Steve Jobs asked one question over and over again because he believed it was so powerful
Rest assured, it’s not how many apples his staff were eating a day.
Steve Jobs, the turtleneck loving former Apple CEO, apparently asked one question over and over again to drive success.
It’s a lot simpler than you may think and it could even change your perspective on how you approach your daily tasks.
So, throw away your productivity planners and ditch the TikTok work hacks, and let’s see what Jobs has to say.
Advert
According to Inc, back in the day, Jobs would continuously ask Apple’s head of design, Jony Ive, "How many times did you say no today?"
It turns out Jobs - who co-founded Apple and was the company's CEO until a few months before he died in 2011 - doesn't see 'no' as a dirty word.
In fact, he apparently liked saying no, as he thought it helped you be more focused.
According to Forbes, Jobs said this at an Apple conference in the 90s: "People think focus means saying yes to the thing you’ve got to focus on. But that’s not what it means at all. It means saying no to the hundred other good ideas that there are.
"You have to pick carefully. I’m actually as proud of the things we haven’t done as the things I have done. Innovation is saying no to 1,000 things."
We've all been there - doing a million other tasks just to put off doing the one big thing that's most important.
So saying no could actually be the key to being more productive, according to Jobs - it's all about choosing the task which will make the biggest difference.
For example, if you got asked to host a last-minute presentation, but you also have a big project to be cracking on with, it’s OK to turn down the presentation.
For Jobs, it is all about managing priorities, and accepting you’re allowed to say no.
Similarly, Mark Zuckerberg, the managing director of Facebook, apparently asks himself: "Am I doing the most important thing I could be doing?" almost every day.
And Steven Bartlett, entrepreneur and Dragon on BBC One’s Dragons’ Den, believes you should be your top priority.
In a tweet from 2019, he wrote: “If we're dating, I want to be your second priority.
“I want your first priority to be you, your ambitions, your life and your future, because my priority right now, is me and mine.
“Finding happiness and security alone, is crucial to finding it together.”
So, sometimes it could help to take a step back to be the most productive version of you.