Page 33 - The Apple Experience

CHAPTER 2

Hire for Smiles

You can dream, design and build the most wonderful place in
the world, but it requires people to make the dream a reality.

—Walt Disney

The ideal Apple Store candidate knows a little about computers and a lot

about people. Read the previous sentence again because it tells you everything

you need to know about hiring exceptional people who will exceed the

customers’ expectations again and again. One Apple hiring manager told me

he would prefer to hire a teacher who doesn’t know computers instead of a

computer expert who can’t teach. Hiring the right people allows Apple

managers to lead rather than dictate or manage.

Apple doesn’t hire for technical knowledge. It hires for personality. Apple

celebrates the diversity of the world in which we live, and nowhere is that

diversity better reflected than in an Apple store. Do you have a nose ring? No

problem. You’re welcome at Apple. Spiked or colored hair? Again, no

problem. Apple would love to have you. Do you have tattoos covering 90
percent of your body? There’s a role for you at Apple. Make no mistake—it’s

very difficult to be hired at an Apple Store. Former head of retail Ron

Johnson once said it’s tougher to be hired at Apple than it is to be accepted at

his alma mater, Stanford. But there are no barriers to race, sex, age, or

appearance. Apple hires for attitude and not aptitude.