自比畢加索 揭祕神祕的"蘋果大學"

CUPERTINO, Calif. — Apple may well be the only tech company on the planet that would dare compare itself to Picasso.

加州，庫比蒂諾——蘋果公司或許是這個星球上唯一一個敢把自己和畢加索(Picasso)相提並論的技術公司了。

In a class at the company’s internal training program, the so-called Apple University, the instructor likened the 11 lithographs that make up Picasso’s “The Bull” to the way Apple builds its smartphones and other devices. The idea: Apple designers strive for simplicity just as Picasso eliminated details to create a great work of art.

公司的內部培訓計劃被稱爲“蘋果大學”，在其中一堂課上，導師將11張構成畢加索《公牛》(The Bull)的版畫與蘋果公司打造智能手機及其他產品的方式聯繫起來。他的意思是：蘋果設計師像畢加索一樣追求簡潔，去掉繁瑣的細節，創造出偉大的藝術品。

Steven P. Jobs established Apple University as a way to inculcate employees into Apple’s business culture and educate them about its history, particularly as the company grew and the tech business changed. Courses are not required, only recommended, but getting new employees to enroll is rarely a problem.

史蒂夫·P·喬布斯(Steven P. Jobs)創立蘋果大學的目的是向員工灌輸蘋果的商業文化，並傳授公司的歷史，特別是公司的發展和技術經濟的變革。課程並非必修，只作爲推薦課程，但是吸引新僱員來聽課從來就不成問題。

Although many companies have such internal programs, sometimes referred to as indoctrination, Apple’s version is a topic of speculation and fascination in the tech world.

許多公司也有類似的內部培訓，有時會被視作“灌輸”，而蘋果公司培訓的主題則是思考與技術世界的魅力。

It is highly secretive and rarely written about, referred to briefly in the biography of Mr. Jobs by Walter Isaacson. Apple employees are discouraged from talking about the company in general, and the classes are no exception. No pictures of the classrooms have surfaced publicly. And a spokeswoman for Apple declined to make instructors available for interviews for this article.

培訓高度保密，幾乎沒有人寫過相關的東西，只是在沃爾特·艾薩克森(Walter Isaacson)爲喬布斯所做的傳記中略有涉及。公司不鼓勵僱員們公開談論公司，這些課程自然也不例外。沒有任何課堂上的照片公之於衆。蘋果公司的一位女發言人拒絕提供導師們的聯繫方式，供本文作者進行採訪。

But three employees who have taken classes agreed to speak to The New York Times on the condition that they not be identified. They described a program that is an especially vivid reflection of Apple and the image it presents to the world. Like an Apple product, it is meticulously planned, with polished presentations and a gleaming veneer that masks a great deal of effort.

但是三位上過課的僱員同意接受《紐約時報》匿名採訪。他們描述的課程特別能夠鮮明地反映出蘋果公司的狀況，以及它呈現給世界的形象。和蘋果公司的產品一樣，蘋果大學的課程也經過精心設計，有着精美的呈現和閃亮的裝飾，其下掩藏着相關者付出的巨大勞動。

“Even the toilet paper in the bathrooms is really nice,” one of the employees said.

“就連衛生間的廁紙都很高級，”一位僱員說。

Unlike many corporations, Apple runs its training in-house, year round. The full-time faculty — including instructors, writers and editors — create and teach the courses. Some faculty members come from universities like Yale; Harvard; the University of California, Berkeley; Stanford; and M.I.T., and some continue to hold positions at their schools while working for Apple.

和其他許多公司不同，蘋果公司的內部培訓常年開課。設計和教授課程的教學人員都是全職，其中包括教師、作家和編輯。有些教學人員來自耶魯、哈佛、加州大學伯克利分校、斯坦福和麻省理工等大學，有些人在自己的學校保留教職，同時又在蘋果教課。

The program was devised by Joel Podolny, then the dean of Yale School of Management. Mr. Jobs selected him when the program was founded, in 2008, and he remains head of the effort.

