At the end of each Apple board meeting, Tim Cook, chief executive, raises the question of who should succeed him if he [steps] off the wrong curb or something. 每次苹果(Apple)董事会会议完结时，首席执行官蒂姆库克(Tim Cook)都会明确提出一旦他丧生或再次发生其他事该由谁接任的问题。It is a tribute to Mr Cook after five years at the helm of the world’s most valuable company that an accident is more likely to finish him than investor discontent.在掌理这个全球市值最低企业五年后，库克因投资者反感辞职的可能性还不如再次发生一次事故造成他辞职的可能性低，这一点是对库克的一种嘉奖。

Mr Cook became Apple’s chief executive in August 2011 in tragic and extremely difficult circumstances: just before the death of Steve Jobs, Apple’s co-founder and guiding genius. 2011年8月，库克是在一种悲剧性而又极端困难的氛围下兼任苹果首席执行官的：当时苹果的牵头创始人及天才导师史蒂夫乔布斯(Steve Jobs)已时日无多。Jobs was, as Mr Cook noted in an interview with the Washington Post, an impossible act to follow. 正如库克在拒绝接受《华盛顿邮报》(Washington Post)专访时认为的，乔布斯是不有可能效仿的。

It would have been a treacherous thing if I would have tried to do it, he said.库克回应：如果我企图这么做到，那将是一种十分危险性的不道德。The impossibility is clear in how Mr Cook’s first five years are sometimes seen: as a mild disappointment. 这种不有可能在库克任期头五年有时获得的评价中反映得很显著：他被指出稍微叫人沮丧。He has presided over the launch of Apple Watch and Apple Pay but it has unveiled no blockbuster to rival the iPhone, an astonishingly successful device that now accounts for nearly 70 per cent of its revenues.他领导了Apple Watch和Apple Pay的发售，然而这两者却没引发可与iPhone比起的疯狂。

iPhone则十分顺利，目前占到苹果近70%的营收。It is fairer to regard his tenure from another perspective: Apple has not only remained steady but has flourished and Mr Cook has kept its senior talent largely in place. 从另一个角度看来他的任期则更加公平一些：苹果不仅维持了平稳，而且还发展壮大，库克也基本将资深人才回到了岗位上。Unlike others who have succeeded charismatic and forceful founders, including John Sculley when Apple forced out Jobs in the mid-1980s, he has stopped it veering off track and managed to develop and broaden its product line.他制止了苹果在急转弯下出轨，并顺利发展和拓宽了苹果的产品线，这与其他有领袖魅力而强势的创始人的继任者有所不同——还包括上世纪80年代中期苹果挤走乔布斯时的约翰斯卡利(John Sculley)。Mr Cook was known before Jobs’ death as an operations specialist, the person who kept Apple’s global operations and manufacturing network running smoothly, allowing Jobs to focus on new, breakthrough products. 在乔布斯去世前，库克是以运营专家而出名，他就是保证苹果全球业务和生产网络运营稳定的人，令其乔布斯需要将精力集中于新的、突破性的产品。

Mr Cook has since applied his analytical brain to Apple, making sure that neither size nor complexity gets in the way of continued progress.而自乔布斯去世以来，库克把他分析式的头脑中用了苹果身上，保证规模和复杂性都会沦为苹果之后发展的妨碍。A lot can go wrong at any company, especially a very large one. 任何企业都有许多地方有可能错误，特别是在是十分大的企业。That accounts for the shortening of chief executives’ tenures. 这一点说明了首席执行官任期大大延长的问题。It is easy to make strategic errors under pressure from consumers, shareholders and regulators, or steadily to lose touch with what made a company great. 在消费者、股东和监管机构的压力下，很更容易罪战略错误，或慢慢忘记是什么使企业最出色。

Merely avoiding these pitfalls for five years is itself an achievement.意味着是能在五年里避免这些陷阱本身，就是众多成就。In addition, Mr Cook has made his personal presence felt. 此外，库克还令人体会到了他个人的不存在感觉。He has defied short-term shareholder pressure to return more of Apple’s $232bn cash pile and resisted the idea that he is there solely to serve their interests, rather than that of consumers and society as a whole. 他杯葛了短线股东让苹果将2320亿美元现金多归还一些的压力，并杯葛了指出他的职责意味着是服务于股东利益而非消费者和社会整体利益的观点。He has taken strong and salutary stands on social issues, including his declaration that he is gay.他对社会问题采行了强硬态度而有益的立场——其中还包括宣告自己是同性恋者。

But this was Mr Cook’s first act. 不过，这只是库克的第一步。To achieve a decade at the helm, he must go further than exploiting the iPhone’s potential in new markets: he has to deliver an unexpected product of his own. 要想要在苹果帅位待上十年，他必需比在新的市场研发iPhone潜力更进一步：他必需发售归属于他自己的出人意料的产品。So far, neither Apple Watch nor services such as iCloud and its App Store, despite the latter’s financial growth, amount to that.到目前为止，Apple Watch及苹果的iCloud和应用于商店(App Store)等服务都约将近这一点——尽管应用于商店在财务上获得了极大快速增长。

This is a daunting challenge, given that Apple’s historic speciality is, as he puts it, insanely great products that really change the world in some way, combining hardware, software and services in a single package. 这是一个可怕的挑战。正如库克曾说道过的，苹果在历史上的专长是发售能确实以某种方式转变世界的最出色到淋漓尽致的产品，将硬件、软件和服务熔于一炉。The company’s recent efforts to produce an Apple television have come to naught, and it is unclear whether it wants to make its own car, or merely the software to operate others.苹果最近生产苹果电视的希望已是泡影，而目前仍不确切苹果是想要自己生产汽车，还是只期望为其他品牌汽车发售操作者软件。

Mr Cook was a close friend of Jobs and has an ingrained sense of the company’s qualities. 库克是乔布斯的亲近朋友，对苹果的品质具有根深蒂固的感觉。Perhaps only Sir Jonathan Ive, Apple’s chief design officer, knows better the products that have made it great. 或许只有苹果首席设计官乔纳森艾夫爵士(Sir Jonathan Ive)比起他更加理解那些令其苹果最出色的产品。In Mr Cook’s five years in charge, he has remained faithful to Jobs’ legacy; eventually, he must transcend it.在库克接掌苹果五年的时间里，他仍然效忠乔布斯的遗产。而最后，他必需打破这一遗产。

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