后喬布斯時代的硅谷領袖：平淡無奇是一種新時尚

When Joe Barton, a Republican congressman from Texas, greeted Jack Dorsey at a congressional hearing last week, he sounded flummoxed.

當?shù)驴怂_斯州共和黨眾議員喬·巴頓(Joe Barton)在上周的國會聽證會上開始向杰克·多爾西(Jack Dorsey)提問時，這位議員聽起來有點困惑。

“I don’t know what a Twitter C.E.O. should look like,” Mr. Barton said. “But you don’t look like what a C.E.O. of Twitter should look like.”

“我不知道Twitter的首席執(zhí)行官該是什么樣子，”巴頓說。“但你看上去不像是Twitter首席執(zhí)行官應該有的樣子。”

The congressman had a point. Mr. Dorsey — who sported a nose ring, a popped-collar shirt and a craggy Moses beard — looked more like a hipster version of a Civil War officer than a tech icon. Yet more striking than his look was his manner before skeptical lawmakers.

這位國會議員說的有道理。戴著一枚鼻環(huán)、穿著一件翻領襯衫、留著一把摩西式大胡子的多爾西，看上去更像是美國內戰(zhàn)時代軍官的潮人翻版，而不是科技偶像。然而，比他的外表更異乎尋常的，是他在持懷疑態(tài)度的立法者們面前表現(xiàn)的舉止。

Faced with tough questions, Mr. Dorsey did not mount an aggressive defense of his company and his technology, as an earlier generation of tech leader might have. Instead, he demurred, conceded mistakes and generally engaged in a nuanced and seemingly heartfelt colloquy on the difficulties of managing tech in a complex world. Even in response to Mr. Barton’s comment about his look, Mr. Dorsey was solicitous. “My mom agrees with you,” he said.

面對嚴厲質問時，多爾西沒有像上一代科技領袖們可能做的那樣，為自己的公司和自己的科技大力辯護，而是表達懷疑，承認錯誤，并就在一個復雜世界中管理科技的困難與議員們展開了一場細致入微、似乎發(fā)自內心的對話。就連回應巴頓對自己外貌的評論時，多爾西也表現(xiàn)出一種對他人的關切。“我媽媽同意你的看法，”他說。

Mr. Dorsey’s testimony prompted questions about what we expect from tech leaders today — and how thoroughly what we expect has been upturned in the last few years. Since the 1980s, a common leadership archetype has loomed over the tech business: Steve Jobs and Bill Gates. Sometimes unconsciously and often deliberately, a generation of tech leaders attempted to ape the Apple and Microsoft founders’ charisma, their quirks, their style and above all their irrepressible, hard-charging confidence, to say nothing of arrogance.

多爾西的聽證會表現(xiàn)，引發(fā)了有關我們如今對科技行業(yè)領袖做何期待的問題，以及我們的期待在過去幾年里發(fā)生了怎樣徹底的轉變。自20世紀80年代起，科技行業(yè)赫然聳現(xiàn)的常見領袖典型是史蒂夫·喬布斯(Steve Jobs)和比爾·蓋茨(Bill Gates)。一代科技領導們曾試圖模仿蘋果和微軟創(chuàng)始人的魅力，模仿他們的怪癖、他們的風格，尤其是他們十足的、全力進取的信心，更不用說他們的傲慢。這種模仿有時是無意識的，但通常是故意的。

Mr. Dorsey — who like the late Mr. Jobs returned to a company he co-founded in order to save it — has long drawn comparisons to Mr. Jobs. Yet the congressional testimony marked a surprising rhetorical shift. Instead of the black-turtlenecked Mr. Jobs, Mr. Dorsey sounded more like Tim Cook, the understated operations manager who replaced him (and who is holding his umpteenth iPhone event on Wednesday).

人們長久以來一直把多爾西與喬布斯相比，與已故的喬布斯一樣，多爾西為了挽救自己參與創(chuàng)建的公司，重返公司工作。然而，他在國會聽證會上的言辭標志著一個令人驚訝的轉變。多爾西聽起來不像是穿著黑色高領套頭衫的喬布斯，而更像是蒂姆·庫克(Tim Cook)，也就是接替了喬布斯的那位行事低調的運營經(jīng)理人。(周三，他將舉行自己的第無數(shù)次iPhone發(fā)布會)。

That is, Mr. Dorsey sounded less like a quotable visionary who can see beyond the horizon and more like what he actually is and ought to be — a thoughtful, accessible, transparent and, despite the beard and nose ring, kind of boring manager of a serious company whose decisions have world-changing consequences.

