Steve Jobs he was known as a company president who could prove to be very difficult, and that was because of the rather controversial way in which he ran his companies. Although not all his working methods were appreciated by the employees, Steve Jobs still had some very interesting ways to find out information from the employees he controlled.
One of these working methods was revealed recently, showing how the former president of Apple finds out what is not working within his companies. To avoid "diplomatic" answers and the fear of telling the truth, Steve Jobs gathered groups of about 10-12 employees in conference rooms and chose each one to ask them what works and what doesn't work in his companies.
Steve Jobs asked his employees to give quick answers, even if it meant putting his collections in a bad light, but that's how he found out the things that are good, or bad, in his companies. Steve Jobs constantly used this method to find out information about how companies work, and it was also adopted by other presidents.
"In the early 2000s, Jobs was splitting his time between Apple and Pixar. He would spend most days at Apple, but then he would parachute into Pixar. He would have to figure out where his attention was needed really fast, so he would arrange sessions with all the different teams—the Cars team, the technology team, whatever—so there were a dozen or so people in each one. Then he would point to one person in each session and say: Tell me what's not working at Pixar.
That person might offer something like, 'The design team isn't open to new technology we're building.' Jobs would ask others if they agreed. He would then choose someone else and say: Tell me what's working at Pixar.
According to Famous CEO, Jobs would alternate between the two questions until he felt like he had a handle on what was going on."
Steve Jobs had many good ideas over time, but also quite a few bad ideas, so it is interesting to find out what worked in what he did in his relations with his employees.
