[uuddlrlr]

To be fair Apple was already a giant rolling ball of success, and they have historically had an ingrained culture of caring deeply about their products above all else.

Any decisions that would affect their trajectory will get a ton of deliberation from a lot of smart people; i.e. there wouldn't need to be a ton of input or ingenuity from the CEO to see returns like those from Apple, imho.

Not to say that Cook isn't great or that it wouldn't be difficult to achieve that success.

[bohemian99]

So many companies have flatlined after a new CEO took over, think Microsoft after Ballmer took over. So I think there is some difficulty involve.

[uuddlrlr]

I guess my point is that the leadership within Apple is a lot more diffuse than typical;

I believe most of Apple's value is from delivering a high degree of consistency and polish; owing to its culture of relentlessly developing the UX of their products.

Therefore the CEO's primary roles at Apple would be to maintain that culture, steer the ship into new segments, and discern when the public will care about those segments.

I think Cook has done a decent job of that.

Making it all possible with RnD and supply chain is another story, but also where Cook is known to excel so maybe I'm underselling him. Jobs had Cook so presumably Cook would find a Cook if he weren't Cook.

I don't know much about Microsoft but Balmer was definitely taking over a different beast than Cook.

[uuddlrlr]

If I let my bias show I'd say Microsoft's value is from developing technology just enough to set up bill gates for customers :p

[Turing_Machine]

Apple was a giant rolling ball of success when John Sculley took over, too.

But that sure didn't last.