Steve Jobs

This is an extemely fascinating biography of one of the icons of the 20th and 21st centuries. Yes, his life straddled 2 millienia, and he obtained fame in both. Last century, he, with Steve Wozniak, founded Apple Computers, which went on to become wildly successful. In his "Second Coming" towards the end of the last century into the 21st, he reinvented Apple as a company of mobile products which paved the way for Apple to become the most valuable company on earth in this new millenium. Steve Jobs has always viewed Apple as a products company. And his product design philosophy is that it must be simple, beautify and closed. Because of this strategy, and the creative people he goaded to produce of their best eventually created the most beautiful products on planet earth - think iPod, iPhone, iPad, MacBook, and before that, the wildly successful Apple ][. Steve Jobs, however, never considered the Apple ][ as his product. That would be the Macintosh computer, which though it introduced many innovative technologies (the graphical user interface, the mouse) flopped as a product.

Yes, Steve Jobs was not perfect even though he demanded perfection in whatever he built. Some people who worked on the original Macintosh computer burnt out working with/for him, as the chronicler, Walter Isaacson, related in the biography of Jobs, simply titled "Steve Jobs".  Isaacson is brutally frank about Mr Jobs in this book. Fortunately, Jobs left him to write whatever he thought he should, and Isaacson did just that, warts and all. It is a very fascinating account. I grew up looking envious at his Apple machines while I bought and used the more affordable IBM-compatible PCs, and wondered about the man. But he was a very private person although he did behave in ways that people either loved him or hated him. Some loved him and then hated him, but strangely never the other way around. Those are the kinds of emotions that one has to go through with him, his wife not excepted.

Jobs was charming, selfish, and spoilt. His exacting ways resulted in highly innovative products that has made fanatics of Apple products the world over. That said, Jobs never always produced the things that became successful. And not all the things that he produced succeeded. Ultimately, his genius was to surround himself with highly creative people, such as John Lasseter of Pixar and Jonathan Ive of Apple, to work his magic through them. All  the rest were bozos to him.

Unfortunately he was so driven that he failed to heed warnings about his health. Some thought that his health was permanently damaged by him running 2 very successful companies - Apple and Pixar - at the same time. But I suppose he wouldn't have had it any other way. He was not a person who listened to others easily. Unfortunately, his strict dieting habits, acquired since young, also contributed to his failing body.

Brilliant as he was, he had to battle the emotional hurt he suffered all his life from the knowledge that he was an abandoned child. One wished he had been able to overcome it, but he never did. This is perhaps the saddest part of an otherwise eventful and creative life. He had done it all. No regrets. RIP.

P.S. I still don't own any Apple product.

Against the odds

Some say "Manners maketh the man". Others say "Looks maketh the man". But there is yet a third - "Trials maketh the man". Of course in this day and age, the word 'man' includes woman. And this is the subject of the book "Innovate! How great companies get started in terrible times", written by Thomas A. Meyer.

Meyer makes the point that, as the saying goes, 'in tough times, the tough gets going". In his narrative in this book, he documents how some well-known and enduring companies were actually borne during economic recessions. His narrative goes as far back as 1797 and continues right up to 2008, where the phenomenon described in his book continues. The companies that were borned of adversity  are exceptional companies, and the people who founded them are exceptional people - like Thomas A. Edison, Walt Disney, Milton Hershey, Robert W. Johnson, and Mary Kay, right up to Steve Jobs. Meyer believes that much can be learnt from the experiences of these entrepreneurs. He has helpfully organised the book according to the qualities demonstrated by these people who would not give up easily - qualities such as perseverance (Edison), Pain (Walt Disney), Intuition (Steve Jobs), Simplicity (Robert Johnson), Failure (Hershey), Faith (Mary Kay), Insignificance (Lonnie Johnson of Hasbro), Greed (AIG), Integrity (George Foreman) and of course, Luck (William Procter and James Gamble).

Each narrative is short and simple but effective. He states the lessons to be learnt through a narrative of the underlying story that validates the point. For example he illustrates the power of starting from the bottom with the example of how Robert W. Johnson Jr, the son of one of the founders of Johnson & Johnson, chose to begin his career in his father's company by first working as a mill-hand in its factories. 10 years were to pass before he assumed control of the company as its CEO. Meyer showed how asking for help can move a person's passion forward after a series of failures in the example of Milton S. Hershey, the creator of the Hershey empire. And as they say, this book is chock full of similar examples and lessons.

