Episode Transcript
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BBC Sounds. Music, radio,
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podcasts. Hey guys,
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surprise. It's Dua here. We're
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back for one more special episode
0:51
of Dua Lipa at your service. This
0:54
is an episode that I can't even believe we're doing.
0:56
We're very, very excited about this. I'm
0:59
currently in London. I'm on
1:01
my sofa and I just
1:03
got the five minute text from
1:05
the man who's coming to join me to do an interview
1:08
who is none other than CEO
1:11
of Apple, Tim Cook.
1:12
This is surreal.
1:14
I'm very excited. I'm a little bit nervous.
1:17
I don't know what to expect, but I think it's going
1:19
to be a really fun conversation. And I
1:21
hope you guys enjoy this very special episode
1:23
of
1:24
Dua Lipa at your service with my very,
1:26
very, very, very, very special guest, Tim Cook.
1:39
Tim. Yes. Thank
1:42
you so much. It's so great to be here. Honestly,
1:44
it's so amazing to have you here at home
1:46
on my sofa. And I love
1:48
it. It's beautiful. Thank you.
1:51
I have to
1:53
say, before this interview, I went
1:55
on the internet to see what Apple is worth.
2:00
It's astonishing. It's
2:02
the biggest company in the world with a valuation
2:05
of around $3 trillion.
2:08
It's an incredible figure just in
2:10
itself and I guess it's
2:13
more than entire countries.
2:15
To kind of put it into perspective, it's
2:17
about the same as the GDP of
2:20
the UK or France.
2:22
I understand that
2:25
you're
2:25
only doing one interview while you're here
2:27
in the UK and I'm just so delighted to have you
2:29
here. I'm so glad you would spend time with
2:31
me. What? I'm serious.
2:34
Of course. No,
2:35
this is really exciting because I'm really
2:37
looking forward to just digging into
2:40
some of the issues that you're looking into now and
2:42
in the future. And as well
2:44
as what you've learned about tech and
2:46
life and leadership in your 25
2:48
years at Apple. It's incredible.
2:52
Should we just get started? Absolutely. Absolutely.
2:55
I'm raring to jump in. So
2:57
it's not every day that I have the
2:59
CEO of the world's biggest company in my living room.
3:02
So I should probably take a little bit of advantage of that
3:04
and get some tips to help with my
3:07
own work-life balance. And
3:09
I was wondering, like, what is
3:12
the day-to-day running of a company like
3:14
Apple? And take me a little bit through your
3:16
day, like day in the
3:19
life of Tim
3:19
Kirk from the moment you wake up to
3:22
the very end of the day. I get up really
3:24
early. I'm an early bird, like
3:27
it's four to five. Wow.
3:31
And I spend my first
3:33
hour doing email. And
3:36
I'm pretty religious about doing this. I
3:38
read emails from a lot
3:40
of customers and employees.
3:44
And the customers are telling me things
3:46
that they love about
3:49
us or things that they want changed
3:51
about us. Employees
3:53
are giving me ideas. But
3:56
it's a way to stay grounded in terms
3:58
of what the community is doing. community is feeling
4:01
and I love it.
4:02
And then after, so you do emails and then you
4:04
go
4:04
into the office and it's just more kind of... Well,
4:06
before I go into the office, I go work out. Okay.
4:10
And... So, emails, working out. Working
4:12
out. I spend an hour in the gym, usually
4:15
doing strength training. Okay. And
4:17
I've got somebody that really pushed me to do things
4:20
I don't want to do. And
4:23
I do no work during that period of time
4:25
at all. I never check my phone. Okay.
4:28
And I'm just totally focused on working out.
4:31
And after doing that, after
4:34
showering, et cetera, I go into the office
4:37
and I start working with people I love.
4:41
And it's an incredible feeling to
4:43
work with people that bring out
4:45
the best in you. And
4:48
that fundamentally, we all believe
4:50
that one plus one equals three. You
4:52
know, that your idea plus my
4:55
idea is better than the individual
4:57
ideas of their own. I love
5:00
that. And so, things like that
5:02
go on all day long. And I'll divide
5:05
the day in terms of spending time with
5:07
product teams or spending time with marketing
5:10
teams or spending time with the executive
5:12
team. And we're either handling
5:15
issues of the day or hopefully our
5:18
balance is more on working
5:20
on future stuff. And
5:22
thinking about what's next.
5:24
I want to go back to the start a little bit because
5:26
you grew up in a blue collar family.
5:29
I did in small town Alabama.
