Steve Job Commencement Speech at Stanford U

"I was fired from the very company I created… and it turned out to be the best thing that ever happened to me."

When I was born, my biological parents gave me up for adoption.

That moment — even though I couldn't remember it — left a mark that never fully faded.

My adoptive parents gave me love, warmth, and stability.

But inside, a quiet voice kept asking: Why wasn't I enough to be kept?

That question became my engine.

That pain — my fuel.

I was determined to build something so meaningful that the world couldn't look away.

At 20, in my parents' garage, I co-founded Apple.

No investors. No safety net. No plan B.

Just an idea — and an obsession to make technology beautiful, simple, and human.

For a while, it worked.

Then life flipped the script.

At 30, I was forced out — fired by the same company I had built from nothing.

It felt like exile.

Like being thrown out of your own home. 💼⚡

For months, I wandered in the dark — humiliated, angry, lost.

But somewhere in that emptiness… a spark reignited.

I started again.

From zero.

I built NeXT — and bought a small animation studio that would soon become Pixar.

And while I was rebuilding, life had a strange way of coming full circle:

Apple bought NeXT — not to hire me back, but to buy the technology I'd created.

That's how I returned.

This time, stronger.

Wiser.

Free from the need to prove — driven instead to create.

Together, we launched the iMac, the iPod, the iPhone.

We didn't just design products — we redesigned how people live, dream, listen, and connect.

Behind every headline was a man once rejected, adopted, and fired —

who refused to let any of it define him.

🍎📲

Because sometimes the greatest breakthroughs are born from heartbreak.

Sometimes the fall is what gives you wings.

⏳💥

"Life will hit you in the head with a brick. Don't lose faith.

Because what feels like an ending… might just be the start of something extraordinary."

— Steve Jobs

Being mysterious: do you want to share a secret?

Nation building via learning and being the best in business

  Air of mystery (do you want to know a secret?)

       In sales platform, they sell mystery boxes and many fall for this.

      People go for mystery and intrigues and hence the prevlance of such shows novels and books

      We want to be kept on edge and be in the world of mystery and unknown.

     Hence the 11th missing herb for KFC, the secret formula for Coca Cola

     Hence in ads, dont reveal all.  Leave something for imagination   

     Make it a striptease.  Dont go for full brochures but fliers or ads that are teasers asking customers

     to want more.

    But personally I find the ads that asks something in return for more info more annoying especially

    if the competition is high.   Some companies are not so domanding.

   What do you do with your ads?   Selling benefits before mentioning price is a way of putting mytery

   in your presentation

      

     

The old book I read regarding increasing revenue by x %, and reducing cost/expenses by y% can increase profits by z%

Nation building via learning and being the best in business

We tried to recompute the GP on an important service and these were the things we did:

     1.  Mechanized the operastions saving xxxxx per unit

     2.  Raised the price by 20% true mark up ( x/0.80

     

The mechanization could increase the intake of customers by 20% and that means a lot

The GP could be a cool 8 numbers and double that of GP on plots wherein we gain only P5,500 per plot

So the things on the following are correct:

    1.  God is in the details

    2.   The box by Gettner re Amazon pain before on packign boxes on employees knees.  It was

           solved by common sense solution of packing on a table

    3.   Post on Elon Musk on wrong frequency which pointed out to a deformed aluminum part which

          could have caused another Space x disaster

    4.  One of the traits of an entrepreneur isi being process oriented

    So find the bottleneck in the operations, what causes the delay:   it could be lack of server in FB, or             slow processing of credit card.

Paul Getter posts and ideas seen at FB

Paul Getter the internet marketing nerd

These are some of his post at FB and we can learn a thing or two from him.  The theme is just being unusual, thinking out of the box, or a purple cow.

