For you, which comes first: happiness or success?

For you, which comes first: happiness or success?

My guess is that you have already answered that question several times today. You answer it every time your brain says, "I'll be happy when I find a job." "I'll be happy when I get a promotion." "I'll be happy when my dissertation is finished."

The formula is clear: Work harder, then you'll be successful, then you'll be happier. When I asked some of my Harvard students, their answer was easy: "I'm working my butt off now so I can be happy when ... [fill in the blank with a six figure banking job, make a scientific breakthrough, get into medical school, etc.]."

But here's what these brilliant students often forget: Getting into Harvard was supposed to make them happy. How many of them in high school thought they'd be happy once they got in? Why didn't the success then happiness formula work?

It's hard to find happiness after success if the goalposts of success keep changing.

Now for the good news. Based on the findings in "The Happiness Advantage," If you reverse the order of the formula, you end up with greater happiness and greater success rates. Happiness and advantage, and the precursor to greater success.

Read more here...

Why Jobs said that those jobs in China are never coming back

Why Apple builds iPhones (and everything else) in China

President Obama reportedly once asked Steve Jobs what it would take to make iPhones in the U.S. Jobs' response wasn't encouraging...

POSTED ON JANUARY 23, 2012, AT 12:07 PM

An assembly line in Shenzhen: China has created an "unparalleled system for taking something from idea to reality faster and easier than any place on the planet," says Sarah Lacy at PandoDaily.Photo: Qilai Shen/In Pictures/CorbisSEE ALL 49 PHOTOS

Should Apple and its rivals make their gadgets in the U.S.?

	Yes. American companies have a moral obligation to hire American workers
	They should. But they'll need Uncle Sam's help.
	No. U.S. manufacturers just can't compete with their global rivals.
	No. Businesses exist to make profits, not to act as job-creation programs.

When President Obama famously dined with a handful of Silicon Valley titans a year ago, he had a question for Apple chief Steve Jobs, say Charles Duhigg and Keith Bradsher in The New York Times: What would it take to make iPhones in the United States? Jobs' answer was unambiguous and sobering: "Those jobs aren't coming back." Now, in a lengthy story, Duhigg and Bradsher explain — based on conversations with executives at Apple and its tech rivals, economists, and government officials — why Apple and just about every player in the consumer-electronics universe has all but given up on "Made in the USA." Here, a concise look at the secret to China's success:

What does China have that America lacks?Quite a lot. China has more mid-level engineers, a more flexible workforce, and gigantic factories that can ramp up production at the drop of a hat. China also offers tech firms a one-stop solution. "The entire supply chain is in China now," a former high-ranking Apple executive tells The Times. "You need a thousand rubber gaskets? That's the factory next door. You need a million screws? That factory is a block away. You need that screw made a little bit different? It will take three hours."

It's not just about cheaper wages?No. Wages actually aren't that big a part of the cost of making consumer electronics, according to The Times. Paying American wages to build iPhones would add only about $65 to the retail price of each handset, according to analysts' estimates. That's an amount Apple could likely afford. And in fact, China no longer offers rock-bottom wages. But when it did, it used that window "to innovate the entire way supply chains work,"says Sarah Lacy at PandoDaily. China is now "a place other countries can beat on sheer cost, but not on speed, flexibility, and know-how."

What does China's competitive edge look like in practice?One example from The Times article: When Jobs decided just a month before the iPhone hit markets to replace a scratch-prone plastic screen with a glass one, a Foxconn factory in China woke up about 8,000 workers when the glass screens arrived at midnight, and the workers were assembling 10,000 iPhones a day within 96 hours. Another example: Apple had originally estimated that it would take nine months to hire the 8,700 qualified industrial engineers needed to oversee production of the iPhone; in China, it took 15 days. Anecdotes like that leave you "feeling almost impressed by the no-holds-barred capabilities of these manufacturing plants," says Edward Moyer at CNET News, "impressed and queasy at the same time."

Is there anything the U.S. can do to bring these jobs back?At the Silicon Valley dinner, some tech executives suggested that a "tax holiday" on foreign profits would allow their companies to repatriate money to create jobs at home. Such a tax break would save Apple about $8.2 billion, says Philip Elmer-DeWitt at Fortune. "That's a lot of lettuce." Jobs also suggested at the dinner that Apple could bring some skilled manufacturing jobs to the U.S. if the government helped train a new cadre of engineers.

Was Steve Jobs generally down on America?No. Apple has actually added quite a few jobs here in the U.S., even as it outsources more of its labor overseas. And at the end of the Silicon Valley dinner, Jobs reportedly told Obama that he's "not worried about the country's long-term future" because the U.S. "is insanely great."