5:31
And now you're heading the world's most valuable
5:34
company. I mean, it's a pretty incredible journey
5:36
that you've been on. Can you tell me a little
5:38
bit about your upbringing and like
5:40
how it set you up on this road?
5:42
It was really a jagger
5:45
journey. My childhood,
5:48
I come from a very modest background.
5:52
My mother worked in a pharmacy
5:55
as a clerk and
5:57
my father worked in a shipyard.
6:01
and very blue collar family, lots of
6:03
love, little money, was
6:07
sort of the childhood. And
6:09
they really taught me the value of hard
6:12
work and
6:16
instilled in me at an extremely
6:18
young age that working
6:21
could bring you great purpose and
6:24
be a key part of your life.
6:27
And I started actually with
6:29
a paper route when I was 13 throwing
6:32
talking papers and I would get up in
6:34
the middle of the night to
6:37
throw everybody's papers so that they could,
6:40
when they got up in the morning, they would have their newspaper.
6:43
And I then took various
6:45
jobs from there, whether it was
6:48
flipping hamburgers at the local
6:51
tasty freeze and
6:54
doing anything I could to
6:56
make some amount of money because I really
6:59
wanted to go to college. And
7:02
my father being in the shipbuilding
7:05
business was subject
7:07
to layoffs in
7:10
that business. It was a very cyclical kind of business.
7:14
And so we would go through tougher
7:16
times during the layoff periods.
7:18
And I always wanted something better for
7:20
myself, more of a job
7:22
that was regular and
7:25
that you could depend on an income
7:28
stream with. And so I wanted to go to college
7:30
and better myself. And
7:32
I wound up at Auburn, which
7:35
is a public university in
7:37
Alabama. And I
7:39
loved it. I loved
7:41
it. The uni experience was... The
7:44
university experience was unbelievable.
7:46
I went a little wild, of
7:48
course. You have to.
7:51
You have to in college. You
7:53
have to. And the world just
7:56
opened for me. I was
7:58
always curious. But you
8:00
get even more curious in college because
8:02
you can take so many different courses and
8:05
challenge yourself in intellectual different
8:08
ways. And it was wonderful.
8:11
And then after that, I started my career
8:13
at first at IBM,
8:16
then went to graduate school
8:18
at Duke, and then
8:21
eventually made my way to Apple.
8:24
It's an incredible journey. It's hearing
8:27
you speak like I remember also when I was really
8:29
young. I think I always wanted to have a job. It
8:31
was again, like when I was 13, I
8:34
was in school. And I think my first
8:36
job, I had gone to a
8:38
pharmacy nearby and a woman
8:40
was selling like, I guess it was
8:42
like the Swedish equivalent to like Avon
8:44
or something at the time. And I was like, let me take this catalog
8:46
and like sell products at the college at my school. So
8:49
that was kind of like my first job. And
8:51
then it progressed from there, but very early
8:53
on, I had like a dream that I always
8:55
wanted to do music and that I wanted to be on stage
8:58
and I wanted to perform. And
9:00
I think I was probably like 10 where
9:03
I was like, I really wanna do this, but I never really knew
9:05
that it was even possible. What was your
9:07
dream? Like was being
9:10
the head of Apple,
9:11
like something that you would have
9:13
ever envisioned doing? It's not something
9:15
I envisioned for myself to be totally honest
9:17
with you. I was in high school,
9:20
I wanted to be a musician. I
9:23
learned how, or kind of learned
9:25
how to play the trombone. I was never any good.
9:28
But I wanted to be in a jazz band and
9:31
I was in a marching band for a while. And
9:34
it kind of hit me
9:36
that I was never gonna be great at it, that
9:39
this was just not my calling, but
9:42
I loved math and sciences.
9:45
And so I decided to study engineering
9:48
in college. And
9:50
that's where I got my start was engineering
9:53
and I was first focused on robotics
9:56
and in the manufacturing lines.
10:00
learning how to manufacture products. And
10:03
this was really cool to me because I love creating
10:05
things. That's so cool.
10:07
It's so nice to just
10:10
get to know you a bit more because I think it's fair to say
10:12
that, you know, we know less about
10:14
you than the more, let's
10:16
say extroverted leaders of
10:19
other big tech companies. What
10:22
kind of leader do you try to be? Well,
10:26
I just try to be a really good one. I
10:29
try to be one that really
10:31
deeply believes in collaboration because
10:34
I do deeply believe that
10:36
our ideas, bouncing
10:40
ideas off of one another, that
10:42
this creates a bigger
10:45
idea than either one of us could generate
10:47
on our own. And that when you can
10:49
do this with larger groups
10:51
of people, not totally
10:53
large, but, you know, several
10:56
people, that these ideas can
10:58
be exponential in size
11:01
and magnitude. And that
11:03
it's an unbelievable what you can create
11:05
with them, whether it's creating products
11:08
or creating marketing or
11:12
whatever you're working on together.
