Published by: Maya Linson on 10/6/2011 11:42:34 AM
The world lost a true innovator this week with the death of Apple’s Steve Jobs. There are many stories about his accomplishments, innovations and contributions, from shaping a digital future for music to transforming day-to-day communications.
But there is another important legacy for us to note: the path he took us on that led to the iPhone and iPad was wrought with failure. For one, he was actually fired from Apple in 1985. He told fresh Stanford graduates in 2005 that this was the best thing that could have happened to him, after much reflection and disappointment, of course: “The heaviness of being successful was replaced by the lightness of being a beginner again, less sure about everything. It freed me to enter one of the most creative periods of my life."
That change led to falling in love with his wife and to the creation of Pixar (one of the most successful animation studios in the world), among other accomplishments in his career and personal life.
In that same commencement speech, he urged the new graduates to live each day as if it were the last. “Remembering that I'll be dead soon is the most important tool I've ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything — all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure - these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important,” he said.
At the time, he had been diagnosed with cancer just one year before and had already undergone surgery to remove it. So he spoke these words having lived through the very real threat of death, as well as the very real relief of beating it. And yet, he said he had been trying to live each day as if it were his last since he was 17 years old. Using that benchmark – “If today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today?" – Jobs was able to create, innovate, fail and succeed.
This lesson in living applies to everyone. We truly advance through trial and error; testing ideas and theories until something holds true. We would not have electricity, motor vehicles, the internet, the iPhone without failure. So what does this mean for the US health care system? It means we may have some wrong turns on the road to lasting improvement, but that is no reason to stop progress.
The legacy I take from Steve Jobs boils down to LEARN SOMETHING and MOVE FORWARD.
- Don’t define yourself by failure. Reflect, learn something and move forward.
- Do not abandon ideas that fail; learn something, augment and try again.
- Don’t go it alone – learn from others – Jobs created a network of support that ultimately helped him turn failures into successes.
In that Stanford commencement speech, he hit the nail on the head for me. As we move forward – whether in our personal or professional lives – the twists and turns will lead us to each next step.
“You can’t connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future.”