Excerpts from Becoming Steve Jobs
Becoming Steve Jobs is an excellent book. You should drop what you’re reading and read it instead. I loved it; I expect to reread at least one more time in my lifetime. Here are the excerpts I highlighted:
Lasetter, Catmull, and everyone at Pixar, on the other hand, fully realized that making a movie for Disney was probably their only change to survive as a company. The negotiations were their last stand, and their fate was in the hands of Steve. Catmull and Lasseter were very comfortable with this. For years, Steve had been the point man on Pixar's negotiations. "He was tough," remembers Lasseter, "He'd walk into the room and say, 'Which one of you has the authority to buy our computers?' If they said no one, he would just dismiss them. 'I only want to negotiate with someone who can make the deal,' he'd say, and leave. We always said that Steve would take a hand grenade, toss it into the room, and then walk in. He'd get everyone's attention right away.
Susan Barnes has observed that Steve entered every negotiation knowing exactly what he had to get, and what his position was versus the other side. In negotiating with Lucas, he had been able to exploit Lucans's need for cash. This time Steve went in knowing that Katzenberg had the power, and that Pixar needed a deal to survive.