也就是說，多爾西聽起來不大像一位視野超越地平線的、時有名言警句的預言家，而更像他實際上的本人和他應該成為的人——一個關心別人、易于接近的、透明的人，而且，盡管他留著胡子、帶著鼻環(huán)，多爾西更像一個重要公司的無聊經(jīng)理人，做出改變世界的決策。

When it comes to tech C.E.O.s, boring is the new black. Under the glare of global scrutiny, the daring, win-at-all-costs ethos that defined so much of the tech industry in the last couple of decades has been undergoing a thorough metamorphosis.

當涉及科技行業(yè)首席執(zhí)行官時，平淡無奇是一種新時髦。在全球的密切關注之下，過去幾十年里定義了科技行業(yè)大部分的那種大膽、不惜一切代價取勝的信念，正在經(jīng)歷一個徹底的質變。

Mark Zuckerberg, the Facebook chief who was once the poster boy of breaking things and moving fast, is now sitting with magazine writers for lengthy, nuanced disquisitions on his failings. Last year, Uber replaced its controversy-magnet founder, Travis Kalanick, with Dara Khosrowshahi, whom almost nobody outside the tech industry had heard of before — a fact that the company regarded as an asset, not a liability.

Facebook首席執(zhí)行官馬克·扎克伯格(Mark Zuckerberg)曾是打破陳規(guī)、勇往直前的典型代表，現(xiàn)在他正在與雜志作家們坐下來，對自己的失誤進行冗長、細致入微的專題討論。去年，優(yōu)步(Uber)撤了經(jīng)常引發(fā)爭議的創(chuàng)始人特拉維斯·卡蘭尼克(Travis Kalanick)首席執(zhí)行官職務，用科技行業(yè)以外幾乎沒人聽說過的達拉·霍斯勞沙希(Dara Khosrowshahi)取代之，公司把后者的不知名視為一種優(yōu)點，而非負面的東西。

Google once played up the nerdy antics of its founders, but now the company’s leaders are almost unidentifiable ciphers. Larry Page, who runs Alphabet, Google’s parent company, has become a recluse, and even Sundar Pichai, Google’s achingly pleasant chief, declined to appear at last week’s hearings.

谷歌(Google)曾大肆渲染其創(chuàng)始人的古怪行為，但公司如今的領導者幾乎都是毫無特征、無足輕重的人。管理谷歌母公司Alphabet的拉里·佩奇(Larry Page)已變得深居簡出，就連很有親和力的谷歌首席執(zhí)行官桑達爾·皮查伊(Sundar Pichai)也婉言拒絕了出席上周的聽證會。

Jeff Bezos, Amazon’s chief and the world’s wealthiest man, has been experimenting with a more daring fashion sense, but his leadership style has always been marked by patience and deliberate expansion — just the sort of boring, operator’s sensibility now in vogue.

雖然亞馬遜(Amazon)首席執(zhí)行官、全球首富杰夫·貝佐斯(Jeff Bezos)一直在嘗試一種更大膽的時尚品味，但他的領導作風一直帶有耐心和謹慎擴張的特征——這正是如今流行的那種平淡無奇的、營運者的敏感性。

Oh, and I almost forgot about Satya Nadella, Microsoft’s C.E.O. In my defense, everyone forgets about Mr. Nadella.

哦，我差點忘記了微軟的首席執(zhí)行官薩蒂亞·納德拉(Satya Nadella)。但這是情有可原的，沒有人想得起來納德拉。

It’s no mystery why tech leaders are turning inward. “Tech is now such a huge and dominant industry,” said Joshua Reeves, the proudly boring founder and chief executive of Gusto, a start-up that makes human resources software. “The fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants mind-set is just not viable when you have a trillion-dollar market capitalization or if you have more influence than many governments around the world.”