11:14
I really deeply believe this. And
11:16
so I try, my leadership style
11:19
is to try to get everyone to work
11:21
together in that kind of way.
11:24
Yeah, the art of collaboration, I think,
11:26
is pretty, is special. Like
11:28
when minds come together and create something really
11:31
unique.
11:32
There's
11:33
a mythology around your predecessor
11:36
and the founder of Apple, Steve Jobs, is
11:38
a great visionary leader. And
11:40
I watched the film called Jobs like a
11:43
few years ago now. And he is a fascinating
11:45
subject. But at the same time, when you
11:48
joined Apple in 1998, the
11:50
company was almost bankrupt. That's
11:53
right. And today, as I said
11:55
earlier, it's worth about $3 trillion
11:58
and around like 90%. if that came under your
12:01
tenure. Do you ever think that you don't
12:03
get enough credit?
12:04
No, I don't
12:07
look at it like that at all, to be honest.
12:10
Uh, Steve was
12:13
a original.
12:16
I think only Steve could
12:19
have created Apple and
12:21
we owe him a debt of gratitude.
12:25
And there's no doubt in my mind
12:27
that if he were still
12:29
alive today, the company would be doing
12:31
outstanding and he would still be
12:34
CEO. And so I don't,
12:36
I don't think of it as a credit deal.
12:38
And plus I get to work with people
12:41
that I love and that are unbelievable
12:44
at doing what they do. And so
12:46
we, we share the
12:49
credit from the company.
12:51
I love that. I think, I think you're an
12:53
incredible leader and I think in more ways than
12:55
one, when you
12:57
publicly came out in 2014, you
12:59
were the only openly gay CEO in
13:02
the fortune 500 and
13:05
today, nearly 10 years later,
13:07
that number has increased to four. Right.
13:11
That's only four openly gay
13:13
CEOs across 500 companies. First
13:17
of all, what the hell? Um,
13:21
like I feel like we've moved, moved on further
13:23
than this. Like, why do you think we're still not
13:25
seeing equal representation at
13:27
like the top levels of business?
13:29
I think there's still a glass
13:32
ceiling and
13:34
not in every company. I,
13:37
we've, we've killed the glass ceiling.
13:39
We've shattered it and an Apple
13:41
and people that came
13:43
before me, I stood on their shoulders
13:45
and, and we took it further and
13:48
further, but I think in a large number
13:50
of companies, there's still a glass ceiling. It's
13:53
bizarre that it's like
13:56
that. My own deep belief
13:58
is that everybody should be. treated with dignity
14:00
and respect. And if you start
14:03
from that angle, a
14:05
lot of other problems kind of go
14:07
away and never create
14:09
themselves. But I do think
14:11
there's still a ceiling for
14:14
not only LGBTQ, but
14:17
for women, for people of
14:19
color. And we
14:21
have more work to do. Society
14:24
definitely has more work to do in
14:26
many countries in the world.
14:27
Yeah, I am quite interested
14:29
in like the racial diversity in
14:32
business as well. I checked
14:34
earlier and it's also, it's like currently
14:37
eight black CEOs in the Fortune 500.
14:39
And I imagine that it must be quite important to
14:41
you because you grew up during the civil rights
14:44
era in the U.S. in the deep
14:46
South. Like, do you have any recollections
14:49
from that time that continue to influence
14:50
your approach to equality today?
14:54
Oh yes, I remember
14:56
when Dr. King was assassinated.
15:01
And this was a extremely
15:03
sad time. He
15:09
was such a statue
15:12
that you felt like he
15:15
was taking the world in the direction
15:17
it should go. And it wasn't
15:20
so clear who else would follow
15:22
him. The same year that he was
15:24
assassinated, Bobby Kennedy
15:26
was assassinated. And this was in 68
15:30
and I was eight years old at the time.
15:33
And this was just the combination
15:37
of these two assassinations were
15:39
really weighed heavily
15:42
on me as a very, very young
15:44
person, knowing that
15:46
these two were pushing
15:49
the human race where it needed
15:51
to go. And it was
15:54
a very, very sad time.
15:57
I guess we can't really talk about.
