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On the Firing Line: My 500 Days at Apple | 
 enlarge | Authors: Gil Amelio, William Simon
Publisher: Collins Business
Category: Book
List Price: $15.00
Buy Used: $1.62
You Save: $13.38 (89%)
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Avg. Customer Rating:  40 reviews
Sales Rank: 1038243
Media: Paperback
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 320
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.6
Dimensions (in): 8.1 x 5.5 x 0.9
ISBN: 0887309194
Dewey Decimal Number: 338.761004165
EAN: 9780887309199
ASIN: 0887309194
Publication Date: May 1, 1999
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Shipping: Expedited shipping available
Shipping: International shipping available
Condition: Spine not creased. Pages tight and free of tears and stains. Corner crease on 8 consecutive pages. Some wear from reading. Remainder mark. Smoke free. Quick shipping.
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| Editorial Reviews:
Amazon.com Review
It's hard to think of a company that has captured the public imagination as much as Apple Computer. The rise and fall of the business that single-handedly created the PC market and then let it slip away has been the fodder for several books, most notably Insanely Great by Steven Levy and more recently Jim Carlton's Apple: The Inside Story of Intrigue, Egomania, and Business Blunders. Now in On The Firing Line, former Apple CEO Gil Amelio tells his own story about his 500 days at Apple. The book provides some insight into the significant events that occurred under Amelio's watch, such as Apple's failed in-house development of Copland, the search to license an operating system for the Macintosh, as well as details about those who would buy Apple including Sun Microsystems and Oracle. But the real focus of the book is Amelio's own frustrations in working with Apple's chaotic and undisciplined culture as well as Steve Jobs, the man who would eventually fire him. Although Amelio's account is at times overly self-serving, On the Firing Line is an interesting read that should interest most Macaholics.
Product Description
On the Firing Line: My 500 Days at Apple is Gil Amelio's gripping and fast-paced recollection of what happened during his seventeen months as the CEO of Apple. This is the revealing story of how a proven high-technology turnaround artist took on the biggest challenge of his careerand perhaps his life. At once a frank revelation of the inner workings of Apple and a cautionary tale of business in today's changing marketplace, On the Firing Line is a must-read for Apple devotees and anyone interested in the politics of today's digital economy.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 35 more reviews...
 if you are still curious about the history of management & marketing, particularly from a CEO's perspective... October 17, 2006
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
On the Firing Line: My 500 Days at Apple
by Gil Amelio
Towards the end of the nineties, I came across this book. I was attracted to it because I was partly fascinated by the author's earlier work, 'Profit from Experience: The National Semiconductor Story of Transformation Management' which I had read a few years earlier. The latter documented the author's success story at National Semiconductor. I had also reviewed this book on amazon website.
This book captured the author's unsuccessful attempt to turn around the world's most famous personal computing company, where he had spent some seventeen months earlier at the helm. He eventually got himself fired by Steve Jobs. In the book, he obviously conveyed a sense of disbelief that he had gotten himself into such a mess.
As I was reading this book at that time, I could not help recalling a similar kind of hard-hitting & compelling account of life as a CEO of Apple Computer almost a decade earlier i.e. towards the late eighties. I am referring to John Sculley's 'Odyssey: Pepsi to Apple : A Journey of Adventure, Ideas, and the Future.' In the book, John Sculley vividly described how, after working as an executive for Pepsi, developing winning strategies in the Cola Wars, & being promoted to president at age 38, he abandoned a "second-wave" company to join Apple, a "third-wave" firm epitomizing creativity, & innovation. He eventually got himself out-manoeuvred & then fired by Steve Jobs. What a coincidence?
Interestingly, the book also captured Steve Jobs' infamous challenge to John Sculley to take up the CEO job offer: `Do you want to spend the rest of your life selling sugared water, or do you want to change the world?'
Even up to today, what intrigues me most about the 'On the Firing Line' book is the author's failure (he practically faced an uphill task from Day I, despite the fact he is a PhD technologist by training!) in replicating his previous 'model of success' at National Semiconductor in the Apple setting? I can only deduce in broad terms, the 'clash of iconic personalities' & 'culture shock' as possible contributing factors.
I can only say this: if you are still curious about the history of management & marketing, particularly from a CEO's perspective within Silicon Valley, the above two books, namely 'On the Firing Line' & 'Odyssey' certainly offer some valuable lessons.
Both books had been very fascinating for me to read.
 Very good insight into the vacuum-sealed area of Apple January 4, 2006
3 out of 6 found this review helpful
Gil Amelio provides excellent advice on how to deal with the difficult, stubborn and bright people who run Apple. At the end of the book it becomes clear that "if you contend with an influential person, then you will fall into his power" (Old Testmnt., Sirach 8:1).
