Recently, Mark Parker, CEO of Nike, Inc., was interviewed by Robert Safian, editor of Fast Company (one of my fave magazines). Parker has a relaxed sense of humor and his ability for self deprecation puts the interviewer at ease. As someone who is in front of the camera much of his day, Mark Parker does not look like a deer in the headlights–his demeanor is an asset.
In this short video, Mark Parker relates a conversation he had with Steve Jobs, the man behind the Apple (with Steve Wozniak) phenomenon. As seers into the collective unconscious, Parker and Jobs have few equals. (Wozniak lived near my college coach, Dan Durante, and would ride his motorcycle along side my training partner, Paul Gyorey, and I, for a mile or so, as he went to find the Sunday paper, deep in the Santa Cruz mountains, about 1980-81.)
However, in terms of zen quality, Steve Jobs gives Mark Parker advice that every PLM and designer should embrace: Keep the good stuff, dump the crappy stuff. It sure sounds funnier, and also more profound coming from Mark Parker!
