On Monday, Tim Cook bid farewell to Apple — the company where he spent nearly three decades and led as CEO since 2011. Cook paid a tribute to founder Steve Jobs and praised Apple staff as “extraordinary” as he passed the baton to incoming CEO John Ternus.
“We have made it possible to leave our ‘dent in the universe,’ as Steve once described it,” Cook wrote in the memo on his last day on the job.
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How Tim Cook decided to join Apple
Apple co-founder Steve Jobs hired Tim Cook in 1998. By 2005, Cook was promoted to chief operating officer. He took over as CEO just weeks before Jobs died from pancreatic cancer.
Under Cook, Apple has become one of the most valuable companies in the world; its market value exceeded $4.5 trillion on Monday.
In a 2014 interview with journalist Charlie Rose, Cook had recalled how he ended up at .
In 1998, Tim Cook was working at Compaq, which at the time was far more valuable than Apple. He had received several calls from Jobs at Apple — and it took just one meeting to convince him.
“I had gotten a call several times from the search people that he had employed. And I said no, I was at Compaq, I was happy and, or thought I was,” Cook recalled.
“And they were persistent. And so I finally thought, I’m going to go out and take the meeting. Steve created the whole industry that I’m in, I’d love to meet him.”
The meeting that changed his outlook
Tim Cook said that one meeting with Steve Jobs convinced him to join Apple. He described the meeting as “interesting” in his interview with Charlie Rose.
“Well I’m just thinking I’m going to meet him and all of a sudden he’s talking about his strategy and his vision, and what he was doing was going 100 percent into consumer,” Cook remembered.
This was at a time when other industry players were steering clear of consumer tech, seeing no money in the space.
“He [Jobs] was doing something totally different,” said Cook.
“And he told me a little about the design, enough to get me really interested. And he was describing what later would be called the iMac. And the way that he talked, and the way the chemistry was in the room, it was just he and I. And I could tell, I can work with him.”
“It didn’t make sense”
Tim Cook acknowledged that the decision to join Apple was not entirely logical. However, he felt after talking to Jobs that he could make a real contribution to the company. It was instinct that told him to join Apple.
“I looked at the problems Apple had, and I thought you know, I can make a contribution here. And working with him, and this is a privilege of a lifetime.
“And so all of a sudden I thought, I ‘m doing it. I’m going for it. And you have this voice in your ear that says go west young man, go west. I was young at the time. But you know, you come back and you try to do the things that people do with spreadsheets and stuff, and none of it makes sense. It didn’t make sense.
“And yet, my gut said, go for it. And I listened to my gut,” he concluded.
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