Not The Rewards
From: Twilight of the smartphone gods by Margaret Wente (edited)
Funny things happen to people who get stupendously rich.
Instead of dreaming night and day about the next great product, they start to dream about building the most spectacular mansion.
Tommy Caldwell said, “Once the CEO is building the maxi-yacht or the great mansion or trying to buy hockey teams, he is not paying attention to his business.”
Meanwhile, Steve Jobs was dreaming up hit products that people would line up overnight to buy.
He had no taste for “that nutso lavish lifestyle that so many people do when they get rich.”
The trouble is that people who get rich get fat and soft. They’re not hungry any more.
Mr. Jobs knew that if you stop swimming fast enough, you die.
He was a screaming perfectionist who cursed out his staff when they moved too slowly, or when some product detail wasn’t good enough.
Meanwhile, last year, when RIM released the PlayBook, which was supposed to compete with Apple’s iPad, it was a miserable flop.
It couldn’t do e-mail. It had no Skype, no GPS, no Angry Birds. It wouldn’t even fit into the breast pocket of a jacket.
The Moral if you didn't get it yet:
Jobs was not distracted by success. The guys at RIM were.
Mike Lazaridis spent his time building a mansion and Jim Balsillie spent 3 years trying to buy a hockey team.
They also thought, because they were so successful, that they knew everything and could ignore anyone who had a different view.
When Apple produced the iPhone, Lazaridis dismissed it. No one, he said, wants a computer on their phone.
See also: Being a prick is not enough -- You have to be insane