It is a great book to learn how not to give up when everything seem to be working against you.

A Doctor and a Gentleman

There has been a rash of books published by Singaporeans on Singapore in the last few years. Mr Lee Kuan Yew published his memoirs some time back, and the latest on him, which has stirred up not a bit of controversy, is actually out of stock in many bookstores due to overwhelming demand. Then there is the tome written by some former Straits Times journalist on the history of the PAP. Even President S.R. Nathan has weighed in with an account of his time with seamen. A month ago, I picked up another book, a thinner and more 'manageable' book, also on Singapore, but on a subject, or more precisely, on a Malayan Singaporean. Why a Malayan Singaporean? Because he lived till 1954, well before Singapore obtained self-government in 1959 and eventually independence in 1965. But Dr Charles Joseph Pemberton Paglar was, in his lifetime, very much a Singapore native, and the book "Dr Paglar: Everyman's Hero" by Rex Shelley (with Chen Fen) recounts the life and times of this hero of Singapore. Dr Paglar was a Eurasian, the offspring of an illicit relation between an Indian women and a British planter by the name of Pemberton. And as offsprings of illicit relations went at that time, he was sent away (abandoned is perhaps a better word here) to a convent in Penang (Malaysia) in which he grew up.

He was eventually adopted by Alexander Paglar and his wife, both of whom were Catholics and Eurasians. Dr Paglar migrated to Singapore in 1910, while still a young man, to further his education. He eventually won a Queens scholarship to study medicine in Britain. Dr Paglar later returned to Singapore and set up his medical practice. He got married, and became friends with the lowly and the royalty - specifically the Sultan of Johor, who made him his personal physician. The Second World War, while disruptive, did not change his routine - he still practiced medicine although medicine was hard to come by, for which he turned to the Japanese conquerors. Therein lies the controversy of his 'collusion' with the enemy. But the book attempts to explain his rationale for working with the Japanese, which was for the good of his own people and the poor and defenseless.

After the war, he turned to helping rebuild Singapore society, and in particular sports. He was very generous with his money and time. The Singapore Badminton Hall still stands as a testimony to his effort, amongst many other facilities. Alas his life in politics proved short-lived. He was elected to the Legislative council in 1951 but died in 1954.

This is a simple book. It doesn't dwell into great detail. For example, Dr Paglar was married 4 times, but the circumstances and reasons for his first divorce are hardly mentioned, and the narrative is also silent on his other marital relationships beyond a single sentence that hinted that he had a weakness for women. But otherwise, the book does introduce you to the man and his times in a short read. The other plus about this book is that it is filled with pages and pages of photographs, some of which show society in a now long forgotten era in Singapore's history.

Lion of the Nation

Even as I write this review, I received news of the death of Mr Lee Kuan Yew's wife, Mdm Kwa Geok Choo. But what does that have to do with the book, "The Singapore Lion", on the life of Singapore's long-time Foreign Minister, Mr Sinnathamby Rajaratnam? Everything, I suppose, because Mr Lee became a significant part of Mr Rajaratnam's life, and through Mr Lee, Mrs Lee would also have figured greatly too. I am only speculating though because that second part of Mr Rajaratnam's story has yet to be told in Irene Ng's biography of Mr Rajaratnam.

"The Singapore Lion" chronicles the life of one of the founding fathers of modern Singapore, tracing his life from his beginnings growing up in Seremban to the time when Singapore attained merger with Malaya to form Malaysia. Mr Rajaratnam was a Ceylonese Tamil, whose family migrated to Malaysia to escape the poverty of his homeland. His father eventually made well in Seremban, which enabled Mr Rajaratnam to proceed to study Law in London. This book begins with an account of his growing up in Seremban and about the hard life of the rubber tappers which his father supervised. So Mr Rajaratnam has known days of want and observed the lot of the poor. It describes him as a quiet and sensitive person totally devoted to books. He loved books, and he devoured them like a Lion (though this is not why the book is so titled). This is perhaps the single unchanging  aspect of Mr Rajaratnam throughout his life. Indeed, it would contribute towards his single ability to weave words into power language in his struggle to build a Singapore according to his ideals.