科技行業(yè)的領導者們?yōu)槭裁炊嫁D為內向，這一點也不神秘。“科技現(xiàn)在是一個如此巨大、如此占主導地位的行業(yè)，當你擁有萬億美元市值，或當你比世界上許多國家的政府都更有影響力時，憑直覺行事的思維模式就行不通了，”約書亞·里夫斯(Joshua Reeves)說，他是制造人力資源軟件的初創(chuàng)企業(yè)Gusto的創(chuàng)始人兼首席執(zhí)行官，對自己的平淡無奇頗感自豪。

Mr. Reeves pointed out that it’s not just the big companies whose chief executives are going beige. Some of the most successful start-ups — from Lyft to Airbnb to Stripe to Slack to Pinterest — are run by understated un-visionaries, people who aim for functional competence over hypey salesmanship. (What hasn’t changed is gender; boring or no, just about everyone who runs a tech company is still a man.)

里夫斯指出，不僅是大公司的首席執(zhí)行官們正在變得平淡無奇。一些最成功的初創(chuàng)企業(yè)——從Lyft到愛彼迎(Airbnb)，從Stripe到Slack、再到Pinterest——也都由低調的非幻想家運營，這些人關注的是實用性的能力，而不是夸張的推銷術。(沒有多大改變的是性別;不管是否平淡無奇，幾乎所有科技公司的運營者都是男性。)

“A start-up that has five million people using it — that’s small for Silicon Valley, but it’s a tremendous number of people, and so even they have a large amount of responsibility in the world,” Mr. Reeves said.

“一家初創(chuàng)公司有500萬人使用其產(chǎn)品——這個規(guī)模對硅谷來說很小，但這也是很多人，所以即使是它們，對這個世界也負有很大的責任，”里夫斯說。

The tech press has also gotten tougher. Once, novelty alone would merit coverage, but in the social media age, even the tiniest misstep can be ruinous. It has become crucial to get a leader who doesn’t speak out of turn.

科技媒體也變得更加強硬。曾經(jīng)，只是新奇的體驗就值得報道，但在社交媒體時代，即使是最微小的失誤也可能是毀滅性的。讓領導者不多話就變得至關重要。

There is one obvious exception to my boring-is-in thesis: Elon Musk, the chief executive of Tesla and SpaceX, whose string of unconsidered tweets, taunts and other recent scandals have been anything but eye-glazing.

我這個“無聊等于時尚”的論點中也有明顯的例外：特斯拉(Tesla)和SpaceX的首席執(zhí)行官埃隆·馬斯克(Elon Musk)，他的一連串未經(jīng)考慮的推文、嘲諷和其他近期的丑聞都絕不乏味。

Mr. Musk’s latest antics were typical. In an email that he considered off the record, Mr. Musk told BuzzFeed News that a diver who had rescued boys trapped in a Thai cave was a “child rapist.” (The diver had questioned Mr. Musk’s off-the-cuff plan to free the boys; Mr. Musk had earlier apologized for calling the diver a pedophile.)

馬斯克最新的滑稽舉止是很典型的。在一封他認為不會發(fā)表的電子郵件中，馬斯克告訴BuzzFeed News，一名援救被困在泰國洞穴中的男孩的潛水員是“兒童強奸犯”。(該潛水員質疑馬斯克的援救兒童計劃過于冒失;馬斯克早些時候為將這位潛水員稱為戀童癖而道歉。)

Last week, during an interview with the podcaster Joe Rogan, Mr. Musk smoked marijuana and extensively detailed what he sees as the apocalyptic possibilities of artificial intelligence. The interview — combined with news of further executive departures — helped sink Tesla’s stock further.

上周，在接受播客主持人喬伊·羅根(Joe Rogan)采訪時，馬斯克抽著大麻，并詳細闡述了他心目中人工智能世界末日的可能性。采訪加上更多管理層離職的消息，令特斯拉的股票下跌。

Mr. Musk’s odd behavior underlines the tensions at play as understated style takes over tech. There is a reason that a big, Jobsian personality was once so prized. Tech companies are leaps of faith. In their early days they exist on the knife edge of oblivion, and it is often only through a founder’s force of personality that investors, employees and the media take any notice. The most beloved founders possess an uncanny genius for selling the world on ideas that look useless, pointless or impossible before we all realize we can never live without them.

馬斯克的奇怪表現(xiàn)凸顯了低調風格接管科技界引發(fā)的緊張局面。強大的、喬布斯式的個性曾經(jīng)如此受到珍視，這是有理由的?？萍脊臼切叛龅娘w躍。在早期歲月，這些公司存在于被遺忘的邊緣，通常只有通過創(chuàng)始人的人格力量，投資者、員工和媒體才會注意到它們。最受歡迎的創(chuàng)始人擁有不可思議的天分，可以將那些看似無用、毫無意義或不可能的想法賣給世界，之后我們才會意識到，我們再也離不開它們了。

For all his flaws, Mr. Musk has long possessed such a genius. All the way back in 2006, he posted a “master plan” for Tesla that reads like a Wile E. Coyote caper: “1) Build sports car. 2) Use that money to build an affordable car. 3) Use that money to build an even more affordable car. While doing above, also provide zero-emission electric power generation options. Don’t tell anyone.”

