I used to be a certified apple trainer, this really paints their training program in the best light possible, it interprets fairly normal corporate training stuff as original ideas.<p>Most of the training programs are just like any well made otj training, the comment about employees signing up for job specific courses is misleading, while they had some optional courses, it was just like any online course management system, a simple way to manage initial and ongoing job training.<p>In Apple's defense, their otj training was still better than any subsequent company I have worked at.
Everything that Apple does is exaggerated. And this Picasso stuff - "Simplifying the Bull: How Picasso Helps to Teach Apple’s Style" looks like a nice PR stunt ahead of the new iPhone launch.
I was expecting a bit more from the article, but I noticed couple of things:<p>1. The program was established in 2008, which I think is relatively late and coincides with Jobs rapid deterioration of health. I guess Jobs was deeply concerned about the long term prospect of Apple.<p>2. As novel as the idea may seem, it didn't sound too different than garden variety internal training programs offered at larger Fortune companies.<p>3. Sounds like Apple HR is growing. I'd be interested to find out what percent of employees fall under HR, before and after 2008.<p>It should be noted that Jobs was never big on performance metrics.
I once did "outside of Cupertino" training. The best bit was the pens & notebooks with subtle Apple emblemising on them. It made me much cooler with peers when I did my masters.
this is fascinating inside view of Apple's culture and the TV remote example given is why Google TV flopped and Apple TV sells well (although way less compared to their i-products). The article depicts a picture of Apple's design centric culture where even engineers think top-down by starting with user interface/experience and then towards the technical implementation. This shows in their products.