书城外语英语PARTY——笑对人生
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第21章 风采(4)

Headaches: Multifold. Apple is still a pipsqueak to the Wintel Goliath. With less than 10 percent of the computer market, Apple needs to lure more software makers into producing programs for the Mac. The company has cut about as much as it can. Now it has a tougher job: Make sales grow. And what,s the followup? Jobs probably also hasn,t been spending as much as he should on research and development. Finally, where is his successor? Pixar, a collegial place, can run without him - but what about Apple? Not a good place for a boss who refuses to remove the “interim” prefix from his CEO title.

最头痛的事:多方面的。苹果公司仍然只是Wintel Goliath方面(意指微机的体系结构由MSWindows操作系统和的Intel的CPU组成)的小人物。 其电脑市场的占有率还不到10%。苹果公司需要吸引更多的软件制造商投入到多存取计算机的电脑编程方面的生产中。该公司已经在这方面做了许多力所能及的工作。现在,他们又面临着一个新的难题:使销售业绩更上一个台阶以及接下来应该开发什么样的新产品?在研究和开发新产品上,乔伯斯很可能还没有投入更多的精力。最后一个问题是,乔伯斯的继任者应该是谁呢?PIXAR公司是一个大学云集的地方,它的操作和运营可以没有乔伯斯——可是苹果公司呢?

Management Style: At Apple, Jobs is a mercurial micromanager - some say nanomanager. Virtually every decision goes by him. “At any time, 10,000 employees are wondering, What would Steve say?, not What is the right thing to do?” said a former Apple exec. At Pixar, realizing that he isn,t a film visionary, he leaves the experts to their knitting.

管理风格:在苹果公司,乔伯斯是一位机智善变的微软经理——也有人说他是非线性方面的经理。事实上,每一项决策都是由他来制定的。 “在任何时候,一万名员工都会在考虑:史蒂文会怎么看呢?而不是:正确的做法应该是怎么样的?”苹果公司的前任首席执行官如此评价说。而在PIXAR公司,他则会放手让他的专家们自己潜心研究。

Habits: Known for casual dress, he cruises the office shoeless and in a sport shirt - but don,t mistake him for laidback. Snacks on granola doused with apple juice.

习惯:乔伯斯是一个以便装形象出名的人。在办公室里,他从不穿鞋,并且总是穿着一件运动衫——但是,请不要误解为他是一个松懈懒散的人。他喜欢将格兰诺拉麦片蘸上苹果汁来吃。

How he got the job: The Apple board begged him to return.

工作背景:苹果董事会邀请乔伯斯重新走马上任。

True story: Former Newton palmtop chief Sandy Benett told his underlings that the subsidiary would be folded back into Apple - before Jobs had made an official announcement. After the news leaked, Jobs fired Benett.

真实故事:前任牛顿掌上电脑的负责人莎迪·伯耐特苹果曾告诉他的手下人说,其子公司将被并入APPLE公司——此事发生在乔伯斯尚未就此发表正式声明之前。该消息被泄露之后,乔伯斯便开除了伯耐特。

Financial reward: His Apple rewards are minimal - a salary of one dollar a year so that his family is eligible for the health plan. But his 69 percent share of Pixar is worth about 1.3 billion.

财务奖赏:乔伯斯在苹果公司的报酬非常少——他的年薪只有一美元,这就足够使他的家人参加健康计划。但是乔伯斯占有PIXAR公司69%的股份,价值约为13亿元。

Dell: How I Sold Computers

戴尔:我是如何卖电脑的

What I saw was a great opportunity to provide computing technology in a more efficient way. That was the core idea of what became dell computer Corporation, and that,s one we were stuck over ever since.

当时我看到一个大机遇就是以更有效的方式提供电脑技术。那后来成为了戴尔公司的核心理念,自那以后我们便一直坚持不懈。

I started the business with a simple question: how can we make the process of buying a computer better? The answer was :sell the computer directly to the end customers. Eliminate the reseller,s markup and pass the savings on to the customers.