盡管馬斯克有種種缺點，但他一直擁有這樣的天分。2006年，他為特斯拉發(fā)布了一個“總體規(guī)劃”，看上去像是威利狼(Wile E. Coyote)的胡鬧：“1)制造跑車。2)用這筆錢制造一輛經(jīng)濟實惠的汽車。3)用這筆錢建造一輛更實惠的汽車。與此同時，還要提供零排放的電動車選項。別告訴任何人。”

Though he has made good on only some of those points — Tesla is now struggling to fulfill orders for the Model 3, the “even more affordable” car in the plan — posting the plan was part of an impish ploy to generate publicity for what looked like an outlandish idea. That ploy worked; ever since, Mr. Musk has leveraged his growing celebrity as if it were a currency.

雖然他只實現(xiàn)了其中一部分——特斯拉現(xiàn)在正在努力完成Model 3的訂單，這是計劃中“更實惠”的汽車——發(fā)布該計劃是一種頑皮的策略，為一種看似古怪的觀念做宣傳。這個策略奏效了;從那以后，馬斯克就一直利用他不斷增長的名氣，好像它是一種通貨。

Every few months, he makes new promises about this or that amazing thing coming soon. Each time, he reaps more attention and financing and, eventually, builds real cars that are sold to real people. In this way, Mr. Musk’s personality became a key element of not just his companies’ brands, but their business models.

每隔幾個月，他就會做出新的承諾，說要推出這個或那個驚人的東西。每一次，他都會獲得更多的關注和融資，并且最終造出真正的汽車，出售給真正的人。通過這種方式，馬斯克的個性不僅成為他公司品牌的關鍵元素，也成為其商業(yè)模式的關鍵要素。

But it’s a tricky, high-stakes gamble. For one thing, Mr. Musk has to deliver on his promises. More recently, another problem has eaten at this strategy: The future has been getting less obviously wonderful, so it’s hard to take any tech chief’s assurances that their new thing will indeed be as great for the world as they say.

但這是一個棘手的、高風險的賭博。首先，馬斯克必須兌現(xiàn)他的承諾。最近，這個策略又遇到了另一個問題：未來的樣子變得似乎不那么美妙，所以無論科技高管做出任何承諾，人們都很難相信，他們推出的新事物確實會像他們所說的那樣對世界有益。

Back in Mr. Jobs’s day, tech was relatively uncomplicated; when the great man came bearing a new music player, you didn’t have to wonder whether it might help a foreign government steal an election. Now, after everything we have seen recently, you do have to worry about what the future may hold. Even Mr. Musk is worried.

在喬布斯的時代，科技還相對簡單;當那位偉人帶來一個新的音樂播放器時，你不必懷疑它是否可能有助于外國政府竊取選舉?，F(xiàn)在，我們已經(jīng)看到了最近的那么多事情，你不得不擔心未來會發(fā)生什么。就連馬斯克也很擔心。

“I tried to convince people to slow down A.I.,” he told Mr. Rogan. “This was futile. I tried for many years. Nobody listened. Nobody listened.”

“我試圖說服人們放慢人工智能的發(fā)展，”他告訴羅根。“這是徒勞的。我努力很多年。沒有人聽。沒有人聽。”

Thus, the tension: On the one hand, Mr. Musk wants us to believe that everything he’s building is going to turn out wonderfully. On the other hand, he’s telling us to be very scared. This sounds like a contradiction, but in its admission of doubt and complexity, it’s actually a pretty good picture of the future.

因此，矛盾就來了：一方面，馬斯克希望我們相信，他正在創(chuàng)造的一切都會變得非常精彩。另一方面，他告訴我們要非常害怕。這聽起來像是一種矛盾，但它承認了疑慮和復雜性，實際上是為未來勾勒出一幅極好的畫面。

No wonder he sounds crazy. No wonder everyone else is going for boring.

難怪他聽上去很瘋狂。難怪其他人都喜歡無聊。