Many months ago, long before the beatification of Steve Jobs began, but sometime after he was declared The-Best-Presenter-The-World-Has-Ever-Seen-And-That-Includes-Obama-Too, my friend Eric and I were debating whether he really was all that as a presenter. Our conclusion, and I may be remembering only part of our whisky-induced brilliance here, was that while a pitch by Steve was better than almost any other business presentation, that’s not really such a high bar.  If you strip away the pretty toy he was usually unveiling, and the carefully orchestrated light and sound, and the weeks and weeks of rehearsals, you got a pretty average, albeit well-prepared guy doing his schtick. In fact, unscripted and unrehearsed, he was a bit of a nightmare from a Hand-Wringer’s point of view.

So in the hope that enough time has passed to do this respectfully (and, FanBoys, if you’re still wearing that black armband you need to move on), here is Eric’s contribution to the Steve Jobs canon.

Stevey at the Podium

With apologies to Ernest Lawrence Thayer

The MS Outlook wasn’t brilliant for Silicon Valley at the Symposium that day:
The score stood foursquare to two, with but one round of funding more in play.
And then when Ellison died at first, and Zuckerberg did the same,
A sickly silence fell upon the Facebook wall of shame.

A straggling few logged out in deep despair. The conventioneers
Clung to their Twitter feeds which spring eternal in the noosphere;
They thought, if only Stevey could whack an app at that –
We’d put up even more money, now, with Stevey at the podium.

But Sculley had preceded Stevey, as did also Gil Amelio,
And the former was a lulu.com and the latter was a Boconnotto;
So the LinkedIn multitude sat fiddling, in grim mobile tedium,
For there seemed but little chance of Stevey’s getting to the podium. 

Then from 5,000+ IPhones and Motorolas there rose a lusty yell
It spread through the valley of the dollars, it rattled in the DELL;
It knocked upon the Mountain View offices and recoiled upon Stanford stadium
For Stevey, mighty Stevey, was advancing to the podium. 

There was ease in Stevey’s manner as he stepped into his space;
There was pride in Stevey’s bearing and a smirk on Stevey’s face.
And when, responding to the cheers, he lightly shuffled his New Balance 991s,
No stranger in the crowd could doubt ’twas Stevey at the podium. 

Ten thousand IPhones snapped him as he drank SmartWater (eck!)
Five thousand updates were posted as he dribbled on his Issey Miyake turtleneck.
Defiance gleamed in Stevey’s eye, a sneer curled Stevey’s lip. 

And now the titanium-covered IPhone 4s came hurtling on the MacBook Air,
And Stevey stood a-watching it in haughty grandeur there.
And just behind the lanky showman, the PPT slides sped-
“One more thing”, said Stevey.  “slide-to-lock patent”, he said. 

From the auditorium, pitch black with people a-recording, there went up a muffled roar,
Like the thunder of a plate-less Mercedes SL 55 AMG on a stern and distant shore.
” America Invents Act”!! shouted someone on the stand;
And its likely they’d a-hugged him had not Stevey raised his hand.

With a smile of Pescatorial charity great Stevey’s bearded visage shone;
He stilled the rising tumult; he bade the keynote go on;
He signaled to the intern, and once more the elegantly transitioning slides flew; 

“Patent lawsuit!” cried the maddened thousands, and echo answered fraud;                                           

With one scornful look from Stevey and the audience was awed.
They saw his face grow stern and cold, they saw his muscles strain,
And they knew that Stevey wouldn’t let that Android OS gain. 

The sneer is now gone from Stevey’s lip, his teeth are no more clenched in hate;
Somewhere in the ICloud, he pounds with cruel violence on an HP Slate.
And now the lights are off on stage, he just had to let it go,
And now the MacBook Air is shattered by the force of Stevey’s laminar flow. 

Oh, somewhere in this favorited land the LEDs are shining bright;
An IPod is playing somewhere, and somewhere heart icons are light,
And somewhere fanboys are lol-ing, and somewhere Gen-Yers shout;
But there is no joy in the Valley – mighty Stevey has Blanked Out.

E r i c  D e l i s l e
Strategic Knowledge Management

BizMarketer is written by Elizabeth Williams
I help organizations build their brands through great conversations with employees and customers

Drop me a line at ewilliams(at)candlerchase.com
Follow me @bizmkter

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