16:00
Apple without talking about the iPhone. And
16:04
my first iPhone, I think
16:06
was like a hand me down from my dad.
16:08
Oh, really? Yeah. And then and then
16:11
I got my first one like on
16:13
contract. I think it was like the iPhone 6
16:15
or something. But
16:18
I got and I was so excited when
16:20
I got it. And today it's
16:22
like it's an extension of my body.
16:25
You know, I even have like the little
16:27
dip in my finger. But
16:32
I'm quite mindful, you know, when I use my phone,
16:34
like I use my phone. I work on it all the
16:36
time, but I try and be mindful and pick up a book
16:39
rather than use my phone, especially like when I'm traveling
16:41
or flying or whatever. But regardless
16:44
of that, I'm on my phone a lot. Right.
16:47
I guess I just kind of want your honest take on
16:49
like, do you think there's an excessive
16:51
phone usage, especially in young
16:54
people? And if so, like
16:57
what can be done about it? I think there is
16:59
an excessive use of the
17:01
smartphone and including the iPhone.
17:04
And that's the reason we came out with screen time. Honestly,
17:07
we wanted we felt like
17:09
the one of the most important things we could
17:11
do was surface the
17:13
amount that you're spending sort
17:16
of similar to what we do on the watch,
17:18
which promotes your ability to
17:21
move more, learn more calories,
17:24
stand more. But on
17:26
the phone, we're looking at that from the opposite
17:28
point of view and saying, do
17:31
you really want to spend five
17:33
hours a day on your phone or whatever
17:35
the number might be? And
17:38
also telling you what you're doing
17:40
on it, where you're spending your time. We
17:43
also did things like surfacing
17:46
how many notifications you get because
17:49
sometimes it's not the amount of time,
17:52
but it's the interruptions. Right.
17:54
And what you mean
17:56
like throughout the day that you keep kind of checking it. It's
17:59
like a.
17:59
That's right. Yeah. And I noticed
18:02
when I remember, uh, when I started
18:05
using the tool before it was released, the
18:08
aha moment for me was
18:10
how many notifications I was getting
18:12
in a day. I was embarrassed
18:15
by the number I was getting in a day. And
18:17
I quickly went and looked
18:20
to see who's sending me all
18:22
of these. And I started cutting out
18:25
different notifications from different groups
18:27
that I felt like, you know, at the end of the day, I could
18:30
catch up on this at the end of the day. Exactly.
18:32
I don't need to know at the moment
18:34
when something is happening. Yeah. And
18:37
so I think screen time is important. And of
18:39
course, for kids, if you're
18:41
a parent, then setting
18:44
some parameters around where
18:46
they're spending time, what apps they're using,
18:49
all of this becomes really important
18:51
and we make tools for all of these things.
18:54
I think that's really important. Sure.
18:57
This year, I feel like more than ever
18:58
we've, uh,
19:01
I don't know, every time we turn on the news, that's kind
19:03
of another like climate disaster.
19:06
Yeah. And I think we're all
19:08
collectively really worried about the climate crisis
19:11
in our respective industries. And I think everyone's
19:13
trying to figure out what the right thing to do is and how
19:15
we can combat everything that's happening.
19:18
And I was just wondering, like, what
19:20
is Apple's climate strategy
19:23
and what do you think are the hardest
19:24
problems to solve? It's a great question.
19:27
Uh, we started running the
19:29
company on a hundred percent renewable
19:31
energy several years ago,
19:34
but we realized this is not sufficient
19:38
that we had to go focus on our supply
19:40
chain, which is largely outside
19:43
of our company and the energy
19:46
that it takes to recharge our products
19:48
at the customer's homes and offices.
19:52
And so we set an objective to
19:54
take all of that cycle,
19:57
the whole product cycle to carbon
19:59
neutral. by 2030, where
20:02
all of our products are carbon neutral. This is 20
20:04
years before the Paris Accord. And
20:07
sorry, carbon neutral is kind of like
20:10
offsetting, right? Carbon
20:12
neutral is a combination of driving
20:14
the carbon away totally,
20:17
and then whatever the residual amount is
20:19
left to offset that by
20:22
planting forest or grasslands
20:25
that pulls carbon from the atmosphere. Okay.
