Which company is more innovative Apple or Google? And how is that is even related to us in the Kingdom?
Such debate is definitely tough; they are both innovative, successful and they have affected our lives, or if you want, changed the world, as we know it. But Walter Isaacson, president and CEO of Aspen Institute and the author of Steve Jobs biography, has a very interesting take on this.
In a TV interview followed by an article on The Huffington Post, Isaacson declared that although he sees Google as the one that is more innovative, Apple is the one more successful. The reason is simple; Apple is the one more focused. “Innovation is wonderful, but on its own it’s not the Holy Grail. Other things matter just as much in creating a great company or product, most notably execution and focus,” is how Isaacson justified his opinion. I find myself inclined to agree with such a proposal. Given that each one has its own flavor ingrained in their different products, there is still that special edge, the next level that Apple seems to be always able to reach with its products. The unique embrace between artistic design and beautiful execution is what makes Apple simply different. Both Apple and Google are innovative, they generate great ideas, but Apple knows how to transform its ideas into reality with focus and great attention to details.
And this is the essence of how such comparison is related to us in the Kingdom, we do not produce state-of-the-art technological products, but we are always interested in the ideas, the dreams, rather than how to realize them!
Dreams and visions, in themselves, are not bad; they are the sparks before the fire, the initial steps on the long journey of development and modernity, however still, they are not enough. You could be dreaming of the best education in the world, spending millions on it for years, but the result is just below mediocrity because you lost focus, you wanted to accomplish a hundred beautiful things, but you ended up with few average ones. You could be dreaming of the best medical services in the world, with modern hospitals, qualified staff, and free, or at least reasonably affordable, services, and yet you failed; you had so much to do, you lost focus. You want to have the most organized labor market in the world, you work hard on many different fronts, to realize that you miscalculated some simple formulas and you lost focus.
The private sector is not doing great either. A lot of private organizations slap their customers, day and night, with the slogan “the customer comes first,” but when it comes to reality, they are all the same; lousy services, and premium profit margins. They have the ideas, maybe the best in the world practices and supporting systems, and that’s it, they love the feeling of having the best in the world, but how this is executed in the field is not of a much importance.
Isaacson used this story about Steve Jobs to stress the importance of work and focus over ideas and dreams. “Once a year, when he was healthy, Jobs took his most valuable employees on a retreat, which he called “The Top 100.” At the end of each, he would stand in front of a whiteboard and ask, “What are the ten things we should be doing next?” People would fight to get their suggestions on the list. Jobs would write them down and cross off the ones he decreed dumb. After much jockeying, the group would come up with a list of ten. Then Jobs would slash the bottom seven and announce, ‘We can only do three.’ He made people focus,” he wrote in his article.
As ideas and innovations and dreams are good, they are not enough, working hard to attain them, and keeping focused along the way, are the factors determining success.
@ smaldosari
