Books like Inside Apple

I read Walter Isaacson's biography of Steve Jobs before I read Inside Apple. Taken together, both books create a fuller understanding of Apple than each on its own. From this book, I learned a lot more about Apple as a business.I think the book is well done considering no Apple senior manager (and probably no current employee) would agree to an interview for the book. Adam Lashinsky has drawn extensively from a wide variety of credible sources to overcome that. But I also think it would have been a more comprehensive and engaging book if such access had been granted. Then again, this behaviour was entirely consistent with the portrait painted of this most secretive of companies.Most surprising, for me, is that a company that places so much emphasis on product quality and customer experience is not a great place to work. I am not sure why I expected it to be...well...more fun, in the sense of all these brilliant, passionate people creating marketplace magic together. But the Apple that emerges in Lashinsky's book is a high-stress nose-to-the-grindstone, need-to-know culture where the focus is exclusively on a narrow range of activities associated with one's current work assignment. Talk about Apple, to anyone, even other employees, and you're done. Scary. I appreciated the effort the author took to discuss Apple's future without its powerful founder. Already, some of what he predicted - turnover in the Executive ranks - has come to pass with the departure of two top Executives in recent months. It will be very interesting to see if Apple's approach to business can endure without its brilliant founder. I recommend this book for any student of business, especially those interested in employee culture and branding.