20:28
So if you look at the Apple
20:30
Watch, certain models of the Apple Watch
20:32
that we just shipped a week ago, they're
20:35
carbon neutral now. And this
20:38
happened seven years earlier than
20:40
we had initially thought we could do it. And
20:43
the way that we got there was it
20:46
has a high degree of recycled
20:48
material. And
20:50
so we were in a position
20:53
where we could stop pulling certain
20:55
products from the earth, which creates
20:58
a carbon emissions. We
21:01
have numerous solar farms
21:03
and wind farms on the renewable
21:06
side. And then on the transportation,
21:09
we shrunk our packaging significantly
21:12
so that we could ship more products.
21:15
And we took them out of the air and put
21:17
them on the sea, which is a much
21:19
lower carbon emission transport.
21:23
This got us to reduce the carbon
21:26
footprint by almost 80%, these
21:28
combination of tasks. And
21:31
in the last 20%, we offset
21:33
with high quality offsets
21:35
like planting forest and grasslands.
21:39
And
21:40
sometimes all
21:42
the terminology can be a little bit
21:44
confusing for me to try
21:46
and understand. But okay,
21:48
so we have carbon neutral and
21:51
net zero, and that's kind of like carbon
21:53
neutral. But it includes also
21:55
greenhouse gases. Am
21:58
I right in thinking that? Most people.
21:59
say carbon neutral mean
22:02
that the carbon has been driven to
22:04
the lowest amount currently possible
22:07
and then the balance has been offset.
22:09
Okay. There's some people
22:11
using it a different terminology but that's how
22:13
we use it. Okay
22:15
and that's different to zero
22:18
emissions entirely. Like
22:21
it's like zero emissions where we're
22:23
trying to get to. Yeah. Like is
22:25
that I presume that's the
22:28
goal for the planet. Like how do we
22:31
do that? When I think of zero emissions
22:33
I think of no offsets. Okay.
22:35
When I think of net zero I think
22:37
of offsets included. But is
22:40
there a way to get to zero emissions?
22:42
I think over the long
22:45
arc of time yes I
22:47
think we have to believe that that's possible.
22:50
I think in the short term you need some
22:52
level of offsets to get to
22:55
a carbon neutral. I
22:57
also want to talk about because you were just mentioning
22:59
the recyclable
23:01
product. That's right. As
23:02
I was researching for
23:05
this interview I came across several
23:08
quite frankly distressing articles about
23:10
young kids in the Democratic Republic
23:13
of Congo mining for
23:15
cobalt. And cobalt is something which
23:17
is used in batteries that are used in phones laptops
23:20
and electric cars and
23:22
I know that this
23:23
is a complicated issue for the whole
23:25
of the tech industry but can
23:27
you give me a hundred percent guarantee
23:30
that the cobalt in my new iPhone 15
23:33
has not been mined using child labor in the DRC?
23:35
Yes we can because we do two
23:38
things. Well first of all I should back up and
23:40
say our objective over
23:42
time is to take nothing from the
23:44
earth to
23:45
make our products.
23:48
This is a big idea of
23:50
not having to mine anything is to use all
23:53
recycled material and today
23:55
we're using a hundred percent recycled cobalt
23:58
in the watch.
25:59
right now.
26:30
It's all about making new friends and have lots
26:32
of fun on the way. And hopefully we say friends
26:34
too. Beautiful. Six degrees from Jamie
26:36
and Spencer. This is going to be amazing. Totally on BBC
26:38
Sounds. I don't
26:42
think
26:46
that I've been quite obsessed
26:48
with, I guess, in the tech sphere. Right.
26:51
Is AI. Yes. And
26:54
some days I feel like I've got a really good grasp
26:56
on like the potential of AI and
26:58
other days
26:59
I just haven't got a clue at all.
27:01
I just feel like it's so complex, but
27:04
I think most experts can agree that AI
27:06
is something that's going to completely
27:09
change our world. And it's kind of almost
27:11
like the invention of the internet. And
27:14
I guess you would
27:15
seem in better position than
27:17
most speculate, like how that world
27:20
is going to look like. And I was just
27:22
wondering what your thoughts are on that. I think
27:25
the first thing to know is that
27:27
if you're an Apple customer today,
27:30
AI is in all of
27:32
the products that we produce.
27:35
If you're composing
27:37
a message or an email
27:40
on the phone, you'll see predictive
27:42
typing tries to predict your
27:44
next words and you can quickly choose the word.
27:47
That's AI. And
27:49
so AI is sort of everywhere today.
