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My understanding is that Tim Cook’s expertise and experience lies in operations/logistics

I don’t think it’s accurate to call him “more of a sales guy”

I don't think operations/logistics is a creative type role. It's striking deals with manufacturing companies and optimising costs (of course very simplified for a company the size of Apple). To me that sounds like sales.

I think it's a mistake to think that sales & marketing can't be a creative role. There are bean counters in every department, including engineering.

Agreed that it's not necessarily a creative type role, though I don't think it's a stretch to say that creativity would help find new methods of optimising costs.

My mental model of TC is based on a not-very-recent reading of Steve Jobs' bio but it did not leave me with the impression that he was a dealmaker, more of a behind-the-scenes director coming up with innovative ways for Apple to optimise time/costs. I may be wrong though.

In any case, I think the actual rub is that sales vs creative is a false dichotomy; operations/logistics may not be a creative role but it also doesn't fit the sales profile in that dichotomy (imho).

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