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People are saying that Jobs was being an asshole. I don't know much about the man, but what he's doing here is intelligent negotiation, plain and simple. The br

People are saying that Jobs was being an asshole. I don't know much about the man, but what he's doing here is intelligent negotiation, plain and simple. The bravado of shredding the paper and loudly announcing the desired figure is a dead giveaway that (1) the other details of the contract don't mean much to him, and (2) the 50% figure means an awful lot to whoever else was supposed to hear it. You have to keep in mind what Jobs is trying to accomplish here. It's like a kid loudly putting stuff away when their mom walks by, "yea mom, just cleaning my room!" The ruthless part is that Jobs would have no problem if she didn't pick up on that and came back with the same contract and the 50% rate. I think that the lessons in this post are valuable for negotiating with intelligent people.

vacri 13y ago
I think that the lessons in this post are valuable for negotiating with intelligent people. The lesson in this post is "Have someone who works closely with the person you're negotiating with, who is willing to chase after you and tell you how to get around such a silly restriction". If the author didn't have the information that that was specifically what Jobs was looking for, then (in a slightly different world) she could have returned with exactly the same contract as she did, but Jobs may instead have taken extreme offense that she was fiddling the numbers, and that he meant 'actually 50%'. Most hagglers see this whole process as coming to an agreed percentage ("no, how about 20? 25? 25 and a free holiday?"), not "cook the numbers so that the same amount of money has a cosmetically different appearance". You start with a ridiculous number and work your way to something reasonable-but-favourable. Hagglers generally don't start with a ridiculous number and peacock about getting it even through a lie. Also, being intelligent (as the layman defines it) does not mean you're a shrewd negotiator and vice versa. There are plenty of successful businesspeople with shrewd negotiation skills that don't even understand the basics of their own business.
lutusp 13y ago
> A bunch of people here are saying that Jobs was being an asshole. Well ... he was. > I don't know much about the man, but what he's doing here is intelligent negotiation, plain and simple. Jobs had the destructive habit of tearing people down for no reason, preventing them from liking either themselves or him. I knew him personally and I saw this behavior any number of times, behavior that had no possible positive outcome. In this case, Jobs could simply have said, "This is completely unacceptable, but I'm sure you'll find a way to meet my legitimate requirements. I'm available next Thursday if you think we can come to an agreement." You know -- like a normal person. In the Isaacson book, Jobs is accurately described as a clinical narcissist, and I can confirm than from personal experience. To those who think Jobs accomplished what he did because of his behavior, I say he accomplished what he did in spite of his behavior. Obviously we will never know, this cannot be science, but Jobs went through life burning everyone down, filtering out everyone who wasn't a born narcissistic enabler.
- deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]
- jckt 13y ago
  > filtering out everyone who wasn't a born narcissistic enabler. Do you mean that there instances where he really listened or liked/respected/etc someone because they had similar narcissistic tendencies? I was under the impression that people like him tend to hate people like themselves -- a narcissist who thinks he's the best is at greatest odds with another narcissist who thinks he's the best.
  - vacri 13y ago
    lutusp means the archetypal 'yes-man', the person who openly admires anything you do and only ever agrees with you, reinforcing your self-esteem, 'enabling' your 'narcissism'.
    - jckt 13y ago
      Ah, okay, I get it now. I completely misunderstood lutusp's sentence.
  - lutusp 13y ago
    > Do you mean that there instances where he really listened or liked/respected/etc someone because they had similar narcissistic tendencies? Narcissists and enablers aren't the same personality type, even though one can become the other over time. More here: http://arachnoid.com/ChildrenOfNarcissus http://arachnoid.com/ChildrenOfNarcissus
  - ngpio 13y ago
    > a narcissist who thinks he's the best is at greatest odds to another narcissist who thinks he's the best. Only if both have very literal, wide-reaching interpretations of 'the best'. Arrogance and narcissism are often contextual, and I've met many self-absorbed, but ultimately capable people who value a similar imbalance in others. Who am I kidding, I'm talking about myself.
- 13y ago
larrys 13y ago
"The bravado of shredding the paper and loudly announcing the desired figure is a dead giveaway" You are right based on my many many years negotiating. Noting also that Steve used this with Heidi Roizen. While he may have also used it with a "Carl Icahn" (someone like Carl, not Carl) I somehow doubt it. It's pure bluster and it telegraphs a lot. [1] One more important point (perhaps someone else has mentioned this). The "friend" could have been part of the act. Quite possibly. Negotiating is part acting and role playing (at least the way I have seen it done and practice myself). As a result it's similar to when the government doesn't officially release info but manages to get someone to "off record" to get something in the press. They call it "absence of malice" or similar (I think don't remember the exact phrase..) [1] I've had cases negotiating where I know in advance that I will shake my head up and down "no" even if the number is good just to send a message.
PhasmaFelis 13y ago
> People are saying that Jobs was being an asshole. You say this, and then you say a bunch of fancy words that boil down to "he's an asshole." I feel like this is a big part of the problem with...hell, with capitalism and corporatism in general. You people have gotten the idea that being an asshole doesn't count as being an asshole if you GET RESULTS. No, that's not right. An asshole who gets results is still just an asshole. That's not a good thing.

