Two strong images of Apple’s co-founder emerge from the biography, says Richard Waters in the FT. One is of Jobs as the latest of a “long tradition of US business leaders. Riding the wave of a new technology and imbued with strong consumer product and marketing instincts, he stirred up new markets where few before even dreamed they might exist – much as entrepreneurs from Henry Ford to Polaroid’s Edwin Land had before him.” The other, to copy a phrase from Microsoft rival Bill Gates, is of someone who was “fundamentally odd”.
For example, in his early years at Atari he rarely bathed, believing that his fruit-only diet cleansed him from within. Co-workers disagreed and Jobs was forced to work nightshifts. It’s also clear from this “eyewateringly frank biography” that Jobs “could be a world-class asshole”, says Tim Martin in The Daily Telegraph. He stole the ideas of underlings and “rode roughshod over employees, friends and lovers”.
Yet colleagues at Apple also maintain that his “abrasive behaviour”, coupled with his “inflexible refusal to take no for an answer”, pushed them to do the best work of their lives.There’s no doubt Jobs’ nastiness served a purpose, says The Economist. But Apple wasn’t a one-man show. “He took on ideas from others and recruited great talent.” He also “engineered a different kind of technology company”. At most companies engineering drives design, whereas “Apple does it the other way around… Mr Jobs would decide on how a product should look and feel, and the engineers had to make it happen.”
Despite its minimalist ‘Applesque’ cover – which Jobs designed – the book isn’t as flawless as one of Jobs’ products. It was rushed to print when his health took a turn for the worse and at times is “repetitive and long-winded”. Nevertheless, the exhaustive research behind it means “it is worth the read” for anyone who wants to get inside one of America’s most creative business brains.
• Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson. Published by Little, Brown, £25.