Zynga IPO And What it Says About the New Economy

...."It takes decades after an iconic turning point for structural revolutions to come to full flower and upend the social and economic order.  The profound impacts of the first era of computing didn’t start until the late 1980s, nearly 30 years after the invention of the first mini-computer, Digital Equipment Corporation’s PDP-8.   What makes a Zynga possible comes decades after the invention of the Internet.  Now, as then, the velocity of change will accelerate.".......
.....more
http://www.forbes.com/sites/markpmills/2011/12/18/the-good-news-behind-the-zynga-ipo-and-what-it-says-about-the-new-economy/

Steve Jobs and the Seven Rules of Success

When we built System Software Associates as an enterprise application software company in the emerging mid market in the 80's & then reinvented it in the mid 90's we lived by  lessons learned from companies like Apple, Microsoft, IBM, Coke and McDonalds. 

1. Be fast, flexible &  focused
2. Change the way the world does business and change the playing field for competitors
3. Do it right or don't do it
4. A quarter pounder should taste the same everywhere around the world
5. Think globally, execute locally (distributors/affiliates/business partners)
6. Act like what you want to become
7. If you think you can, or you think you can't....your probably right
8. Sell the whole Vision but install in digestible pieces - lead from the front
9. Luck is the intersection of where preparation meets opportunity and you take advantage of it - make your own luck
10. Earn the right to own your piece of the market - clients/customers are what matters most - the rest flows from there

Here is Steve Jobs list for when he founded then reinvented Apple.

BY Carmine Gallo | October 14, 2011|

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Steve Jobs' impact on your life cannot be overestimated. His innovations have likely touched nearly every aspect -- computers, movies, music and mobile. As a communications coach, I learned from Jobs that a presentation can, indeed, inspire. For entrepreneurs, Jobs' greatest legacy is the set of principles that drove his success.
Over the years, I've become a student of sorts of Jobs' career and life. Here's my take on the rules and values underpinning his success. Any of us can adopt them to unleash our "inner Steve Jobs."
1. Do what you love. Jobs once said, "People with passion can change the world for the better." Asked about the advice he would offer would-be entrepreneurs, he said, "I'd get a job as a busboy or something until I figured out what I was really passionate about." That's how much it meant to him. Passion is everything.
2. Put a dent in the universe. Jobs believed in the power of vision. He once asked then-Pepsi President, John Sculley, "Do you want to spend your life selling sugar water or do you want to change the world?" Don't lose sight of the big vision.
Related: Why Entrepreneurs Love Steve Jobs

3. Make connections. Jobs once said creativity is connecting things. He meant that people with a broad set of life experiences can often see things that others miss. He took calligraphy classes that didn't have any practical use in his life -- until he built the Macintosh. Jobs traveled to India and Asia. He studied design and hospitality. Don't live in a bubble. Connect ideas from different fields.
4. Say no to 1,000 things. Jobs was as proud of what Apple chose not to do as he was of what Apple did. When he returned in Apple in 1997, he took a company with 350 products and reduced them to 10 products in a two-year period. Why? So he could put the "A-Team" on each product. What are you saying "no" to?
5. Create insanely different experiences. Jobs also sought innovation in the customer-service experience. When he first came up with the concept for the Apple Stores, he said they would be different because instead of just moving boxes, the stores would enrich lives. Everything about the experience you have when you walk into an Apple store is intended to enrich your life and to create an emotional connection between you and the Apple brand. What are you doing to enrich the lives of your customers?
Related: 10 Things to Thank Steve Jobs For
6. Master the message. You can have the greatest idea in the world, but if you can't communicate your ideas, it doesn't matter. Jobs was the world's greatest corporate storyteller. Instead of simply delivering a presentation like most people do, he informed, he educated, he inspired and he entertained, all in one presentation.
7. Sell dreams, not products. Jobs captured our imagination because he really understood his customer. He knew that tablets would not capture our imaginations if they were too complicated. The result? One button on the front of an iPad. It's so simple, a 2-year-old can use it. Your customers don't care about your product. They care about themselves, their hopes, their ambitions. Jobs taught us that if you help your customers reach their dreams, you'll win them over.
There's one story that I think sums up Jobs' career at Apple. An executive who had the job of reinventing the Disney Store once called up Jobs and asked for advice. His counsel? Dream bigger. I think that's the best advice he could leave us with. See genius in your craziness, believe in yourself, believe in your vision, and be constantly prepared to defend those ideas.