Steve Jobs was “one of the most disagreeable people in the history of humankind,” and that was part of his genius, billionaire venture capitalist Marc Andreessen said.
Speaking on the “A16z” podcast produced by his investment firm, Andreessen Horowitz, Andreessen said the late Apple CEO would “disagree with you over the shape of a glass on the table in front of you, he was going to argue about everything.”
“It was where a lot of the genius came from,” Andreessen added. “He was just not going to take the status quo for granted under any circumstances.”
Andreessen got to know Jobs in the 1990s when he was a young entrepreneur in Silicon Valley, having cofounded Mosaic Communications Corporation, which later became Netscape.
Andreessen said Jobs and Elon Musk shared an approach to “first principles thinking,” where difficult problems are broken down into their most basic elements and then rebuilt.
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The Tesla CEO previously told workers to employ a first principles philosophy to improve performance.
Andreessen said there seemed to be two types of stories about Jobs in the books about him: that he was a “saint,” and that he was a “screaming lunatic,” who would yell and fire staff in meetings.
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Andreessen said that, from what he saw and speaking to people who worked with Jobs, “I think the reality was in the middle.”
“If you brought him first-class work, and if you were topping your field and super diligent, and on top of everything, and had all the details figured out, and knew what you were doing, and really good, he was like the best manager you were ever going to work with, and the best CEO you were ever going to work with” Andreessen said.
He said many people who worked with Jobs said they did their best work under him.
“His approach to performance management was ‘everybody is going to be doing top-end work, if not, they’re not going to be here. As a consequence, the best people in the world are going to love being here because they’re surrounded by the best people in the world,'” Andreessen said.
