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Together with Steve Jobs and Ronald Wayne, Steve Wozniak set Apple on a path toward changing the world in 1976, when the trio officially founded the computer company.\u00a0<\/p>\n
And while Apple is one of the world\u2019s most valuable businesses today\u2014with a market capitalization of roughly $4.5 trillion and globe-changing products like the iPhone, iPad, and iMac\u2014Wozniak said building a tech empire was never part of the plan.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen you try things, they don\u2019t have to be for obvious money,\u201d Wozniak said earlier this month at a commencement address for Grand Valley State University. \u201cWhen we started Apple, did I want to make money? Start a company? Start an industry? No.\u201d<\/p>\n
Instead, Wozniak said he was simply driven by a desire to bring his idea for a personal computer to life\u2014and earn the admiration of fellow engineers.<\/p>\n
\u201cI wanted other engineers or other computer people to look at my designs and say, \u2018Whoa\u2019 and appreciate me and my brilliance, \u2018How did he come up with these things?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
In the 1970s, after taking a break from his degree program at University of California, Berkeley, Wozniak landed a job at Hewlett-Packard (HP), where he hoped to spend his career. But after pitching his personal computer idea to the company five separate times\u2014and being turned down each time\u2014he began warming to Jobs\u2019 suggestion that they strike out on their own.\u00a0<\/p>\n
That decision ultimately laid the groundwork for Apple\u2014and informed one of Wozniak\u2019s core messages to graduates: don\u2019t be afraid to take an unconventional path.<\/p>\n
\u201cDon\u2019t follow the same steps as a million other people,\u201d he said. \u201cThink: \u2018Is there something I can do a little different?\u201d<\/p>\n
Wozniak\u2019s original Apple stake could have made him a trillionaire today\u2014instead, he opted for a $50 paycheck<\/p>\n
When Apple was founded, Jobs and Wozniak each received a 45% stake in the company\u2014while Wayne received 10%\u2014a share he famously sold back just days later.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Wozniak, however, didn\u2019t hold onto his stake either. In the 1980s, he gradually sold much of his stock, giving some shares away to early employees who had missed out on equity and sums of money to charity. Had Wozniak held onto his original ownership stake, his fortune could theoretically have made him the world\u2019s first trillionaire.<\/p>\n
However, his approach reflects a long-standing skepticism toward wealth accumulation.<\/p>\n
Earlier in life, he said he spent nights typing college term papers for strangers for just pennies and tutoring students\u2014not because it paid well, but because he enjoyed it.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen you had to type them on a real typewriter from midnight to 6:00 in the morning for a stranger I would never see again, I would charge 5 cents,\u201d he continued in his speech. \u201cIf you do something you love\u2014and I love typing\u2014you don\u2019t need to prove it by charging a huge amount of money.\u201d<\/p>\n
He carried those feelings with him later in life, too.<\/p>\n
\u201cI do not invest. I don\u2019t do that stuff,\u201d he previously told Fortune. \u201cI didn\u2019t want to be near money, because it could corrupt your values.\u201d<\/p>\n
Wozniak stepped back from full-time involvement in Apple in 1985, though in preceding years, stayed on the payroll.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m still an Apple employee\u2014the only person who\u2019s received a paycheck every week since we started the company,\u201d Wozniak said in a separate 2020 podcast interview, adding that after savings and taxes, he received \u201c$50 a week or something\u201d into his bank account.<\/p>\n
Wozniak finished his degree later in life\u2014his message to Gen Z: you don\u2019t need your career figured out on day one<\/p>\n
Wozniak grew up in California with two dream careers in mind: becoming an electrical engineer like his father and teaching fifth grade.<\/p>\n
Though Apple helped fulfill one ambition, education remained central to his life.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019d been taught your education gives you the skills to possibly have a life, have a home, have a family, have children, all that stuff. Education was a very high value to me,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Twelve years after cofounding the tech giant, Wozniak reenrolled to complete the degree he had left unfinished at the University of California Berkeley.<\/p>\n
He eventually graduated, at age 35, under an alias to avoid attention: \u201cMy Berkeley diploma says Rocky Raccoon Clark.\u201d<\/p>\n
In the years following, Wozniak also unlocked his dream of being at the front of the classroom\u2014spending a decade teaching elementary and middle school students about computing.<\/p>\n
Considering his roundabout career, he offered advice for graduates worried about finding the perfect career path immediately:\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201c[It] doesn\u2019t even have to be working in the job you want to do for the rest of your life,\u201d he said. \u201cTake some job to get enough money for an apartment. That\u2019s the most important thing.\u201d<\/p>\n
Wozniak acknowledged that uncertainty is an inevitable part of life\u2014but said he has always tried to meet it with humor and fun. His final message to graduates was simple: \u201cDo your best.\u201d<\/p>\n
#Apples #Steve #Wozniak #cofounded #tech #giant #rejections #HPnot #money #years #paycheck<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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