該項目由喬伊·波多爾尼(Joel Podolny)設計，他當時是耶魯大學管理學院的院長。培訓計劃於2008年開始創立時，喬布斯選擇了他，如今他仍然領導着這項工作。

On an internal website available only to Apple staff members, employees sign up for courses tailored to their positions and backgrounds. For example, one class taught founders of recently acquired companies how to smoothly blend resources and talents into Apple. The company may also offer a course tailored specifically to employees of Beats, perhaps including its founders, Dr. Dre and Jimmy Iovine. Neither Apple nor Beats would comment.

在只對蘋果公司員工開放的內部網站上，員工可以登記爲自己的職務與背景量身定做的課程。比如其中有一門課專門向新近收購的公司的創始人們開放，教他們如何平穩地將原公司的資源和人才融入蘋果。蘋果公司恐怕也專門爲Beats公司的僱員開設了一門課程，其創始人Dr. Dre和吉米·艾歐文(Jimmy lovine)可能也在學員之中。蘋果公司與Beats公司拒絕對此作出評論。

Some of the courses teach case studies about important business decisions that Apple made, one of the employees said, including the one to make the iPod and its iTunes software compatible with Microsoft’s Windows system. This was a topic of fierce debate among executives. Mr. Jobs hated the idea of sharing the iPod with Windows, but he eventually acquiesced to his lieutenants. It turned out that opening the iPod to Windows users led to explosive growth of the music player and the iTunes Store, an ecosystem that would later contribute to the success of the iPhone.

一位僱員說，有些課程的內容是案例研究，就是蘋果公司如何作出重大商務決定的事例，比如讓iPod和它配套的iTunes軟件與微軟的Windows系統兼容的決策。當時這在管理層中曾激起很大的爭論，喬布斯不喜歡iPod與Windows兼容的想法，但最終還是默許手下這樣做。最後iPod向Windows用戶開放的做法爲這種音樂播放器與iTunes商店帶來了爆炸式的增長，形成了一種生態系統，後來對iPhone的成功大有裨益。

The classes are taught on Apple’s campus in a section of buildings called City Center and are as thoughtfully planned as an Apple product, the employees said. The rooms are well lit and built in a trapezoid shape; seats in the back rows are elevated so that everyone has a clear view of the instructor. Occasionally, classes are given in Apple’s overseas offices, like one in China, and the professors travel there to teach.

僱員們說，授課地點是在蘋果工業園內一個名叫“城市中心”的建築羣，這些建築和蘋果的產品一樣，經過精心設計。房間照明良好，設計成梯形，後排的座椅是升高的，讓所有人都能清楚地看到教師。偶爾也會在中國等海外辦公室授課，教授們會出國講課。

Randy Nelson, who came from the animation studio Pixar, co-founded by Mr. Jobs, is one of the teachers of “Communicating at Apple.” This course, open to various levels of employees, focuses on clear communication, not just for making products intuitive, but also for sharing ideas with peers and marketing products.

蘭迪·尼爾森(Randy Nelson)是“蘋果公司的溝通”課程的教師之一，他來自皮克斯動畫工作室，喬布斯是該公司的創辦人之一。這個課程向不同等級的僱員開放，主要內容是清晰的溝通技巧，不僅要憑直覺製作產品，也要與同伴們分享想法，爲產品做市場推廣。

In a version of the class taught last year, Mr. Nelson showed a slide of “The Bull,” a series of 11 lithographs of a bull that Picasso created over about a month, starting in late 1945. In the early stages, the bull has a snout, shoulder shanks and hooves, but over the iterations, those details vanish. The last image is a curvy stick figure that is still unmistakably a bull.

在去年的溝通課上，尼爾森放了畢加索“公牛”的幻燈片，那是畢加索在1945年底期間，於一個月內畫出的11幅公牛圖案。早期階段的公牛有口鼻、肩膀和蹄子，但是隨着一次次的再創作，這些細節漸漸消失了。最後的圖像是曲線構成的形狀，但仍讓人能看出是一頭公牛。

“You go through more iterations until you can simply deliver your message in a very concise way, and that is true to the Apple brand and everything we do,” recalled one person who took the course.

