Steve Jobs' 20 rules of success

Steve Jobs' rules for success:

• First thing: As soon as you join/start a company, make a list of strengths and weaknesses of yourself and your company on a piece of paper.

• Don't hesitate in throwing bad apples out of the company.

• Don't worry about too many things at once. Take a handful of simple things to begin with, and then progress to more complex ones.

• People judge you by your performance, so focus on the outcome.

• Success generates more success. So be hungry for it. "I've always wanted to own and control the primary technology in everything we do."

• Ask for feedback, from people with diverse backgrounds. Each one will tell you one useful thing.

• If you're at the top of the chain, sometimes people won't give you honest feedback because they're afraid. In this case, disguise yourself, or get feedback from other sources (Steve Jobs actually called Apple Customer Care disguising himself as a customer, just to check on them).

• Focus on those who will use your product - listen to your customers first.

• Advertise. If they don't know it, they won't buy your product.

• Pay attention to design. "We made the buttons on the screen look so good you'll want to lick them." "Design is not just what it looks like and feels like. Design is how it works."

• "Innovation distinguishes a leader from a follower." If there's a better technology available, use it no matter if anyone else is not using it. Be the first, and make it an industry standard. “I think this is the start of something really big. Sometimes that first step is the hardest one, and we've just taken it.”

• “Be a yardstick of quality. Some people aren't used to an environment where excellence is expected.”

• Learn to criticize your enemies openly, but honestly.

• If you partner someone whom you don't like, learn to like them - praise them and benefit from them - "Ecosystem approach"

• Sometimes when you innovate, you make mistakes. It is best to admit them quickly, and get on with improving your other innovations.

• Do your best at every job. No sleep!

• Think about not just tomorrow, but the future. “I want to put a ding in the universe.”

• There's always "one more thing" to learn!

• "Better be a pirate than to join the navy"

• "Think different"

Reality Distortion Field

Reality Distortion Field (abbr: RDF) is a term first heard in the Star Trek series. This term referred to optimism being taken to great heights, so that mere mortals could do things way beyond their reach. But this term went almost unnoticed, unpopularized, until Budd Tribble used this term again. Budd Tribble was an MD, PhD working at Apple Computer as a manager of the development team. Being a trained physiologist, he noted Steve Jobs' ability in keeping his team highly motivated by an intriguing mixture of his charisma, charm, exaggeration and clever marketing.

Steve Jobs made his programmers believe that they could "just do it", and his team then put in enormous amounts of effort in their work, leading to heightened productivity and efficiency. The result was Apple Computer passing milestones of success, non-stop.

How to create Reality Distortion Field:

1. Be optimistic yourself.
   
2. Present small achievements as "breakthroughs", interesting developments as "turning points" and "huge leaps forward".
3. Use your personality and charisma effectively for convincing others "you can do it"
4. Be funny about your ideas.
5. Be ready to bend the facts to fit the purpose at hand.
6. Make others follow you, and then make them dream of success.
   

Notes:

1. The effect of RDF is quite volatile. It stays only as long as the initiating force (Steve Jobs in this example) is around the subject, and withers off in his absence.
2. RDF works effectively even when the subject knows about it.