The book gives much space to his life in London, and especially his interaction with people who believed passionately in communism. The Left Book Club was to be the main vehicle for him to wade into the world of Leftism, where he formed friendships with people of like mind. His own passion about social consciousness in life and society, and his beginning to write on the same eventually led him to abandon his studies in Law, dashing the hopes of his father. As events would have it, the Germans began to bomb London during the Second World War and Mr Rajaratnam, who was not able to make his way back to Malaya, stayed in London, dodging bombs and trying to eck out a living for himself and his Hungarian wife, Piroska.

The second major part of Mr Rajaratnam's life is recounted in his days as a journalist, first with the Singapore Standard and later, the Straits Times. By now, he had begun to agitate for the abolition of British colonial rule. The book describes in great detail his life as a journalist, perhaps because the author, also a journalist, shares with Mr Rajaratnam the love for the word and world of journalism.

A third phase of Mr Rajaratnam's life began when he formed a close association with Mr Lee Kuan Yew in the shared objective of getting rid of the colonial government, and working for an independent Malaya. Mr Rajaratnam had always believed that independence had to mean the integration of Singapore into the then Malaya to form a Malaysian Malaysia, void of racial segregation or any special consideration for one race over another. The idea of equality, regardless of race, language or religion, was his creed, which he fought so valiantly for. Mr Rajaratnam eventually gave up his career as a journalist to become a politician, finding common cause with people like Mr Lee Kuan Yew, and yet able to work with erstwhile communists such as Lim Chin Siong. The book describes Mr Rajaratnam's mighty and valiant hands with words, and how he would make use of his powerful pen (actually his typewriter) to challenge, debunk and defend his ideals and those of the PAP, like a fearless and fearsome Lion, the Singapore Lion.

The book is written in a sympathetic manner, where Mr Rajaratnam failings, if there are any, are explained in the context of the times, the difficulties and challenges. This is not surprisingly as the author has known Mr Rajaratnam both at the professional level and a personal level. Nevertheless, the treatment of his life is both sensitive and factual. It is obvious that much research has gone into the writing of this book.

Harry's Bar

I haven't raced through a book as quickly as this one. No, I didn't just skim over it. I pretty much read it cover to cover. You just must appreciate the tight narrative of the book "The Story of Harry's" by current owner, Mr Mohan Mulani. It is concise yet it has managed to bring out the story of home-grown (i.e. Singapore) jazz bar complete with a narrative of its founding by Mr Jim Gelpi, a Louisiana native expatriate in Singapore, the author's involvement, first as a customer, then an investor and ultimately its sole owner. All of which makes for fascinating reading. The author has even slipped in a chapter on his life before Harry's. This account is to lead up to why and how he eventually ended up giving up much of his original business ventures into developing the Harry's business and brand. After all, by his own admission, he is not familiar with the restaurant and bar business, being more experience and having made his fortune in the trading business (consumer electronics products) and in property and real estate investments. The author draws out an important lesson from the failure of this early part of his business ventures, which is to be honest and to honour one's obligations in business.

Against this backdrop, Mr Mulani then narrates the development of Harry's Bar, which is located in Boat Quay. It is still there. He also writes about the key people whom he relied on in the early years to run the business, and the people who regularly came by after a hard day's work in the central business district just a stone's throw away from its Bar on the banks of the Singapore River, including the infamous Nick Leeson who wrecked Barrings. Just as interestingly he has included brief narratives of the many jazz musicians who have played at Harry's over the years. The book is interspersed with pertinent photographs throughout the book that lends intimacy to the stories. The book even has a discussion of the origin and and development of the Harry's well-known business logo.

Within this fascinating story, Mr Mulani has weaved in material one would expect to find only in business books - building up the Harry's chain of bars and restaurants, brand making while expanding the business, and a look into future ventures. There is even a chapter distilling the business wisdom that he had spent a lifetime learning.