It is the focus of most strategist.   Do nothing exotic about your business model.  Just make an outstanding unique product or ad, to be the  most preferred and saleable 

product in the market place

And profiting from you mistakes

1.  THE BAD PEN  (a recurring theme in his writings)

      A bad pen in the batch can be your best teacher.   It teaches you to make a better product.    It can be your free consultant to improve your product and hence your company

2.  The MISSING KEY

     One day, Andrew Carnegie the steel business magnate found out that they could not start the factory because they could not find the KEY  to the warehouse Then Andrew c ordered the

     unthinkable -  destroy and stop having a lock from thereon.   What was the lock and key for -  to prevent the 1% possibility of theft.  What then was the solution:    better system, better

     process to stop the theft .   The key could not be a bottleneck for running a multimillion project.   There has to be a better way.  How many times do we find bottlenecks in the business

     that should not be there and stop the business.  Find and remove them

3.  The spotlight switch

     This is about the concert of Bayonce that experienced a brown out.  The team of Bayonce was prepared and anticipated this.    And the concert was a success.  And a PR was created:

     to highlight the  team of Bayonce -   " Bayonce concert proceeded despite brown out"   A great team, a great singer   Turn a misfortune a disadvantage into a uniqueness, a shining moment, a 

     stand out

4.   The empty table 

       The story is about Steve Jobs returning to Apple.   Apple was on verge of collapse and bankruptcy  after he was fired and other CEOs took over including Sculley, whom he recruited from

       Pepsi Cola but fired him   Steve looked at the list of the plethora of products  And initially Steve Jobs said nothing.  But he cleared the table -  removed the other non performing products and

       left just four.   More products line:    1.   Create confusion and chaos    2   Dissipate resources and management thinking and energy.  3.   Destroys focus.

      Application in marketing;    the first 5 seconds is important.  If it cant be explained in 5 seconds, then you cant sell it.      If the ad cant stop the eye of the scroller in 5 seconds it cant sell.  

      Empty table enables focus, focus, focus

     The successful billionaires are those who focus on one industry or product.   Or activity.   Conglomerates

       are long gone  So who are most successful:   Warren Buffett Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg for               staying focussed.   Most successful ads are 7 words, some say it is 15 words.  Too many tend to               confuse

     Again same thing:   from nothing to nothing.  (Pay Pal  -   Peter Thiel)

5.  Inside out

     This is reverse thinking, this is about stand out.    This is about clothing     Abercombie fitch  Other clothing focussed on things that are visible -  outside.   Fitch focussed on logos and

      graphics in the inside.   They built identity inside and out.    The bigger the logos sign the bigger the sales.   Sales fettered out when they changed the strategy.  

     So the product must be presented what it does inside -  the body, the label, not what it does outside   It is one approach.

6   Lost luggage

     Thsi happened to Southwest, Herb Gallagher airline  One time it kep losing luggage.   It could not  afford that bad pr bad customer service.   So Herb athered its ground crew and staff and conferred

      on how to address this issue and they were able to solve this at a minimal cost.  From pure team work and cooperation.

    ( A negative into a positive)

7.   From missed call bug to an opportunity.

     There was a bug that existed in a Motorola phone model.  There was a buzzing sound in case there was a missed call  It was a bug.  Motorola did not solve this and use this bug aa a distinguishing

      feature.   Turning a glitch, a bug into an advantage

      (disadvantage into advantage)

8.   Less talk, less mistake, less talk more of mystery

How do you treat subordinates? Does good human relations and camaraderie apply

Nation building via learning and being the best in business

HR practitioners and new business leaders often mistake that being lax and friendly to the staff -  being lax on work standards and loan is the key to successful business management.   Often these individuals like me in the beginning fall flat on their faces.

Sooner or later the staff:    leave

Personnel management becomes difficult because of this system.

We need to have a system rather than personnel relationship

Business models: how companies make money and sometimes they are hidden

Nation building via learning and being the best in business

I saw this post at SocMedia regarding a driving school.  The other schools were charging P34,000 and others lowered this to P24,000   Still no takers

One enterprising driving school entrepreneur offerred the course for free.    But will require a P24,000 deposit for safety of car being driven (to cover repairs just in case.  

1.   The refund of the deposit can be given back at the end of the course;

2.  P5,000 will be given as reward  for safe driving at the end of two years. and P10,000 can be given at the end of 5 years if the studdent is accident free

3   How can the driving history be tracked?   By selling insurance to the student bought in bulk,   The driving school gets a 40% gross margin on this as com.

4.  By tying up with car companies and dealers for com by referring students for services and sales

Crafty isnt it?