Jon Gluck

Over the weekend, Dallas Mavericks owner and Internet billionaire Mark Cuban posted a piece of advice titled “Don’t Follow Your Passion, Follow Your Effort” on his personal blog. This particular post went more viral than usual with many wide-eyed entrepreneurs accepting his assertion with open arms.

Needless to say, we passionistas were shocked, shocked I tell you!

Therefore, as an entrepreneur who has always chased his passions with positive results, I felt compelled to offer a rebuttal…

Don’t Follow Mark Cuban, Follow Your Passion

Sometimes Mark Cuban is right on the money and other times he’s bouncing around the court like a mad man. This is one of those times when I’m left scratching my head. Mark’s post about abandoning passion for the bitter embrace of a cubicle is one of the most irresponsible pieces of advice I’ve seen offered by an influential business figure.

Contrary to Mark’s take, “follow your passion” is indisputably the best advice anyone can receive. I can only guess that what he was trying to drive at is that making a living from your passion isn’t too realistic in today’s world - a point well-taken. But that sad reality doesn’t make following your passion any less legitimate a path to pursue.

The fact is people work ten times harder, faster, better when doing what they’re passionate about. The big unknown, however, is whether that love and drive can be turned into money, because without money we can’t survive.

For some, success through passion happens in mere months; for most others, it takes years, even decades, before they either succeed or have to give up and join the regular workforce. Unfortunately too many people work to live instead of the other way around and that’s a real shame. Whoever is lucky enough to break out of that mold should absolutely do so and do it as early in life as possible.

The fundamental question for every dream-seeker to decide for themselves is for how long to chase a passion before it becomes too unrealistic to make a living from it.

Of course there’s no success without effort so one of Mark’s points about working hard makes good sense. But that’s no revelation. Most of us learned there are no shortcuts early on when, through overreliance on Cliffs Notes, we were handed that heart-stopping D-minus on the English Lit mid-term.

Most egregious of all his assertions was in saying passion follows effort. Mark’s point of view is dangerously naive and just plain wrong. I have a feeling Mark Cuban’s own path proves that. I think it’s pretty obvious that he is immensely passionate about technology, and he managed to turn that healthy obsession into billions. So why teach others to pursue any different a path than he himself followed? He may well have forgotten that just because something’s difficult doesn’t make it wrong.

The truth is, effort follows passion, not the other way around, and they are really a package deal. Love something and the effort will cascade out of you uncontrollably. Thought-leaders like Cuban should empower people to succeed by doing what they love, not encourage them to get a “real” job and hope one day passion sprouts up out of nowhere.

It shouldn’t be Mark Cuban’s job to point out to us the harsh realities of life; that’s for us to find out on our own during our rollercoaster journey. What we need to hear from successful people like him is that the seemingly impossible can be achieved and the best way to achieve big things is by doing what you love.

If we have to settle for less then so be it, but not a moment before our dreams are given their fair shot at becoming realities.

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Click here to see Mark Cuban’s original post.

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Not exactly how I’d put it but his point is well taken. The little things in business count.

Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer on his time management secrets.

“Productivity Future Vision” by Microsoft

// IN MEMORIAM //

Sadly, Apple co-founder and chairman Steve Jobs died today after a years long battle with pancreatic cancer. His family released a heart breaking statement saying, in part, that “Steve died peacefully.” He was 56.

Jobs took his third and final leave of absence from Apple back in January and resigned as CEO in August as he was known to be gravely ill. He was most often described as a visionary, but insiders also knew him as a caring, charismatic technologist who was set on changing the world. Mission accomplished. To most, Steve Jobs will be remembered as the business icon who changed the way we experience and enjoy life. What a wonderful legacy to leave behind.

This is an incredibly sad day for the millions of people impacted by his iconic products and inspirational leadership. And his family bears the greatest loss of a husband and father to four. Steve Jobs was a once in a generation kind of guy and he left us far too soon.

