Apple's Core Dilemma: Should a New CEO Preserve or Evolve?

We Fixed It, You're Welcome

This episode of 'We Fixed It, You're Welcome' explores the leadership transition at Apple following Tim Cook's move to executive chairman and John Ternus's

Key takeaways

• Apple's strength lies not in copying past leaders but in evolving its culture of innovation and collaboration.
• Successful transitions require honoring legacy while allowing space for new leadership styles to emerge.

Main topics

• Apple leadership transition
• Steve Jobs vs. Tim Cook leadership styles

Notable quotes

"The future belongs to the best storyteller." – Steve Jobs, referenced as a guiding principle for Apple's narrative.

Conclusion

John Ternus doesn't need to be Steve Jobs or Tim Cook—he needs to lead with

Transcript preview

Speaker 1 (0:00) Welcome to We Fixed It. You're welcome. The show where we take over companies, you come along for the ride, and we try to put them back better than we found them. Apple has a brand new CEO. With Tim Cook moving to executive chairman, longtime hardware chief John Ternus is taking over. The question on everyone's minds is whether Ternus could fill Tim Cook's shoes. Here's another question. Should he even try? Because, to quote an old ad campaign, Apple likes to think different. So no doubt the company's looking for fresh ideas. But if a newly appointed CEO like Ternus changes too much too fast, that's a problem. If he doesn't make any changes at all, Speaker 1 (0:40) and tries to preserve the way things were, that's also a problem. And this is not any old company. This is Apple. So how can a hand-picked successor hold on to everything that made this company great and also move the company forward? This is a moment where the right move could signal progress, confidence, and growth. The wrong move could be disastrous. That's what we're here to fix. And lucky for us, our guest knows a thing or two about this situation. You won't be hearing from Chino today. She's a little under the weather. So please join Melissa and me in welcoming Chris Deaver. Speaker 1 (1:13) Chris worked in leadership development at Apple during a highly successful period even by Apple standards. Even more relevant, he worked extensively with John Ternus for more than a decade to prepare him for the CEO role. Since 2023, Chris has been the co-founder and principal of BraveCore, where he works with Fortune 500 leadership teams on performance and growth. He's also co-author of the book Brave Together, which was selected by Malcolm Gladwell's Next Big Idea Club. So I'm guessing he knows his stuff. Speaker 1 (1:41) Welcome, Chris. What else would you like to share? Great. Thank you, Aaron. And great to be here with you, Melissa, as well, and everybody that's listening. Just excited to be part of the conversation and looking forward to diving in. Nice. Thank you, Chris. We're very glad you're here. We've been wanting to talk about Apple for a good while from a leadership perspective, so we can't wait to hear what you have to say. Before we jump into it, let's rewind a bit. So yes, Apple has a new CEO, but that has happened before. A lot of us associate Apple interchangeably with Steve Jobs, but Steve Jobs actually left in 1985 and didn't come back until 1997. But he came back on fire. He took a company that was operating at a loss into a profit by the next year. After Jobs took over, the product line was simplified and beautified. The ad campaigns were clever and undeniable. Speaker 1 (2:30) and the company culture was solidified. Apple could not be stopped. Then, of course, the baton passed from Steve Jobs to Tim Cook in 2011. That could have been catastrophic given the circumstances, but actually, the transition went well. Cook had already spent 13 years at Apple and did not try to become Steve Jobs 2.0. Instead, he scaled the company, improved the technology, strategically introduced new products, and built a much larger global operation. By 2025, Apple's revenue was almost four times higher than it was in 2011. Go Tim Cook. So that all sounds great. As a leader, Tim Cook played it a little safer, was more diplomatic, and didn't take the big swings that Steve Jobs did. And there were missteps too. Speaker 1 (3:10) Apple cancelled its automotive project, that was expensive, delayed major Siri improvements, and was accused of price gouging. But ultimately, a new leader came in, moved the company forward, drove profits, and pretty much nailed it. Now, we're in the exact same situation. A new leader, promoted from within, with everyone waiting to see what will happen. Was the handoff to Tim Cook a fluke, or can magic happen again? John Ternes is not Tim Cook, he's not Steve Jobs. So... Speaker 1 (3:38) What is a new leader supposed to do in this situation? And it's a fair question that it's on a lot of people's minds. In fact, I get calls from reporters, you know, Wall Street Journal, and everybody's curious, right? How's it going to play out? And I think they were very curious in those other circumstances, right? When Steve came back and when, you know, Tim took over the reins, certainly. That was a big moment, right? And so... But I think there's also a deeper question too about why would Steve choose somebody who is very different than him in terms of personality, right? Steve being a more aggressive aggregator or integrator of stuff and having direction, right, in meetings and showing up