Fortune’s 101 Dumbest Business Moments of 2007

Written by

I just read Fortune’s list of the "101 dumbest business moments" of 2007 and it is deeply funny and deeply troubling. My favorite, because it is such a stunning display of arrogance and bad business judgment, is number 51. It might be subtitled "Yes, we really do believe that our customers are complete idiots." (And this letter may also explain why Apple’s last General Counsel did not last very long: perhaps the options scandal has nothing to do with it.)

51. Apple

One, two, three, four, we’ll sue you if you send us more

Nine-year-old Shea O’Gorman sends a letter to Apple CEO Steve Jobs
suggesting ideas for improving her beloved iPod Nano, including adding
onscreen lyrics so people can sing along. She gets back a letter from
Apple’s legal counsel stating that the company doesn’t accept
unsolicited ideas and telling her not to send in any more suggestions.

Let me know your favorite. I also was impressed with Stanley Bing’s humility and ability to laugh at himself. Check out his list of Bing’s Dumbest Moments of 2007. In the spirit of Bing’s list, I had a lot of dumb moments this year. A lot of them centered around forgetting things, including losing two cell phones, one iPod, a leather jacket, and checking into the wrong hotel in New York City (and not having any information about the right one).

P.S. Most of these dumb moments provide further support for the saying that Diego and I love so much: Failure sucks, but instructs. As you read them, don’t just think "those idiots," I would suggest thinking: "Why would such smart people do such dumb things?" And perhaps "What can I learn from this mistake so I won’t be on the list next year?"

Comments

6 responses to “Fortune’s 101 Dumbest Business Moments of 2007”

December 18, 2007

Krishna Kumar

Apple has a legal policy not to accept unsolicited ideas to avoid potential lawsuits from people claiming their ideas was stolen. What happened here was perhaps:
1. Someone did not recognize that it came from a child(assuming it was handwritten in a child’s handwriting or mentioned that it was from a child) and decided to follow the standard company procedure.
2. Someone did recognize it and decided to follow it anyway. Maybe they just acted on their own, or asked someone else, who told them to follow company rules.
I don’t think (1) is a problem, but the letter could explain why they don’t accept ideas. (2) is a definitely a problem. Eric Sink had a good article on that recently – “Exception Handling in Running a Business”

Reply
December 18, 2007

Pamela Slim

Good to see I’m not the only one Bob!
I had my own “I’m an asshole” moment this year when I used the wrong word to describe consulting guru Alan Weiss on my blog. I called him “crass,” when I meant “direct.”
He set me straight right away which made me blush 12 shades of red.
But I sure did learn from it, and did my “cheaper than therapy” usual, which is to blog about my lessons.
Read it and weep! 🙂
http://www.escapefromcubiclenation.com/get_a_life_blog/2007/11/4-lessons-on-le.html

Reply
December 19, 2007

Nathan Stehle

The Apple situation is standard legal protocol so that they do not get into patent issues where they are accused of stealing ideas. It’s CYA and a product of our legal system. It’s too bad that it has to be like that. I doubt they even read the letter.
Of course, I seem to recall some record labels sending out such a letter and then using an unsolicited song.

Reply
December 19, 2007

Robert Sutton

Krishna and Nathan,
My wife, who is a lawyer, had the same comment that you did about why the letter was sent out. She quickly added, however, that is a great example of the kind of thing that happens when the legal department does not understand the big picture, yet another example of a specialist not understanding how his or her job is linked to the big picture.
I also have to laugh because it is so contrary to open source innovation. But Apple has done pretty well with its level of paranoia and arrogance.

Reply
December 19, 2007

HR Wench

Bob – Great minds think alike! I blogged about this just yesterday: http://hrwench.blogspot.com/2007/12/101-dumbest-moments-in-business.html

Reply
December 19, 2007

Nathan Stehle

Agreed. The response was knee-jerk and in poor taste. Apple does get quite jerky about their stuff though, even though I love their products.

Reply