Devoted to Managers and those that seek to improve their management skills

"A lot of companies have chosen to downsize, and maybe that was the right thing for them. We chose a different path. Our belief was that if we kept putting great products in front of customers, they would continue to open their wallets."

This particular comment by Steve Jobs is especially important in our current economic climate, where people are much more careful on what they want to spend their money on.

He's of course talking about two of the more important responses to the economy slowing down. You can either downsize, and/or cut back on expenses and run lean, or you can innovate and offer the types of products people consider a must to own.

It's not that either way is wrong, but both can be great if they're done right. It's not like great products can't be produced and in the pipeline while a business is run lean - they're not mutually exclusive of one another. The truly great business leaders and companies are able to do both, without either suffering.

Having said that, Jobs comment on putting great products before customers on a continuous basis is important no matter what the economic climate. We don't want to have macroeconomic conditions dictate what we do as a business. That would develop an attitude of outward circumstances deciding where and what a business will go and do. We can't operate that way.

As a matter of fact, when we run a business lean no matter what the outward circumstances, we can be in the position to continually offer products to our customers because we're in the financial place to do so, without going into huge debt.

Either way though, it's difficult to be a leader if all we do is run lean. We need to do that while innovating in the field we serve in.

To do one or the other is risky, because we could lose market share and profits if we only run lean. At the same time, if we only offer an ongoing introduction of "great products," it could hurt us badly if we miss, as it could cut deeply into our resources and make it difficult to survive. Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) has been in that place in the past.

Running lean helps us survive, whereas innovative new products help us to thrive. Those able to do both are the companies that will grow healthily over the long term.