我是从一个简单的问题开始创业的:我们如何使购买电脑的过程变得更方便?答案是:直接把电脑卖给终端用户。去除转销商这一层的钱,并把省下的钱还给用户。

It hadn,t occurred to me that others hadn,t figured it out. I thought it was pretty obvious. I am sure if I had taken the time to ask, plenty of people would have told me that my idea wouldn,t work - I have heard that a lot in the fifteen years since starting the business.

当时我并不知道其他人没有意识到这一点。在我看来,那是相当明显的。我确信当时如果我肯花点时间问问人的话,会有很多人说我的想法行不通——创业后十五年我听过许多这样的话。

Sometimes it,s better not to ask or to listenwhen people tell you something can,t be done. I didn,t ask for permission or approval. I just went ahead and did it.

有时不闻不问是最好的办法——当别人告诉你行不通的时候。我就没有去问别人的许可和赞同。我只是一往直前的去做了。

On January 2, 1984, I went back to Austin earlier than I would have to attend classes, and I did all the things you need to do to set up a business. I registered the company with the State of Texas as “PC,s Limited”。 I placed ads in the classified section in our local newspaper.

1984年1月2日,我比开学时间略早一点回到了奥斯汀,我做了一切成立新公司需要做的准备。我注册了个德州公司,名为“个人电脑有限公司”。我在当地报纸的分类广告上登了一则广告。

Through my previous contract with customers and the small ad I placed in the paper, I was already getting a lot of business. I was selling between 50,000 to 80,000 upgraded PCs, upgrade kits, and addon computer components to people in Austin area. Not long after starting the classes I was able to move from a stuffy room that I shared with a roommate to a condominium with high ceilings and two bedrooms. (I didn,t, however, tell my parents for a few months that I moved.)

通过我与客户的早期接触以及在报纸上的广告,当时我已经接到了很多业务。我在奥斯汀地区出售的升级电脑,升级工具,附加零件,每月的销售额达到5万到8万美元之间。开学后不久我便从和室友共住的闷热宿舍搬出来,住进了有高高的天花板,和两个卧室的公寓套间。(然而,我是在好几个月后才把搬家的事情告诉父母的。)

In early May, about a week before I took my final exam to complete my freshman year, I incorporated the company as “Dell Computer Corporation”, doing business as “PC,s Limited”。 we moved the business from my condo to a 1000squarefoot office space in a small business center in North Austin. I hired a few people to take orders over telephone and a few more to fulfill them. Manufacturing consisted of three guys with screwdivers sitting at sixfoot tables upgrading machines. Business continued to grow, and I began to think of what the potential could be if I could devote myself to the venture, fulltime.

五月初,大约是我一年级期末考试前一周吧,我的“戴尔电脑公司成立”,以股份公司形式经营“个人电脑”。公司的地址也从我的公寓搬到了奥斯汀北部一个一千多尺的小商业中心写字楼里面。我雇了些人接电话订单,还有一些人负责填单。生产部有六个人,拿着螺丝起子坐在六英尺的桌子旁升级电脑。业务逐渐扩大,我也开始考虑如果我全心全意的扑在生意上,公司是否还有潜力。

Where I came from, not going to the college is not an acceptable option. Convincing my parents to allow me to leave school would have been impossible. So I just went ahead and did it, whatever the consequences. I finished my freshman year, and left.

不上大学在我的家乡是难以被接受的,要说服父母同意我辍学几乎是不可能的。因此我毅然不顾的我行我素。在念完一年级以后,我便离开了学校。

After a while, my parents forgave me. And a litter bit after that, I forgave them, too.

后来,我父母原谅了我。再后来,我也原谅了他们。

People asked me now, “were you scared?” Sure.

人们现在问我:“你当时害怕吗?”当然害怕。

But it turned out, the timing for PC,s Limited couldn,t have been better.

而结果证明,那个时机成立个人电脑公司再好不过。