27:52
What has gathered people's imagination,
27:55
I think more recently is generative AI
27:58
and the use of large language. models
28:01
and I think this is an area that
28:05
is also
28:07
can be life-changing and
28:10
it can be life-changing in a good
28:12
way because it can do things
28:15
like in in the future I don't mean necessarily
28:17
today it can help diagnose
28:20
a problem that you're having from a health point
28:22
of view there's a limitless
28:25
kind of a number of things that AI
28:27
can do unfortunately can also
28:30
do not good things right and
28:32
I know that those are things that I'm like more
28:34
worried about because it seems like
28:35
there's so many great things AI can
28:37
do but then I
28:38
think it also like poses profound
28:41
risks and like a threat to humanity
28:43
and I'm like tell me AI is gonna
28:46
destroy the world yeah what
28:48
is needed in with AI with
28:50
this new form of AI generative AI
28:53
is some rules of the road some
28:55
regulation around this and
28:58
I think many governments around the world
29:00
are now focused on this and focused on how
29:03
to do it and we're trying to help with that and
29:06
we're one of the first ones that that say
29:08
this is needed that some
29:11
regulation is needed for
29:13
us we're very thoughtful and
29:16
deliberate about how we approach these
29:18
things and so we think deeply
29:20
about how people will use our products
29:24
and if they can be used for nefarious
29:27
reasons we don't go down those
29:29
paths our government's
29:32
actually able to
29:33
regulate AI or have we kind
29:36
of gone past that point
29:37
it's a really good question I think
29:40
most governments are little behind
29:43
the curve today I think that's
29:45
a sort of a fair assessment
29:47
to make but I
29:50
think they're quickly catching up I
29:53
think the US the UK
29:55
the EU and several countries in
30:00
Asia are quickly coming
30:03
up to speed. And I do
30:05
think there will be some AI
30:07
regulation in the next 12 to 18 months.
30:11
Okay. And so I'm pretty
30:13
confident that will happen. Yeah, because I think
30:15
it could be a bit catastrophic if it goes rogue
30:18
and there's no controlling. Yeah,
30:21
we need it. We absolutely need it. Yeah,
30:23
it's a real sign of the times.
30:26
It gets the way that things are just completely
30:28
rapidly changing and with
30:29
all the new products as well. I
30:32
mean, when you think about it, like the smartphone has
30:34
entirely changed the world. And
30:38
I guess obviously the internet and now AI
30:40
is going
30:40
to completely change the world. Like,
30:43
what product or technology
30:46
do you think is going to have a similar transformative
30:49
impact in the future?
30:51
And do you think it's going to be an Apple invention?
30:54
We just launched
30:57
in June the Vision
30:59
Pro. You can be sitting
31:01
here in your living room and
31:04
you can have your virtual world
31:07
overlying your physical world.
31:11
And all of a sudden you and I might
31:13
be having this conversation and we
31:15
may want to reference something. You
31:18
could kind of pull it up in space
31:21
and we could chat about it. That's
31:24
fascinating. But you use your hands. You
31:26
use your hands and your eyes. You use your eyes
31:28
as well. And your eyes. And
31:31
so if you just look
31:33
at something on Vision Pro, you
31:36
can select it with your eyes. That's
31:40
fascinating. And it's
31:42
so wild because people
31:45
pick it up like this. They can't believe
31:47
how easy to use it is. But
31:52
we spent years in
31:55
researching and developing this product
31:58
to make it so simple. to
32:00
use that it works like your mind works.
32:04
If you look at something, you kind of expect
32:06
it to do something and it does.
32:10
Yeah, that's fascinating. I mean, how far do you
32:12
think we are from like tech
32:13
actually becoming part of our bodies?
32:16
Like
32:18
do you think we're... In some ways we're
32:21
there because the watch becomes
32:23
a part of your body in a way. Right.
32:26
So, measuring all of these things that you're doing,
32:28
your movement, your stand, your exercise,
32:31
your heart, it's looking
32:33
for things like diseases and
32:36
so forth like asyb that
32:38
you may have in alerting you before
32:41
the symptoms would ever alert you. And
32:43
so, I think wearable tech
32:47
has become an extension of your
32:49
body now. And as you mentioned earlier,
32:52
iPhone in a lot of ways has become
32:54
an extension of you.
32:55
It's a complete extension of my body. So that's why
32:57
I'm like,
32:58
I guess we're probably not so far away of
33:00
just it being a part
33:02
of us. But I always wonder, do
33:05
you think this is going to improve
33:07
the human condition?
33:07
I think it
33:09
must. Technology doesn't
33:12
want to be good or bad. It's
33:16
in the hands of the creator of
33:19
whether it is. And you
33:21
can bet that we're being very thoughtful
33:23
and very deliberate on things
33:26
that we develop. So our technology is for
33:28
good and that it's really enriching
33:31
people's lives, not
33:34
distracting. Yeah.