I would recommend this book to anyone looking for a quick but good read. Along the way, you would pick up a gem or two regarding starting and growing a business. But above all, you will get a glimpse into one of the iconic brands in the F&B industry in Singapore.

p.s. If you buy the book, you can claim a free bottle of Harry's Premium Lager upon presentation of the book. Now that's what I call good value for money. This offer is good till April 2011.

New New Things

Chock Full of stories - this is the main impression that you are left with after reading half of the book, Upstarts, by Donna Fenn. This book is about the stories of young entrepreneurs in America, how they saw a need, worked out a solution either on their own, or with friends, or with the social crowd (crowd sourcing), typically on the Internet Forums, and became profitable, some wildly so. So if you are looking for examples and case studies on entrepreneurship, particularly of the younger set, this is a good resource. All the examples in this book are about young entrepreneurs in the US, and their business varied from technology startups to publishing. Ms Fenn has helpfully categorized them into Extreme Collaborators, Technology Mavens, Game Changers, Market Insiders, Brand Builders, Social Capitalists, Workplace Renegades, and Morph Masters. Each chapter in the book discusses these categories of enterpreneurs and cites many examples of actual startup businesses, which Ms Fenn dubs 'Upstarts'.

The many examples are fascinating and each provides a lesson or two about starting a business. However, at about the half way marked (of the book), you can't help feeling a bit tired. The stories, while still interesting, get a bit formulaic. So this is probably a book not for reading cover to cover, but a rich resource of case studies and analyses of the many ways and paths and types of ideas and endeavors that can become springboards for successful businesses. Of course Ms Fenn warns what not all businesses succeed, that probably more companies fail than succeed, but the stories of those that failed is just as important as those that succeed. Keep it for a ready reference source.

The best that he could

Reading a book brought back a lot of memories. Memories of a boyhood home. Fond memories indeed. What book has had that power? "Subhas Anandan - the best I could" is a semi-autobiographic account of Singapore's best known criminal lawyer, Mr Subhas Anandan. This book covers his early life and the criminal cases he has dealt with over his long legal career. What's so interesting in this account? Well, Mr Anandan writes in a simple yet engaging style, shorn of any legalese that might deter anybody except fellow lawyers. Yet this is not what drew me to the book in the first place. After all, the author devotes half of the book recounting cases he has handled - cases that have, in their time, received wide public coverage through the local print and broadcast media.

The reason I picked up the book was because someone else who had read the book told me that he is a Naval Base boy. And so I found out through this book that he lived in the Naval Base workers' quarters, like I did. His father worked for the British, like my father did. And he went to Naval Base school, like where I did. One might wonder why I never realise these earlier, given our shared history. Perhaps it is because because he preceded me by a generation - he had already qualified as a lawyer when I was just in primary school. Or perhaps we only know it now that he has written this book, which was published only at the end of last year, 2008. Whatever the reason, his account of his experiences, places, things and people brought me back to the place - Naval Base - as memories came flooding back. In this sense, I enjoyed the book, but I was wrong about the second part of the book, where he recounts some of the more famous criminal cases he was involved in. Yes, I have read about the cases in the public media, some in great detail, but his account gives the 'inside track' on these cases. They are more personal accounts as he wrote about the criminals themselves, and their motives and drew pithy lessons from each of the cases.

My mother used to say that if nothing, lawyers do one bad thing - they defend criminals. How can one act on behalf of a person who has done wrong, who has cheated, who has maimed and worse, who has killed somebody else? Mr Anandan appears to have addressed these doubts in the pages of this book. And he has more. His experiences in jail, his encounters with fellow lawyers Francis Seow, JB Jeyeratnam, David Marshall, and even the famous playwright, John Mortimer, are absorbing reads. Truly, when you pick up this book, you wouldn't want to put it down until you reach the last page.

Profit with people

Sam Wyly? Never heard of him. Is he related to that famed Warner Brothers cartoon character, Wily E. Coyote? Well, yes, if you consider that both live in Texas. But no, because the first is immensely rich while Wily continues to pursue the Road Runner and gets its head smashed in a desert rock.