with a lot of clarity about, you know, the focus of the company and, you know, Tim being kind of more of a stepping back, zooming out kind of MBA. Speaker 1 (4:35) Seeing the big picture and then a deep operator. Yeah, Chris, I think I like what you're saying about the right leader at the right time. Because like you said, even after a consensus builder like Tim Cook, I don't know that there'd be room for someone like with a singular vision like Steve Jobs. I mean, they'd have to be incredibly dynamic to kind of steamroll to get their way. Um, but it's Apple has become more of a, I've, you know, from everything I know, more of a committee driven type of company. Um, there's, there's more peacekeeping and, and, uh, and that's all thanks to Tim Cook. And, you know, so after those two big imprints, um, I don't know that a Steve jobs could come in and just say my way or get out. Yeah, no, there's a funny hypothetical here too. That actually was a plausible scenario at one point when Apple was in the automotive game. Speaker 1 (5:28) they looked at, and Tesla was struggling financially. There was real conversations about acquiring Tesla. And the contingency for Elon was he would have to be the CEO of all of Apple. And of course, Tim wouldn't have that, right? Yeah. Well, and I think that this is like a great story when we talk about CEOs in transition, right? And so I think Chris... you know, this very specifically about Apple, like the spotlight is on there. But this is not a story that is any different than has happened at other large corporations and other large brands, right? Where, you know, what happens operationally during that CEO transition? How do you make it work? And you are very in touch with Tim as well as John. Speaker 1 (6:20) And so the fact of the matter is that to have that be a successful transition is really going to be important and that there is a smooth handoff. And it's more than just, you know, the rah-rah press release. And, you know, that you're honoring, I think what you're saying is not just Steve Jobs. It's honoring that culture that Apple has built. That is what it's known for. It's known for innovation. It's known for... pushing the limits. And it's known for beautiful products, right, that deliver on that, on those services. So, you know, Apple really has given itself some runway here by having Cook stay on throughout the summer and then also on the board. But I think that we've seen those stories like that where it actually hasn't worked out well. Speaker 1 (7:10) Chris, what would your advice be to him as he's coming in to kind of build that clarity there so that that transition goes smoothly as well as, you know, honoring Tim Cook? Yeah, I think first of all, to your point, like these transitions are very hard. And I think sometimes like with acquisitions, as another example, people tend to underestimate how difficult it is. And in the underestimation, you also have sometimes egos at play, right? There's kind of a reluctance to letting go. And some of that is like, hey, these are like dream team people. It's like Michael Jordan retiring, but actually retiring, right? And not going to the Wizards and doing whatever he did there. And no shade on Michael Jordan. He's the greatest ever played. But there's a time and a place and a season to make that transition and to be able to Jedi fade and drop the baton officially. Speaker 1 (8:05) I don't think Tim's going to have a problem with that, frankly. You know, I'm pretty close to the pulse with Tim. Actually, we put out a newsletter every week, and he's the first one to read our newsletter. And we did great work together at Apple. And the main thrust of that was, hey, we're great at thinking different, right? We're great at innovation. That's the heartbeat. Steve established it. And then with Tim, our work was taking it to the next level, which we call different together. And it was shifting to a culture that is innovative, but is also extremely collaborative horizontally. And this was really important because you had teams that had grown from, you know, one or 10 people to 100 or 1,000. Right. And you have a culture of secrecy layered in. I'm talking like more secrecy than the government or the FBI or CIA. And about products. And there's a reason for it because. Speaker 1 (9:00) You want the surprise and delight at the end of the tunnel, right? Something special that emerges. Now, somebody like John, first of all, handpicked because you're not going to bring somebody in the outside of the culture of Apple. The antibodies would come out. It wouldn't work at all. They wouldn't have the DNA. And, you know, that gets to the point about the Elon thing we were talking about earlier. But I also think that that personality wouldn't work out. You know, to Aaron's point earlier, having somebody that... Speaker 1 (9:28) understands the context that they're, whatever they say is going to be scrutinized. It's a global, you know, in fact, height in a heightened sense than ever. I mean, Apple, like it gets all that attention, right? Like there's a lot of people looking at what's their next move. I talked extensively with Angela Ahrens about this too. And, you know, she had transitioned out as the head of retail a few years ago and did a phenomenal job, right? Launching like 500 stores. But I guess to get to the heart of your question is how does this transition, how do we ensure that it works properly? With