Here are links to some notable reactions to his tragic death:

Statement by Steve Jobs’s family

Tribute statement on Apple’s website

Statement by Apple’s Board of Directors

Email to Apple staff by CEO Tim Cook

Statement by President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama

Statement by Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates

Facebook post by Facebook co-founder Mark Zuckerberg

Google+ post by Google co-founder Sergey Brin

Google+ post by Google co-founder Larry Page

Statement by Disney president Bob Iger

Facebook post by Jobs’ former colleagues at Pixar, Ed Catmull and John Lasseter

Statement by Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer

Statement by New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg

Obituary by The New York Times

Blog post by AllThingsD co-executive editor Walt Mossberg

Facebook note by Napster co-founder & former Facebook president Sean Parker

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Steven Paul Jobs

1955 - 2011

Technologist, Visionary, iCon.

We can all learn a thing or ten from great leaders, and Steve Jobs is no exception. Here are thirty-three fascinating things you may not have known about the Apple founder and business icon, told through excerpts from the 2011 best-selling book The Steve Jobs Way by Jay Elliott.  This must read book offers a rare perspective into the life and times of one of the most consequential businessmen in history and certainly the most impactful of the past decade.  Jay was Senior Vice President at Apple for many years and was Steve’s longtime “left-hand man,” as he puts it in the book.  Which leads us to Steve Jobs fact #1…

1. He is left-handed

2. He follows his passions

“Steve Jobs survives, thrives, and changes society by following his own passions.”

3. He is enthusiastic

“Steve told me the Lisa would be such a breakthrough that ‘it will make a dent in the universe.’ You couldn’t help but be in awe of talk like that; the line has been an inspiration for me ever since, a reminder that you won’t get people working for you fired up with enthusiasm unless you’re fired up yourself… and you let everyone know it.”

4. He is determined

“Steve Jobs doesn’t hear the word ‘no’ and is deaf to ‘We can’t’ or ‘You may not.’”

“He believes that ‘about half of what separates the successful entrepreneurs from the non-successful ones is pure perseverance.’”

5. He is a Buddhist

“Here was a young man who had dropped out of college after a little more than a semester, taken himself off to India where he traveled not like a tourist but more like an itinerant begger-monk, and had become absorbed with Buddhism, which became a lifelong commitment.”

6. He knew his destiny

“‘I could be doing a lot of other things with my life,’ he said. ‘But the Macintosh is going to change the world. I believe that, and I’ve chosen people for the team who believe it, too.’”

7. He is a perfectionist

“Steve’s level of focus on details is one of the most crucial aspects of his success and the success of his products.”

“He is always fiercely demanding about the smallest detail - down to the exact placement on stage of the key product being introduced, exactly how it will be lighted, and on exactly what cue it will be revealed.”

“For Steve, launching a product on time isn’t nearly as important as getting it right - as near to perfection for the user as possible.”

“I couldn’t imagine any other CEO of a global company who would take the trouble to inspect the flooring in a company store, yet it seemed so typical of Steve, the master of details.”

“To Steve, everything matters. He will keep innovating to get closer and closer to his ideal, his vision of perfection, which almost always goes beyond what everyone else considers the currently achievable reality. The process is time-consuming, it’s maddening to the product creators who work for him, but it is an absolutely essential element of his success.”

8. He is a collaborator

“He used to tell me, ‘Apple should be the kind of place where anybody can walk in and share his ideas with the CEO.’ That pretty much summed up his management style.”

9. He was a self-made millionaire in his twenties

“In a single day… when Apple Computer shares were offered on the stock exchange… Steve had become one of the world’s richest self-made men. He liked to tell people, ‘I was worth a million dollars when I was twenty-three, ten million when I was twenty-four, and over two hundred million when I was twenty-five.’”

10. He reverse-engineers products

“Steve always starts by envisioning the end product rather than working through the engineering details, which is how so many other high-tech products begin their lives.”

11. He is an aggressive recruiter

“When Steve identifies someone he thinks might turn into a key player, he doesn’t leave recruiting in the hands of somebody from HR or an outside recruiting firm. He picks up the phone himself.”

