Steve Jobs no longer micromanaging Apple (but he “calls in regularly”)

Steve Jobs at Apple’s developer conference in the summer of 2011. As soon as he took the stage, Jobs pointed at someone dear to him in the audience, flashing that infectious smile of his.

Well, don’t get enraged immediately, that’s what some analysts are saying seven months in Steve Jobs’ medical leave, his longest leave of absence ever at Apple. Analyst Tim Bajarin with Creative Strategies told The San Jose Mercury News that Jobs had appeared to him at WWDC this June “the same as he did in March when he introduced the iPad 2”. One cannot “draw too much from the length of the absence”, he said, speculating Jobs’ recuperative process might require less physical activity.

After all, announcing his third medical leave in January, Jobs said in a company statement that Apple’s operations boss Timothy Cook would be “responsible for all of Apple’s day to day operations” as “I will continue as CEO and be involved in major strategic decisions for the company”. Bajarin, who reportedly mingles regularly with upper management at Apple, confirms Jobs has definitely moved away from micromanaging every aspect of the company:

They tell me he calls in regularly. He talks to Tim, he talks to the top guys, he talks about the Apple stores. But while he used to micromanage everything in ways that most CEOs would not, right down to issues with the company cafeteria, the big change with his latest leave is that there’s less micromanagement and more management of his executive team and the big-picture issues.