13A – Reading Reflection No. 1

1) You read about an entrepreneur: I read Steve Jobs, Walter Isaacson

·       What surprised you the most?

• I was very surprised to find that Steve Jobs was not the most well-behaved kid. He experimented with drugs such as LSD and marijuana. I was even more surprised to find out that Jobs dropped out of college after only one year!

·       What about the entrepreneur did you most admire?

• The thing I most strongly admire about Steve Job s is his determination. He knew what he wanted and would not quit until he got it. Even though he didn’t get a college degree, he still persisted and tried his hardest to make a good life for himself. An example of him being determined was when he walked into the Atari head office and said he would not leave until being offered a job.

·       What about the entrepreneur did you least admire?

• I honestly admired everything about him, so I am not quite sure what to answer for this. The only thing that I least admire was when they mentioned in the book that Jobs would tell people there were essentially stupid and take their ideas as his own.

·       Did the entrepreneur encounter adversity and failure? If so, what did they do about it?

• Jobs seemed have faced adversity when his girlfriend became pregnant with his child. This seemed to have completely thrown Jobs off from his life and he didn’t even acknowledge the child as his own. He did although later regret how he handled the situation.

2) What competencies did you notice that the entrepreneur exhibited? 

Steve Jobs had many competencies that made him very successful. Some of them include determination, courage, decision-making, and commitment.

3) Identify at least one part of the reading that was confusing to you.

I was confused towards the end of chapter 5 and beginning of chapter 6. It seems as if the simple idea of making computers immediately jumped to him selling millions of them. It didn’t really elaborate on this area, it seemed to have just jumped from not having a business to selling millions of products.

4) If you were able to ask two questions to the entrepreneur, what would you ask?

·      What kept you motivated to keep pushing on?

·      Did you ever feel like quitting everything?

I am asking this because I am very interested in his motivation and what his main drivers were to keep him so focused and determined.

5) For fun: what do you think the entrepreneur's opinion was of hard work? Do you share that opinion?

His opinion of hard work is probably that you get out what you put in. The more hard work you do, the more return you are going to get out of it. Jobs put in countless hours of tireless work which is how he became so successful.