33:35
Amazing. Really, really cool. I
33:38
mean, I imagine there's so many people
33:40
who are listening to this interview who would
33:43
love to work in the tech industry. And
33:45
I was wondering, like, what tips have you got? Do
33:49
you have to be able to code? Or if I had an English
33:51
degree, like, would I be able to work
33:54
at Apple?
33:55
We hire people
33:57
from all walks of life, people
33:59
that to have college degrees, people
34:02
that don't, people that code,
34:04
people that don't. I do recommend
34:07
coding for everyone to learn
34:10
because I think it's a form of expressing
34:13
yourself. And it's a global
34:15
language and it's the only global language
34:17
that we all share is coding. And
34:20
so I recommend it, but
34:22
we hire people that don't know how to code.
34:26
We hire a lot of people that don't code on a
34:28
daily basis that do other
34:30
things. I think one of the characteristics
34:33
that I look for in people is collaboration
34:36
that we talked about earlier. Can
34:38
they really collaborate? Do they deeply believe
34:40
that one plus one equals three? I
34:43
think curiosity is
34:45
a trait that I love about people,
34:48
about people that ask questions that
34:51
are so curious about how things work,
34:53
how people think, all
34:56
of the whys and hows
34:58
questions. I love
35:00
people that are creative because
35:03
we're looking for people that can see around
35:05
the corner because ultimately we
35:08
want to create products that
35:11
people can't live without, but they didn't know they
35:13
needed.
35:14
Right.
35:15
And you kind
35:16
of want to get ahead of the curve and
35:18
kind of, you know. That's
35:20
right. So all of these traits go into,
35:22
I think, making a great team player.
35:26
I can only imagine that you've done
35:29
pretty well financially at
35:31
Apple. Yes. And that
35:34
you've said that you intend to give away
35:36
a majority
35:37
of your wealth. That's right.
35:40
I guess Bill Gates has made a similar
35:42
pledge and his big vision was to end
35:44
poverty and disease. What's
35:47
the big global challenge that you feel like
35:49
you want to solve and
35:51
how do you plan to do it? You
35:53
know, because of my background and
35:56
equality is a big one. I
36:00
do deeply believe that everyone
36:03
should be treated with dignity and respect around
36:05
the world. And so I'll
36:07
steer a lot of my
36:09
resources accordingly. I
36:12
also want to make sure
36:14
that people that were in a similar or
36:18
are in a similar position to where
36:21
I was, where you're from
36:23
a family without significant
36:27
means that you
36:29
can go to school. And
36:31
because I believe that education is
36:33
the great equalizer of people. And
36:36
so I'll steer some of my money
36:38
to scholarship funds
36:41
as well to make sure that kids in
36:43
those areas can do well
36:46
and have the opportunity that I had,
36:49
frankly.
36:50
That's really cool. I
36:52
mean, there's a lot of ambitious kids
36:54
that
36:55
grow up
36:57
wanting to change the world. And the iPhone
37:00
and Apple's inventions have really changed lives
37:02
across the globe. We still have more to do.
37:04
Yeah, but I'm imagining
37:06
a young Tim Cook growing up in
37:09
Robertsdale, Alabama. Are
37:11
you satisfied with where you are right now? I'm
37:14
incredibly humbled for
37:16
where I am. I feel privileged
37:20
and I want to give back. I
37:23
want to help other people achieve the same
37:25
dream that I've achieved. I
37:28
didn't have a dream to be CEO of Apple.
37:31
It was beyond what I would have ever
37:33
dreamed for myself, but
37:35
it happened and I want to make sure it
37:37
can happen for other people as well. I
37:40
love that. I mean, you've been at Apple
37:42
for 25 years now. Years,
37:44
yes. You're planning to
37:47
be there for the next, I don't know,
37:50
three, four, five years. You're planning on
37:52
staying
37:52
till 2050 and seeing the environmental.
37:55
2050 might be a stretch. You know.
37:59
I don't know how long I'll be there. I
38:02
love it there. And
38:06
I can't envision my life without
38:08
being there. Yeah. And
38:11
so I'll be there for a while. Okay,
38:14
cool. So there's no succession
38:16
plan that you've got? Well, now
38:19
we're a company that believes in
38:21
working on succession plans. And so we
38:23
have very detailed succession
38:25
plans. And because
38:27
something that's unpredictable can always
38:30
happen, I can step off the wrong curve tomorrow.
