We’re back with another Amazing Apple Anecdote for you to laugh, cry or smile at. This week, we learn how one Apple employee Burrell Smith pledged to overcome Steve Jobs’ reality distortion field and quit, even though he didn’t quite deliver on his promise.
Andy Hertzfeld recalls (via Folklore):
No matter how much resolve you could muster, it was still difficult to quit Apple if Steve wanted you to stay. You’d have to sit down with him for a reality distortion session, which was often effective at getting people to change their minds. One day, a few of us were talking about strategies to overcome Steve’s persuasiveness.
“I’ve got it!”, said Burrell. “I know the perfect way to quit that will nullify the reality distortion field.”
Of course we wanted to know how he could do that.
“I’ll just walk into Steve’s office, pull down my pants, and urinate on his desk. What could he say to that? It’s guaranteed to work.” We laughed, thinking that not even Burrell would have the guts to do that.
A year and a half later, it finally was time for Burrell to quit, after months of scuffling with Bob Belleville and some of the other managers, who wanted to cancel the “Turbo Mac” project (a redesigned, faster Mac based on a semi-custom chip, with an internal hard drive) that Burrell was working on with Brian Howard and Bob Bailey.
Burrell told Bob Belleville (who was probably relieved, since he knew that Burrell didn’t respect him) and the human resources department that he was quitting, and then made an appointment to see Steve that afternoon. When he walked into Steve’s office, he was surprised to see Steve grinning at him.
“Are you gonna do it? Are you really gonna do it?”, asked Steve. Somehow, word about the urination threat had gotten back to Steve, and he was genuinely curious if Burrell would go through with it or not.
Burrell looked Steve in the eye. “Do I have to? I’ll do it if I have to.”
Steve’s expression gave him the answer, so Burrell turned and walked out of the office, no longer an Apple employee.
So it wasn’t quite the epic send off that Burrell had been planning, but he got what he wanted in the end without covering Steve Jobs desk in yellow liquid. That’s it for this week but we’ll be back soon with another amazing story, for now though, enjoy.