Dr. Amelio contended with Steve Jobs and challenged him in many ways. For example, back in the winter of 1995, Mac OS 7 was having problems and possible solutions were "two years" away (p. 151). Amelio immediately started the process of fixing OS 7 and contacted three outside sources: Bill Gates who promised to "put hundreds of people on the probject" (p. 152) even though Mr. Gates' technical solutions were "sophomoric at best" (153); Jean Louis Gassee who "scarmbled to the top of the Apple organization in France" but lacked the ability to create " a steady stream of new products" (p. 154); and Steve Wozniak who was concerned that "Apple was not putting enough energy into education" (p. 223). At the same time Apple engineers worked on "Copland" and "Gershwin".
The well-known result of the efforts of Amelio and others lead to the July 1997 release of OS 8.1 which sold 1.25 million copies in less than two weeks and became the best selling software of that time. However, the private result of Amelio's efforts to fix OS 7 by consulting outside sources was the humiliation of Mr. Jobs and his followers. Amelio writes, "To someone obsessed, when another person gets in the way, the solution is to roll right over him... I was in Steve's way and had to be eliminated" (p. 269).
"On the Firing Line" is a very good book, because "On the Firing Line" is fun to read, full of excellent advice for business people, discusses some of the major personalities in Silicon Valley, shows the brilliance of Mac engineers, gives examples of the "narrowness, passivity and lack of unity" within Apple (pp. 268, 276), and is a business person's review of "what the heck just happened?" after getting fired from a job without good reasons.
Beyond Self Pity there is Actual Value and Insight April 21, 2005
5 out of 8 found this review helpful
I know he seems rather naive and in a serious mode of self pity, but Jobs is infamously known for getting under people's skin and turning them inside out. He can make you a true believer, a zealot, or fill you with such dour disposition that you'd even contemplate suicide. He's that powerful. And it looks like Gil is caught up in that distortion field to his determent, so cut him a break please.
Now I was there before and after Amelio was there, when things were in dire straits. My manager in a team meeting would ask "Common sense, and why is there none at Apple?" When in a rare moment, all of the QA divisions would say thumbs down to shipping the buggy OS, the infamous Dave Nagel would say ship it anyways. The local community college in Cupertino (who dearly love Macs) had actually put a purchase freeze on Macs. I recall Amelio relaying a story about him trying out the new Macs at his desk, and had it crash all the time; he understood there was a serious problem and tried to do something about it, but unfortunately there was Nagel and others. Some engineers' attitudes was the workaround for the bug was to "buy a new computer". Now Nagel is off to Palm to destroy drive that into the ground.
Other infamous people were Ike Nassi (a.k.a. Ike Nasty) who was known for gauging funding from the TCP/IP stack (OpenTransport) and spending on pet projects he was dazzled with. OpenTransport later became affectionately called BrokenTransport internally.
Gil has account for dealing with these two infamous characters and others, and it is rather enlightening. I only wish he had the minerals to fire their butts.
Apple Made a Big Mistake August 25, 2003
After reading this book, I came to a conclusion that Apple made a big mistake by getting rid of Amelio. The truth is, they could be a lot further along than they are, even today, had they not have made the descision to oust him from his post after only a year and a half. The book is written very well, and is a book that you can get through, and understand easily. There were not many typos that I noticed in the book. This is a must read for Apple fans, Windows fans, and businessmen alike.
The Man Who Saved Apple March 6, 2002
5 out of 13 found this review helpful
It is now clear why the best OS in the world didn't catch on. If the business fundamentals of a company are not sound, the company will lose marketshare and eventually...fail. Here is a look into how Apple's loose corporate culture almost became it's undoing. This book proves that you can have all the talent in the world, but if there is no discipline and teamwork, it will all be for not. I had thought Gil's short tenure was due to incompetance....a stuffed shirt who was wrong for the job. I mean, Steve Jobs saved Apple...right? Wrong. Gil was exactly what Apple needed. Apple had a rotten core of self-serving individuals. I find it incredible that Apple management would listen to Gil's order and then do nothing to act on them. His biggest failure was a failure not to kick their lazy butts out the door sooner! How can a business be run with everyone doing their own thing? And surprise...the sales people were only interested in achieving a certain quantity of sales even if it meant selling computers at such a low price that the company lost money on a per unit basis. If you are into Apple and/or business turnaround stories, this is a great read. I could hardly put it down. Throw in Gil's encounters with Bill Gates and Steve Jobs and you really get keen insight into the whole computer industry and the personalities of the industries biggest movers and shakers. It is ironic that today so many credit Apple's turnaround to Steve Jobs. If you still believe that then you really need to read this book.
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