38:33
And hopefully that doesn't happen. Yeah, hopefully
38:35
that doesn't happen. I pray that it doesn't. No.
38:38
Are you able to say who's in line for succession?
38:41
Oh, I can't say that. But I would
38:44
say my job is to prepare
38:47
several people for
38:51
the ability to succeed. And
38:54
I really want the person
38:56
to come from within Apple, the
38:58
next CEO. And so that's
39:01
my role is to make sure that there's several
39:03
for the board to pick from. Interesting.
39:06
We'll have a look as well and see
39:08
what we can solve. That's cool. Thank
39:11
you. Well, that was great. I
39:13
love, love talking to you about just
39:16
all things, life,
39:17
leadership, tech. And
39:19
I actually, I love to end my conversations with
39:21
a list. Okay. And
39:24
I read about your love of
39:27
national parks and I had the family, you're a very
39:29
keen hiker. Yes, I love
39:31
to hike.
39:31
So I was wondering what are five
39:34
national parks
39:35
to visit in the US? Oh,
39:37
it's a tough list because there's so
39:39
many great ones, but I would say
39:42
Yosemite, which is sort
39:44
of my local national park
39:47
in a way. It's so beautiful. The
39:50
Grand Canyon, beautiful.
39:53
The Grand Teton, Glacier,
39:56
and Zion.
39:58
Okay, so there's a few I haven't been to.
39:59
And they're all
40:02
so special. And when
40:04
you're out in them, it reminds
40:07
you of how small all
40:09
of us are relative to the
40:11
grandeur of nature. And
40:14
it's sort
40:16
of a palate cleanser for the
40:18
mind, being out there
40:21
and hiking and sweating.
40:26
And for me, it's just
40:30
incredibly meditative. And
40:32
I love it. Yeah, that sounds special.
40:35
I got to do more hiking
40:36
and exploring and
40:38
being a bit more outdoorsy, I think. Oh,
40:41
I would highly recommend it. And in Europe,
40:43
this summer I went to the Dolomites. Oh,
40:46
yeah? And the Dolomites were...
40:49
It was just jaw-dropping. I
40:53
was so excited about being there. And
40:55
the hiking
40:58
and the Via Ferratas are
41:01
incredible to do. I
41:03
would highly recommend it. I'm going to go back. So
41:05
cool. Yeah.
41:06
And then my next and last
41:09
list
41:09
is we recently started
41:11
a Service 95 book club. Right. And
41:15
I love to ask my guests about their reading
41:17
pile. Right. Can you share
41:20
five books that have shaped you?
41:22
Yes. As
41:25
a young student to kill a
41:27
mockingbird, and I think it's
41:29
not just for young students, but for all of
41:31
us still, Shoe
41:33
Dog, which was
41:36
Phil Knight's book. And
41:38
it's kind of meant to be a business
41:41
book, but it's a book on life. I
41:43
really like that book. It's really great. When
41:46
Breath Becomes Air was phenomenal.
41:49
Malala's book, I Am Malala. I
41:53
love... And I love Malala's story
41:56
and her passion around
41:58
young girls' education. and
42:02
we work with her and the
42:04
work that she does is incredible. And
42:07
then I love reading biographies of
42:09
Martin Luther King and
42:11
Bobby Kennedy and some of the great people
42:14
that were pushing forward on civil
42:16
rights.
42:17
Tim, thank you so much for your time
42:20
and your generosity. This has just been such
42:22
a fascinating and illuminating
42:25
conversation and I think
42:27
it's going to be amazing for all the listeners. I think they're
42:29
going to have a lot to
42:31
take away from this.
42:33
Thank you so much for coming
42:35
and being here in London and spending some time with
42:37
me today. Thank you for having me. It means
42:39
the world to me. Thanks for having me in your
42:41
beautiful home.
42:42
Any time. Maybe we can do
42:44
this again sometime. Absolutely.
42:45
I'll look forward to it. Thank you so
42:48
much. Thank you. It's 2003
42:50
in Birmingham.
42:57
Doors
43:00
have been slammed in your face. You're not welcome
43:02
here. They were capable of murder and had murder.
43:05
Drive-by killings, gang wars,
43:07
a vigilante group that fought against
43:10
Jamaica's notorious yardee. The homeboys
43:12
fought, but I'm not going to say this anymore. We're going to be
43:14
even more violent than you. Before
43:16
turning on each other. I'm
43:19
Livy Haydock and this is Angster,
43:22
the story of the burg of our boys.
43:25
Listen to BBC sounds.
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