors listening to a 45-minute presentation by Apple CFO Peter Oppenheimer. About 20-minutes into Oppenheimer’s presentation Cook “popped into the room about 20 minutes into Oppenheimer's talk, quietly sat down in the back of the room, and did something unusual for a CEO of Apple: He listened. He didn't check his e-mail once. He didn't interrupt.”

Cook, after Oppenheimer finished, “strode confidently” to the front of the room and fielded questions from investors. According to one investor “He was in complete control and knew exactly who he was and where he wanted to go.” As Fortune notes, the most incredible thing about this appearance, Steve Jobs “wouldn’t have bothered.”

Perhaps an even more telling example is Cook’s mood during Apple’s famed Top 100 retreat, where the top 100 managers as assessed by the CEO and not by rank, get to learn what products and services are on the horizon for the next year or so. Cooks was reportedly in a “jovial, joke-cracking mood” compared to the fear mongering tone of Jobs. One veteran executive was reportedly “blown away” by what he had seen coming down the Apple pipeline, presumably the next iPhone, and perhaps the much rumored Apple HDTV.

Cook is very much his own man. For a long time he was Jobs second in command, and like Jobs his actions indicate he’s going to take Apple where he thinks it should go. Still, Cook is well versed in and loyal to the Jobsian focus on great products and innovation. But, Cook is a little more human often sitting down at random with employees for lunch in the Cupertino campus cafeteria. Fortune puts it best concluding that Apple’s perhaps “doesn’t need a god as CEO, but a mere mortal who understands how to get the job done.”

Source: Fortune

[iPod]

Tim Cook is a great leader for Apple. He doesn't have that dictator-like features of Steve Jobs. I just wish he would stop with the lawsuits...

[severe]

Nice to hear.

[The Amazing Atheist]

He must carry on the tradition of lawsuits though. I agree, he's the best example of leadership for any large company such as Apple.

[PlatoTheForms]

Phillip Swanson, my friend, you'd do well to proofread your writing before posting it.

[iPod]

Phillip Swanson, my friend, you'd do well to proofread your writing before posting it.

Haha, I was gonna mention it, but decided against it