Sam Wyly, as I only recently read about, is a serial entrepreneur who started businesses such as University Computing, Sterling Software and took over the running of Bonanza Steakhouse, amongst many successful commercial ventures. The first I have never read about, but I know the second and third businesses. He was a millionaire by the time he was 30 years old. Today, he is 70 something and a billionaire. Now why did he fall under my reading radar all these years, when even his compatriot and friend, Ross Perot, is so much more well known, though not necessarily more wealthy? I really don't know. But I am glad I made his acquaintance through his autobiographical book, "1,000 Dollars and an Idea". I would normally not pick up any book that boasts about getting rich or how to do so. Not that I don't want to but I am realistic. Let's just say it isn't in my genes to become one - financially rich, i.e., though Mr Wyly might disagree. It was those technology companies mentioned in the jacket of the book that interested me.

The book recounts Mr Wyly's rags to riches story, of how he exploited, legally of course, opportunities that came along to enable him to build companies that made lots of money. And doing so with hardly enough money of his own in the bank. Would-be entrepreneurs could learn a thing or two on how he did it. He is a person of his times, when computers (NOT personal computers) were becoming important. Is it any surprise that he cut his teeth with Tom Watson Sr and Jr while working as a salesman in IBM? His story is a fascinating one, as he recounts how he started companies, built them, then sold them, acquired others, sometimes through leveraged buyouts, and accumulated wealth in the process. Of course, he did lose money along the way, lots of it, and he failed to realise some of his ideas, or dreams, but he is sanguine about it. One has to be patient and it will pan out. They did, most of the time, i.e.

One of the things that I took away from this account is the importance of people in your lives, and how it is important to identify them, trust them, get them to work for you, nurture them and share the rewards with them. That is probably one of the keys to his success. The other is the lesson of creative destruction - to know when to quit, when to exit a business. Many hold on to their babies, see them grow up and old, and die.

Not so Mr Wyly's approach. He does not seem to be sentimental about any company he has formed. Instead, he is sentimental about the people who took the journey with him forming these companies. As it turned out, he was right many times and profited from those decisions, some in the nick of time. Some would say he has a good sense of timing. Others would say it is just dumb luck. Whichever way, he made his fortune with an eye for opportunity and, shall I say, a lot of daring.

Teacher Man

Frank McCourt is not easy to read. I 'suffered' through his Angela's Ashes more than a decade ago and never returned to him until this year when, on the advice of a wise man, took up his third book, Teacher Man.

I remember trudging through Angela's Ashes because the story, his story, was so depressing. The book recounts McCourt's growing up in Limerick, Ireland and the psychological scars he acquired through the many downs he encountered. He was to mention these again in Teacher Man to similar feelings of depression. In Teacher Man, he added depressing accounts of his start in the teaching profession, of how the schools he started with had students who had no great interest in studying. And McCourt was depressingly frank - he wrote that he didn't know what to do with these students, or how to teach them. It would have been uplifting if he had written of how he faced the odds in the classroom and overcame them. But he didn't overcome the odds, it just got too tiresome. He eventually left for another school - a community college, where the students were older and more mature and probably more willing to learn. It didn't last either because he only had a Master's degree. The school could only offer him a position if he had planned on getting a PhD. So he returned to a teaching position in a Vocational School, but this lasted only 5 months before he was 'forced out'.

When I started out with the book, I wasn't expecting so much 'failure' in the book. I had expected this to be an inspirational book, but for 2/3 of the book, it was not to be found - even in his recounting of his attempt at a PhD in Trinity College, Dublin. But he does keep the narrative interesting by describing some of his students and their antics, and related some of this to his early days in New York, after he came over from Ireland. To me, the narrative starts to sparkle when he join his last school, Stuyvescent High School. before he retired. It is here that he came into his own as an innovative and effective teacher of creative writing. It is not surprising that he eventually put pen to paper himself and produced his autobiographical trilogy - the award-winning Angela's Ashes, Tis! and Teacher Man.

In this book, and his earlier one (I have not read Tis! though), he brings a depressing honesty to his narrative, calling a dog a dog, and not fudging at his failings. At least, that is my impression. And he does have some gems in the book on what teaching is about, and how he developed as a teacher. This is a very interesting book (although somewhat dated), but if you consider teaching an evergreen profession, then you can do nothing better than read his account of teaching and learning. Just for forewarned - you need to be patient to be inspired here.

Postscript:

Frank McCourt Dies at 78

Frank McCourt Dies - other news sources