12. He is his employees’ biggest cheerleader

“Steve truly cherishes his people. It’s not just that he knows he couldn’t be doing all these great things without them: He lets his people know he knows. The lengths Steve goes to shower recognition, appreciation, and reward on his people often left me in awe.”

13. He is a giver

“When the iPhone was introduced, every employee received one free. So did every part-timer and consultant who had been with the company for more than a year.”

14. He is a fan of Odwalla juice

“Steve’s well-known preference for Odwalla has made it a huge international success.”

15. He is demanding

“He breaks some of the supposedly ironclad rules about how to handle people. He’s notorious for pushing people to their limits and expecting them to work to the extreme every day.”

16. He loves music

“You had a sense that any newcomer could learn a lot about Steve’s personality and focus by riding in that Mercedes with him. The newcomer would also quickly discover Steve’s love of music, clearly a major part of his life.”

17. He can assess any situation

“I never really understood where this came from or how he developed it, but Steve has acquired the ability, even lacking the technical knowledge, to assess accurately what’s possible and what isn’t”

18. He shows genuine gratitude

“When he’s pleased and grateful, you can hear the twinkle of enthusiasm in his voice. Moments like that are so motivating.”

19. He is a master showman

“To watch him on stage at one of these presentations was to see a consummate actor; no, in fact, he was better than a great actor, because actors mouth words written by others, while Steve would speak impromptu, knowing in advance of course precisely what messages he wanted to get across, yet not following any script.”

20. He is eager to learn

“Always eager to improve his management skills, Steve had asked me how he could pick the brain of more seasoned corporate leaders, which led me to set up what I called the Management Leadership Program. I invited CEOs to come to Cupertino to sit down and just talk with us.”

21. He focuses on consumers’ unmet needs

“In Steve’s handbook, every opportunity starts with an unmet need. If you can build a product to meet that need, it becomes a ‘must-have.’”

22. He is a minimalist

“Steve’s real gift is his ability to refine consumer products. He’s a superb editor and polisher whose core philosophy is ‘less is more.’ He takes things out of over-engineered, complicated products, revealing what really makes them usable and exciting.”

23. He is a multitasker

“Like all great entrepreneurs, Steve is a master juggler who’s almost always working on several apparently unrelated projects at once. These next big things have a way of eventually proving part of a unified master strategy.”

24. He hates lengthy contracts

“A team of IBMers showed up to present the company’s offer to Steve, and shoved a hundred-page contract under his nose. I’ve been told that he picked it up, dropped it in the trash basket, and told them he didn’t sign any contracts longer than three or four pages.”

25. One teacher changed his life

“In the Smithsonian oral-history interview, Steve said, ‘I think I probably learned more academically in that one year than I learned in my life.’ Quite a testimonial for how one teacher can change a student’s entire history.”

26. He is careful about choosing his Board of Directors

“One thing that Steve learned from the whole wrenching experience of being exiled was the importance of a board of directors that understands what the head of the company is doing strategically.”

27. He doesn’t believe in focus groups

“Steve Jobs believes that you cannot design a product with focus groups, not when you’re trying to be truly original. He loved to quote Henry Ford, who once said something like, ‘If I had asked my customers what they wanted, they would have told me, ‘A faster horse.’”

28. He admires Sony

“He often spoke about Sony as ‘the Apple of Japan’ and his model for producing incredibly original products. The visit to Sony was like a trip to Mecca for him.”

29. He loves meetings

“Managers elsewhere boast about how little time they waste in meetings. Apple is big on them and proud of it.”

30. He is loyal

“When Steve finds a person or a company that meets his demanding standards, he becomes dependably loyal.”

31. He reached the Fortune 500 in record time

“Apple ascended to the hallowed ranks of the Fortune 500 in shorter time than any other company in history.”

32. He takes big risks

“He had the vision of being directly connected to the Apple customers. Steve Jobs, with no background in retail and no real knowledge of how retailing operated, was going to try to eliminate the middleman. Within weeks of his return, he began one of his riskiest projects ever.”

