This is a question that a lot of people have been searching for the answer to and with any luck, I will be able to shed some light on what will likely end up happening. Yes, Steve Jobs is critical to the success at Apple as the company stands now. But his departure is more hurtful to those public events where he makes appearances than anything else. Let me explain further. Steve Jobs, along with Steve Wozniak, changed the way we look at the world of computers forever. And in more recent years, Jobs’ company has gone on to reinvent the way we see mobile applications and the world of mobile devices in general.

See, the rub is that nothing really that new was created here. Microsoft was first with tablet computers (using a stylus) and mobile applications date back to the Palm OS days of portable computing. But Apple, much of it through Jobs, managed to make the idea of the tablet computing device more attractive by adding a better user interface — the ability to use fingers instead of a stylus. And of course including a singular application store for mobile apps didn’t hurt, either. Clearly, all of these ideas had to have come from somewhere. And based on his track record, I think it’s safe to suggest that Jobs was responsible for the overall vision of much of this.

Apple post-Steve

Apple can and will go on strongly without Steve Jobs at its helm. Is him not being there a bad thing? Sure, no question. But assuming he’s been able to influence the COO enough to ensure continuity of his vision,  then I think Apple will continue to hit products and services out of the park. The trick will be to keep the company at the same level of “experience” it’s currently providing now. Apparently, this is working, so the idea of changing it at all would be a really bad idea. For Apple’s sake, let’s hope that whoever is set to take the lead from Steve really gets this. It’s critical as image is perhaps Apple’s most prized product.

Kool-Aid aside, Apple must provide value

Photo by Jack000

Believe it or not, I am not an Apple user. Wait, not entirely true. I use an iPhone 4. But I rely exclusively on Ubuntu for my desktop/netbook/notebook needs. I love iOS, but really don’t want it on my desktop. Weird, yes, my OS X using wife reminds me of this daily. But I digress. Apple is set up to basically provide an experience. Whether or not that experience is bad or good depends on your point of view. And to a large degree, I think that Steve Jobs was a massive part of this experience driven concept fairly early on with Apple products.

For Apple to do well post-Steve, it will need to ensure that the experience provided by the company to the consumer remains consistent. It doesn’t have to necessarily be “better,” rather the same as it’s always done. Because it’s this, not just the products, that make the each cog within the Apple machine function smoothly. But this is just my take as I look into the labyrinth of Apple.