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SPEAKER: Back in 1997, Steve Jobs implemented the functional
structure at Apple.
That is, he divided the company into departments
based on domain expertise rather than traditional business
units.
Ever since this change in structure took place,
Apple's managers at every level have
been expected to possess three key leadership characteristics.
The first is deep expertise.
Apple is not a company where general managers
oversee managers.
Here experts lead experts.
The company believes that it's easier
to train an expert to manage well than to train a manager
to be an expert.
In a 1984 interview Job said, "do you
know who the best managers are?
They are the great individual contributors
who never, ever want to be a manager
but decide they have to be because no one else is
going to do as good a job."
The upside is this.
Apple's 600 plus experts on camera hardware technology work
in a group led by Graham Townsend, a camera expert
himself, because iPhones, iPads, laptops, and desktop computers
all include cameras.
These experts would be scattered across product lines
if Apple was organized in traditional business units.
Consider how this would dilute their collective expertise
and their power to drive innovations.
The second leadership must at Apple
is an immersion in the details.
Apple believes leaders should know
the details of their organization three levels down.
They should be able to push, probe, and smell an issue,
and know which details are important
and where to focus their attention.
Take for instance, how our senior leaders pay
extreme attention to the exact shape of products'
rounded corners.
Let's take a moment to understand this.
The standard method for rounding corners
is to use an arc of a circle to connect the perpendicular
sides of a rectangular object, which
produces a somewhat abrupt transition from straight
to curve.
In contrast, Apple's leaders insist on continuous curves
resulting in a shape known in the design community
as a squircle.
The slope starts sooner but is less abrupt.
The difference is subtle.
And executing it isn't simply a matter of a more complicated
mathematical formula.
It demands that Apple's operations leaders
commit to extremely precise manufacturing tolerances
to produce millions of iPhones and other products
with squircles.
And this deep immersion in detail
isn't pushed down to the lower levels.
It is central to the leadership level.
The third leadership imperative at Apple
is a willingness to collaboratively debate.
Apple has hundreds of specialist teams across the company,
dozens of which may be needed for even one key component
of a new product offering.
For example, the dual lens camera with portrait mode
required the collaboration of no fewer than 40 specialist teams.
The collaborative debate approach involves people
from various functions who disagree, push back, promote
or reject ideas, and build on one
another's ideas to come up with the best solutions.
It requires open mindedness from senior leaders and for them
to inspire, prod, or influence colleagues
to contribute towards these goals.
To recap then, deep expertise, immersion
in details, a willingness to collaboratively debate.
When managers have these attributes,
decisions are made in a coordinated fashion
by the people most qualified to make them
like it does at Apple adding to its innovation and success.
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