<story><title>The New Apple Advantage</title><url>http://daringfireball.net/2011/09/new_apple_advantage</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>microarchitect</author><text>I understand these things are partly symbolic, but besides that is this really useful? I mean, is there a real business benefit to Apple by making Khan take the next immediate flight to China rather than the one a few hours later. Similarly, what was your friend doing that was so important that he couldn&apos;t wait to get a change of clothes?&lt;p&gt;I personally do my best work when I&apos;m relaxed and un-stressed. The apple environment seems to be diametrically opposite to this. I can see that some people might thrive in this environment, but I always wonder at what cost to themselves.</text></item><item><author>jballanc</author><text>There&apos;s a story that I&apos;ve heard told about Tim Cook numerous times. I can&apos;t remember the original source (there&apos;s a reference here: &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.cultofmac.com/who-is-apples-new-ceo-tim-cook-bio/110498&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http://www.cultofmac.com/who-is-apples-new-ceo-tim-cook-bio/...&lt;/a&gt;), but I think it basically sums up Tim:&lt;p&gt;&amp;#62; When in a meeting discussing a problem in China, Tim Cook noted that the problem was “really bad” and that someone should be in China fixing it. Thirty minutes later, Cook then famously looked over at Apple’s operations manager, Sabih Khan, and asked “Why are you still here?” Khan was on the next flight to China.&lt;p&gt;But what&apos;s most remarkable is that like Jobs, Tim has managed to infuse this attitude into the very fabric of Apple. Once, when I worked there, a friend called and asked if I had plans for lunch. I replied that I did not. &quot;Good,&quot; he said, &quot;Can you drive me to SFO?&quot; So I picked him up. He had a seat on the 1:30 PM flight and we were barely going to make it. &quot;Do you think we have time to stop by my place so I can grab a change of clothes?&quot; he asked. I told him that we did not, and his reply was &quot;Oh well, I guess I&apos;ll just have to find a store in Boston&quot;...</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>glenra</author><text>Speaking from experience as somebody who has done this sort of trip:  Yes, it&apos;s hugely useful and there is a real business benefit.&lt;p&gt;First off, we&apos;re probably talking about a time when there were only a few direct flights a day from SFO to the relevant airport so if he didn&apos;t go that afternoon he&apos;d have to wait until the next morning so instead of flying through the night he&apos;d be flying through the day - flying RIGHT THEN means &lt;i&gt;one less day in which your product slips its schedule&lt;/i&gt;.&lt;p&gt;Now recall that Apple used to have trouble getting enough media attention so they would schedule product announcements around, say, MacWorld or the Superbowl. Big events that &lt;i&gt;cannot be moved&lt;/i&gt;. Every day the schedule slips makes it that much more likely you miss the intended product launch window. For Apple, if your product isn&apos;t ready to ship, it&apos;s not ready to show which means you&apos;ve wasted a lot of money - your next suitable launch window might be months later by which time the product no longer has a compelling story to tell. Missing the intended launch date can mean the difference between a successful product and a failure.&lt;p&gt;Conference calls are expensive and tend to involve both high-level people and lower-level people. If the schedule is slipping, the chinese engineers won&apos;t necessarily tell you the truth about &lt;i&gt;why&lt;/i&gt; it&apos;s slipping in that sort of forum - there&apos;s a face-saving issue. There are also communications difficulties when people who don&apos;t speak english well just nod and say &quot;yes, we&apos;ll do that&quot; without really understanding what they&apos;re agreeing to. Email can clarify and puts things in writing but the time difference means most exchanges lose at least a day.&lt;p&gt;Another factor is &quot;the squeaky wheel gets the grease&quot;. The same factory is trying to build products for you &lt;i&gt;and&lt;/i&gt; a variety of other companies. When some other company&apos;s product totally unrelated to yours has a crisis, they might choose to rationally pull engineering resources away from &lt;i&gt;your&lt;/i&gt; product to serve somebody else...if you&apos;re not there to nag and check up on the schedule.&lt;p&gt;The bottom line is that if you don&apos;t have at least one person there most of the time, your product stands a very very low chance of meeting your schedule &lt;i&gt;or&lt;/i&gt; your quality targets.</text></comment>
<story><title>The New Apple Advantage</title><url>http://daringfireball.net/2011/09/new_apple_advantage</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>microarchitect</author><text>I understand these things are partly symbolic, but besides that is this really useful? I mean, is there a real business benefit to Apple by making Khan take the next immediate flight to China rather than the one a few hours later. Similarly, what was your friend doing that was so important that he couldn&apos;t wait to get a change of clothes?&lt;p&gt;I personally do my best work when I&apos;m relaxed and un-stressed. The apple environment seems to be diametrically opposite to this. I can see that some people might thrive in this environment, but I always wonder at what cost to themselves.</text></item><item><author>jballanc</author><text>There&apos;s a story that I&apos;ve heard told about Tim Cook numerous times. I can&apos;t remember the original source (there&apos;s a reference here: &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.cultofmac.com/who-is-apples-new-ceo-tim-cook-bio/110498&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http://www.cultofmac.com/who-is-apples-new-ceo-tim-cook-bio/...&lt;/a&gt;), but I think it basically sums up Tim:&lt;p&gt;&amp;#62; When in a meeting discussing a problem in China, Tim Cook noted that the problem was “really bad” and that someone should be in China fixing it. Thirty minutes later, Cook then famously looked over at Apple’s operations manager, Sabih Khan, and asked “Why are you still here?” Khan was on the next flight to China.&lt;p&gt;But what&apos;s most remarkable is that like Jobs, Tim has managed to infuse this attitude into the very fabric of Apple. Once, when I worked there, a friend called and asked if I had plans for lunch. I replied that I did not. &quot;Good,&quot; he said, &quot;Can you drive me to SFO?&quot; So I picked him up. He had a seat on the 1:30 PM flight and we were barely going to make it. &quot;Do you think we have time to stop by my place so I can grab a change of clothes?&quot; he asked. I told him that we did not, and his reply was &quot;Oh well, I guess I&apos;ll just have to find a store in Boston&quot;...</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>jballanc</author><text>This wasn&apos;t for show, wasn&apos;t symbolic. Without going into details, there was no alternative for being there in person (remember Apple is as much, or more of, a hardware company as a software company).&lt;p&gt;As for your second point, I think you make the mistake of assuming that there are only two states one can operate in: stressed or relaxed. In fact, there is a third...let&apos;s call it &quot;flow&quot;, for lack of a better term. That&apos;s where you&apos;re up all night, running to the airport on a moments notice, pulling out all the stops to be &lt;i&gt;absolutely perfect&lt;/i&gt;, but you don&apos;t feel stressed in the slightest.&lt;p&gt;...Apple runs on that flow.</text></comment>