“經歷一次次再創作，直到你能把信息以非常簡潔的方式傳達出來，蘋果品牌，乃至我們所做的一切都是這樣，”據一個參加過這門課程的人回憶。

In “What Makes Apple, Apple,” another course that Mr. Nelson occasionally teaches, he showed a slide of the remote control for the Google TV, said an employee who took the class last year. The remote has 78 buttons. Then, the employee said, Mr. Nelson displayed a photo of the Apple TV remote, a thin piece of metal with just three buttons.

尼爾森有時還會教另一門名叫“蘋果何以成爲蘋果”的課程，一個去年上過這門課的僱員說，他會在課上放出谷歌電視遙控器的幻燈。這個遙控器上有78個按鈕，然後尼爾森拿出了一張蘋果電視遙控器的圖，它是一個薄薄的金屬片，上面只有三個按鈕。

How did Apple’s designers decide on three buttons? They started out with an idea, Mr. Nelson explained, and debated until they had just what was needed — a button to play and pause a video, a button to select something to watch, and another to go to the main menu.

蘋果的設計師們是怎麼決定只設三個按鈕的？尼爾森解釋說，他們一開始先有了一個創意，然後繼續討論，直到實現了他們所需要的東西——一個按鈕用來播放和暫停視頻，一個按鈕作爲選擇鍵，另一個按鈕用來回到主菜單。

The Google TV remote serves as a counterexample; it had so many buttons, Mr. Nelson said, because the individual engineers and designers who worked on the project all got what they wanted. But, Apple’s designers concluded, only three were needed.

谷歌電視的遙控器則是反例，它有太多按鈕了，尼爾森說，這是因爲參與項目的工程師和設計師們都實現了自己想要的東西。但是蘋果的設計師們達成了一致：只有三個按鈕是必需的。

“The Best Things,” another course, takes its name from a quotation by Mr. Jobs. Its purpose is to remind employees to surround themselves with the best things, like talented peers and high-quality materials, so that they can do their best work.

還有一門課程叫做“最好的東西”，這個名字來自喬布斯的一句話。它的目標是提醒僱員們，要讓最好的東西圍繞在自己身邊，比如有才華的同伴和高品質的材料，這樣才能在工作中做到最好。

One of the teachers for this course, Joshua Cohen, a Stanford professor, brought up Central Park in New York. The space for the park was originally a rocky swamp. But, Mr. Cohen said, its designers wanted to transform it into an area that gave urban residents the experience of nature.

這門課的教師之一喬舒亞·科恩(Joshua Cohen)是斯坦福大學的教授，他在課上舉紐約的中央公園爲例。公園起先是一片岩石和沼澤，但設計師們想把它改造成一片供城市居民體驗自然的地方。

The comparison was to one of Mr. Jobs’s goals: to make complex computer technologies feel understandable and natural.

這種對比正是喬布斯的目標之一：把複雜的電腦技術變得讓人容易理解，變得非常自然。

Ben Bajarin, a consumer technology analyst for Creative Strategies, said Apple University would take on more importance as Apple continued to grow.

本·巴賈林(Ben Bajarin)是創意戰略公司的消費者技術分析師，他說，隨着蘋果持續發展，蘋果大學會變得更加重要。

“When you do the case studies on Apple decades from now, the one thing that will keep coming out is this unique culture where people there believe they’re making the best products that change people’s lives,” Mr. Bajarin said. “That’s all cultural stuff they’re trying to ingrain. That becomes very difficult the bigger you get.”

“研究蘋果迄今幾十年的案例，你會發現它們始終保有這樣一種獨特文化——相信自己在創造能夠改變人們生活的最好產品，”巴賈林說。“他們想植入的完全是文化上的東西，公司越大，要做到這一點就越困難。”