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Characteristics of Business Leadership

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Characteristics of Business Leadership
Assignment 2: Characteristics of Business Leadership
Daniel Sloat
Charles Wittenberg
BUS 302
2/22/2012
Abstract In this paper I will discuss how Steve Jobs became the leader of the largest publically traded company in the world. Along with being CEO of Apple I will discuss the many challenges he encountered in founding Apple and other companies and his rise to the top of the companies and industry. I will discuss his leadership styles such as his unconventional tactics and is unusual involvement in every aspect no matter how small of Apple. The attention to style and design placed in to every product and his aspiration to be the forefront of his industry. He was also not considered by many to be philanthropist. I will also cover his challenges with environmentalist groups and his ways of overcoming these challenges to raise his company to be the first to provide some of the most environmentally friendly devices. Steve Jobs was a businessman, designer and inventor. He was best known for cofounding Apple Computer, Inc which makes the popular iPhone and iPod as well as the Macintosh line of computers and the iPad. He also cofounded Pixar Animation Studios and when Disney acquired Pixar became a member of the board of directors of The Walt Disney Company.

Before helping found Apple, Steve Jobs took a job as a technician at Atari, Inc in Los Gatos, California in 1974. He worked with Steve Wozniak who he met in 1971 through a mutual friend. Wozniak help Steve Jobs create a circuit board for Atari. In 1975 he started attending meetings of the Homebrew Computer Club with Steve Wozniak. A year later Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak along with Ronald Wayne founded Apple Computer, Inc after Wozniak invented the Apple I computer. Steve Jobs did not initially serve as the CEO of Apple. Steve Jobs lured John Sculley away from Pepsi-Cola to be CEO. He faced many challenges with running Apple. Some of Apples employees from that time described him as


References: "Apple Improves Recycling Plan". PC Magazine. April 21, 2006. http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,1895,1952356,00.asp. Elkind, Peter (March 5, 2008). "The trouble with Steve Jobs". Fortune. http://money.cnn.com/2008/03/02/news/companies/elkind_jobs.fortune/index.htm. Retrieved February 22, 2012. Linzmayer, O. W. (2004). Apple Confidential 2.0: The Definitive History of the World 's Most Colorful Company. No Starch Press. ISBN 1593270100 “Apple 's $46 billion sales set new tech record". CNN. February 24, 2012. http://money.cnn.com/2012/01/24/technology/apple_earnings/index.htm. "Apple now worth more than Google and Microsoft combined". Appleinsider.com. 2012-02-09. http://www.appleinsider.com/articles/12/02/09/apple_now_worth_more_than_google_and_microsoft_combined.html. Retrieved February 22, 2012. Gupta, Poornima (August 9, 2011). "Apple briefly passes Exxon as largest U.S. company". Reuters. http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/08/09/us-apple-exxon-idUSTRE7784RX20110809. Retrieved February 25, 2012. Butcher, Lee (1987). Accidental Millionaire: The rise and fall of Steve Jobs at Apple. Paragon House. ISBN 978-0913729793.
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