“It’s in Apple’s DNA that technology alone is not enough — it’s technology married with liberal arts, married with the humanities, that yields us the result that makes our heart sing and nowhere is that more true than in these post-PC devices.”
Steve Jobs
Jobs had it right. Technology alone is functional and cold. However, blend the liberal arts with the humanities and you have one powerful combination. It’s Leonardo daVinci using an iPad versus an engineer on a PC. Philosophy, music, history, language, and art blended with technology. Form working with function.
I wrote this on a PC and am both a big Dell and Apple fan. As some of the Harvard case studies I teach about note, Apple breaks the commodity barrier with innovation and Dell with efficiency. Once the competition catches up, both companies have to innovate and streamline to start the cycle again.
All my years of studying the humanities, liberal arts, technology, and business, blended with real-life business experience have paid off. My humanities foundation has helped to generate creativity, innovation, and efficiency. Steve Jobs personified the blend of non-technology with technology. The broader your exposure to vast bodies of knowledge the better your product offerings. The humanities made Steve Jobs human and creative. He saw the value in both and thus created valuable products. His legacy thus lives on in both the humanities and in Apple’s products.
Well said, Steve Jobs…you will be missed.
By Stuart Atkins
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