vacri 13y ago

I think that the lessons in this post are valuable for negotiating with intelligent people. The lesson in this post is "Have someone who works closely with the person you're negotiating with, who is willing to chase after you and tell you how to get around such a silly restriction". If the author didn't have the information that that was specifically what Jobs was looking for, then (in a slightly different world) she could have returned with exactly the same contract as she did, but Jobs may instead have taken extreme offense that she was fiddling the numbers, and that he meant 'actually 50%'. Most hagglers see this whole process as coming to an agreed percentage ("no, how about 20? 25? 25 and a free holiday?"), not "cook the numbers so that the same amount of money has a cosmetically different appearance". You start with a ridiculous number and work your way to something reasonable-but-favourable. Hagglers generally don't start with a ridiculous number and peacock about getting it even through a lie. Also, being intelligent (as the layman defines it) does not mean you're a shrewd negotiator and vice versa. There are plenty of successful businesspeople with shrewd negotiation skills that don't even understand the basics of their own business.

lutusp 13y ago

> A bunch of people here are saying that Jobs was being an asshole. Well ... he was. > I don't know much about the man, but what he's doing here is intelligent negotiation, plain and simple. Jobs had the destructive habit of tearing people down for no reason, preventing them from liking either themselves or him. I knew him personally and I saw this behavior any number of times, behavior that had no possible positive outcome. In this case, Jobs could simply have said, "This is completely unacceptable, but I'm sure you'll find a way to meet my legitimate requirements. I'm available next Thursday if you think we can come to an agreement." You know -- like a normal person. In the Isaacson book, Jobs is accurately described as a clinical narcissist, and I can confirm than from personal experience. To those who think Jobs accomplished what he did because of his behavior, I say he accomplished what he did in spite of his behavior. Obviously we will never know, this cannot be science, but Jobs went through life burning everyone down, filtering out everyone who wasn't a born narcissistic enabler.

deleted 13y ago
[deleted]
jckt 13y ago
> filtering out everyone who wasn't a born narcissistic enabler. Do you mean that there instances where he really listened or liked/respected/etc someone because they had similar narcissistic tendencies? I was under the impression that people like him tend to hate people like themselves -- a narcissist who thinks he's the best is at greatest odds with another narcissist who thinks he's the best.
- vacri 13y ago
  lutusp means the archetypal 'yes-man', the person who openly admires anything you do and only ever agrees with you, reinforcing your self-esteem, 'enabling' your 'narcissism'.
  - jckt 13y ago
    Ah, okay, I get it now. I completely misunderstood lutusp's sentence.
- lutusp 13y ago
  > Do you mean that there instances where he really listened or liked/respected/etc someone because they had similar narcissistic tendencies? Narcissists and enablers aren't the same personality type, even though one can become the other over time. More here: http://arachnoid.com/ChildrenOfNarcissus http://arachnoid.com/ChildrenOfNarcissus
- ngpio 13y ago
  > a narcissist who thinks he's the best is at greatest odds to another narcissist who thinks he's the best. Only if both have very literal, wide-reaching interpretations of 'the best'. Arrogance and narcissism are often contextual, and I've met many self-absorbed, but ultimately capable people who value a similar imbalance in others. Who am I kidding, I'm talking about myself.
13y ago

larrys 13y ago

"The bravado of shredding the paper and loudly announcing the desired figure is a dead giveaway" You are right based on my many many years negotiating. Noting also that Steve used this with Heidi Roizen. While he may have also used it with a "Carl Icahn" (someone like Carl, not Carl) I somehow doubt it. It's pure bluster and it telegraphs a lot. [1] One more important point (perhaps someone else has mentioned this). The "friend" could have been part of the act. Quite possibly. Negotiating is part acting and role playing (at least the way I have seen it done and practice myself). As a result it's similar to when the government doesn't officially release info but manages to get someone to "off record" to get something in the press. They call it "absence of malice" or similar (I think don't remember the exact phrase..) [1] I've had cases negotiating where I know in advance that I will shake my head up and down "no" even if the number is good just to send a message.

PhasmaFelis 13y ago

> People are saying that Jobs was being an asshole. You say this, and then you say a bunch of fancy words that boil down to "he's an asshole." I feel like this is a big part of the problem with...hell, with capitalism and corporatism in general. You people have gotten the idea that being an asshole doesn't count as being an asshole if you GET RESULTS. No, that's not right. An asshole who gets results is still just an asshole. That's not a good thing.