the insular nature of it and the promoting from within and the really nurturing over a decade plus, it has the feel of a family business. Speaker 1 (10:11) you know, um, a picture like a family furniture store where the stakes are just for the family are very high, but the global stakes are a lot lower. It still has that same kind of like push and pull dynamic of with, with, especially with Tim Cook's, you know, staying on and having a role and however involved he chooses to be or will be, uh, in the next phase. But you, you have Tim Cook didn't have the, the Steve Jobs after a certain point, Steve Jobs wasn't around to make. to check with or make decisions or assert his influence. So, but Ternus has Tim Cook around. I think the other DNA that, you know, Steve, to his credit, he saw this in contrast, even though he had a ton of respect for Disney and Walt in particular, Walt Disney, the question of like that people were left with in that lost decade after Walt died, right? It was like, what would Walt do? And trust me. Speaker 1 (11:04) That still lingers on sometimes, right? The work that I did at Disney too, we did there was as we acquired Pixar was infusing this new thinking towards, hey, you can rethink this, right? You can reimagine your approach to how you do it. And, you know, kudos to Bob Iger. I think he did a fair amount with a lot of acquisitions and direction for the company. There are fair questions to be asked about, like, why is their stock price the same it's been for like 10 years after? Speaker 1 (11:33) And I think that has to do with some of what we're talking about. Succession was very messy, right? Bob Chapik, that was kind of messy. There was another CFO, Tom Staggs, before that. And I think Josh DeMauro is the right person now. I think they landed on it. And, you know, why was it so messy there? Probably a combination of forces. I think Bob Iger was such a definitive leader. He'd made such great decisions related to... working with Steve on some of those, frankly, Marvel, Lucas, et cetera, Pixar foremost. But, and those re-infuse the Disney, the heartbeat of what Disney is, right? Animation, et cetera. So like, I think there's a way that going back to Apple, they're so intentional that, I mean, again, we were talking about this, yeah, 10 years ago and just continuing to build that capability in John, both on the product side. Speaker 1 (12:28) As he took on more, going from MacBook to iPad to iPhones, more involvement in that, and then taking on that SVP role, which Dan Riccio was before him, you know, we could already see the potential. And a lot of this work about working different together and being a deep collaborator, he had already been embracing with his team. Well, I love what you've said about John being, or not just John, but like Apple having that collaborative culture, you know, and we all know that, you know. Each of these companies that we've been talking about have uber talented people, very smart, very, you know, very, you know, innovative. And so what's great about this is that coming, you know, John's challenge is that he has spent most of his career focused on the hardware engineering. And this is the challenge of any CEO coming into a company is that if they're operationally really good at one thing. Speaker 1 (13:25) That's great. But being a CEO is being able to have, you know, the understanding of CX, retail support, marketing, the full customer journey, just what you said, what's out there in the future, all of the innovation labs, not just owning the product coming out of their specific space. And I think that you brought up a cautionary tale there with Disney where, you know, Chapek. was a strong operational leader, but maybe struggled with the whole enterprise. And that's where the fit was off. And that stakeholder management with the creative talent and all the things that were going on. And, you know, being a CEO, you're in a very political position. You have sensitive issues. You need to be able to, you know, make decisions and really, you know, respond to the shareholders. Speaker 1 (14:14) customers and the board. And I don't, you know, I think what you've said is that that's not going to be Ternus's issue, right? I mean, it's really about him being able to have the trust and because he's been there and knows the people, right, and knows the leaders, to have those strong, I don't even know if second in command is the right way to say it, but have the right generals in place. to really root the entirety of what that Apple experience is all about. And being very explicit publicly that this is what we are and who we are. And it's not. And I feel like even Tim did this. It wasn't about Tim. It wasn't about Steve, right? Well, maybe it was about Steve. But I think that that's one of the things that really is rooted in that culture beyond. And I really appreciate your perspective because I do think there have been cautionary tales where Speaker 1 (15:15) CEOs haven't been able to kind of get over that hump of being embracing that collaborative nature and the culture of the entire enterprise. Yeah. And it's if you've ever worked for any company anywhere, you know, there's the process that's supposed to happen. And then there's what everyone actually does. The problem is most leaders can't see that gap, which makes it pretty hard to know what's actually worth fixing. That's why I like Scribe Optimize, which automatically