33. He conceived the iPad before the iPhone

“Here’s a surprise: the iPad was actually conceived before the iPhone and had been in development for years… but the technology wasn’t ready.”

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Click here to buy the book The Steve Jobs Way on Amazon, and here to visit the book’s official website. Share below.

// ORIGINALS BY JON GLUCK //

This article was originally published on Microsoft’s Office Blog. It can be viewed there by clicking here.

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Today we have a guest post from Jon Gluck; an entrepreneur, connector, and marketer extraordinaire I started reading on the web. I invited him to give us his take on what he does with technology. – Doug Thomas

Twelve-to-sixteen hour work days. 6-7 days a week. Dozens of emails and calls a day. Weekdays booked solid with coffees, lunches, and after work drinks. Not one, or two, but three businesses to run. Weekly articles to write for various blogs and news outlets. A daily blog and ten-plus social media channels to maintain. And organizing the largest small business group in Los Angeles with over 750 members.

A day in my shoes may not seem too appealing on paper, but I manage just fine. I manage in large part because of my intense passion for business but equally important are the organizational skills I’ve committed myself to mastering. 

So, whether I’m at home in bed, at dinner with friends, or dutifully at my desk, my system never leaves my side.  I never know when a grand idea will hit or when a time sensitive opportunity will infiltrate my inbox. I can’t fall victim to unpreparedness. What follows is my starter kit to discover your “inner administrator.” Here are three ways I keep myself organized; three more are coming next week.

1. Shortcuts

As tasks at work become more hurried, digital shortcuts become a businessperson’s best friend. Utilize the amazing shortcut functionality built into Microsoft’s Windows 7 operating system, like pinning frequently used programs to the Taskbar and the Start Menu. You can get even more granular and pin frequently used documents and passwords, spreadsheets, favorite songs, etc., to the Jump Lists of programs pinned to the taskbar. You can also pin frequently used folders to the ever-present Favorites corner within Windows Explorer. And don’t forget to setup Quick Access Toolbar icons (Send/Receive, New Email, New Meeting, Print) right above your mail stream in Outlook.

2. Folders

Organizing your computer files and folders not only helps you locate things but also empowers you to file more, and the more you have on file, the more knowledge and resources are at your fingertips. Choosing perfectly practical wording for your folder names sometimes means going against conventional verbiage, like using “Writeups” instead of “Executive Summary.” Whatever comes to your mind first is what your folder should be named.

Since folders are auto-sorted alphabetically, you can add a simple “A –“ or “B –“ at the front of the names of your most frequently used folders so they don’t get lost in the alphabetical shuffle. Also, be consistent: if your Web bookmarks folder says “IMAGES”, don’t have your Windows folder read “PICS” and your physical filing system “PHOTOS”. Use “IMAGES” across the board, and feel free to add empty folders labeled “PHOTOS see IMAGES” and “PICS see IMAGES” for good measure.

3. Productivity Apps

Nifty tools like Techsmith’s Snagit and Microsoft’s Snipping Tool are the Computer Gods’ gifts to workhorses. Just as some people can’t imagine life before online reserved seating at movie theatres, I can’t imagine life before being able to point, drag and capture a specific area of a webpage or article. These snag tools have helped me snag so many on-the-fly images that I now have a powerful archive of hundreds of the most historical images in social media, including the Pope’s first tweet, major Facebook redesigns, Twitter’s Fail Whale, original iPad launch headlines, and much more. I can now simply pull the images into my PowerPoints for speaking engagements.

Other types of productivity tools like voice-to-text dictation apps – Dragon Dictation is the ultimate – and voice memos apps should be explored as well.

Jon Gluck operates the only business incubator in Beverly Hills, California and manages Iconic Digital, a leading social media marketing firm that helps businesses succeed in the brave new digital world.  Visit www.JonGluck.com to check out more about his projects and to connect with Jon via email and his social media channels.

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