2012-08 Kurt Eichenwald.Microsoft's lost decade

MICROSOFT’S LOST DECADE

微软失落的十年

Once upon a time, Microsoft dominated the tech industry; indeed, it was the wealthiest corporation in the world. But since 2000, as Apple, Google, and Facebook whizzed by, it has fallen flat in every arena it entered: e-books, music, search, social networking, etc., etc. Talking to former and current Microsoft executives, KURT EICHENWALD finds the fingers pointing at C.E.O. Steve Ballmer, Bill Gates’s successor, as the man who led them astray

从前，Microsoft 主宰着科技行业；确实，它曾是全球最富有的公司。但自 2000 年以来，随着 Apple、Google 和 Facebook 一路飞驰而过，Microsoft 在它涉足的每一个领域——电子书、音乐、搜索、社交网络等——都铩羽而归。与 Microsoft 的前任与现任高管交谈后，KURT EICHENWALD 发现大家纷纷把矛头指向 C.E.O. Steve Ballmer，这位 Bill Gates 的继任者，被认为带偏了整家公司。

KURT EICHENWALD

To the saccharine rhythm of a Muzak clip, Steve Ballmer crouched into a tackling stance and dashed across a ballroom stage at the Venetian Las Vegas. A 20-foot wall of video screens flashed his name as the 55-yearold Microsoft chief executive bear-hugged Ryan Seacrest, the ubiquitous television and radio host, who had just introduced Ballmer’s keynote speech for the 2012 International Consumer Electronics Show.

伴着一段甜腻的 Muzak 背景乐，Steve Ballmer 俯身摆出“擒抱”的姿势，疾步冲过拉斯维加斯威尼斯人酒店的舞台。一个 20 英尺高的视频屏墙不断闪现他的名字，这位 55 岁的 Microsoft 首席执行官紧紧拥抱了刚刚为他引介 2012 年 International Consumer Electronics Show 主题演讲的无处不在的电视与电台主持人 Ryan Seacrest。

More than 150,000 techies and executives were swarming the city’s hotels last January in the annual bacchanalia of cutting-edge gizmos and gadgets. Attendees ran from one vendor to the next, snapping up fistfuls of freebies, inhaling flavored oxygen, and rubbing elbows with stars such as LL Cool J and Justin Bieber.

去年一月，超过 15 万名技术人士与高管涌入这座城市的各家酒店，参加这场年度的前沿小玩意儿与新奇设备的狂欢。与会者在各个展商之间来回穿梭，成把领取赠品，吸嗅各式“风味氧气”，还与 LL Cool J、Justin Bieber 等明星近距离接触。

But this night, an air of discomfort filled the Palazzo Ballroom, where Ballmer was about to give the show’s opening presentation, one delivered by Microsoft’s C.E.O. for 14 of the previous 17 years—the first 11 by Bill Gates and the rest by Ballmer. Weeks earlier, the company had declared that this would be its final keynote—and, worse, that it wouldn’t even be back next year as an exhibitor to showcase new innovations. The timing for big news about its products, it said, didn’t match that of the annual high-tech pageant.

但当晚，Palazzo Ballroom 弥漫着一股不自在的气息。Ballmer 即将发表开场演讲——在此前 17 年中，有 14 年都是由 Microsoft 的 C.E.O. 来担纲，其中前 11 年是 Bill Gates，后面则是 Ballmer。几周前，公司宣布这将是它最后一次发表主题演讲——更糟的是，明年甚至不会以参展商身份回归展示新产品。公司称，自家重大产品新闻的发布节奏与这场年度高科技盛会的时间并不匹配。

Rumors had swirled throughout the day that Ballmer planned to go out in a blaze of glory, offering a peek at a yet-to-bereleased stunner from a company whose recent innovations had too often been lackluster or worse. Instead, what emerged was a gonzo spectacle, structured as a confab between Seacrest and Ballmer. Cookie Monster showed up, as did a gospel choir that belted out a bizarre song composed entirely of random tweets shot into cyberspace by who-the-hell-knows.

整日里，谣言四起：Ballmer 将以辉煌谢幕，预告一款尚未发布、足以惊艳四座的新产品——毕竟这家公司近年来的创新屡屡乏善可陈。结果呈现出来的，却是一场夸张离奇的综艺式表演：由 Seacrest 与 Ballmer 对谈串场。Cookie Monster 现身，福音合唱团也登台高歌，唱的还是一首离奇的曲子，歌词完全拼贴自不知何人发往网络空间的随机推文。

As for announcements of quantum leaps into the technological future: nothing. Ballmer applauded the still-long-awaited Windows 8 operating system (which as of this writing is available only as a release preview online). He burbled about his expectations for Xbox, the game console that successfully competed with Sony PlayStation. Out came Windows Phone 7 again, which, despite widespread praise from users, had experienced bleak sales results. A demo followed, which proved an embarrassment; the device’s voice-to-text messaging failed and then another glitch forced a Microsoft staffer to reach for a different phone. The media response was dismal—the company’s last presentation, a prominent blogger wrote, was a “cruel joke.”

至于对未来科技的“量子级”跃迁式发布：没有。Ballmer 为仍在漫长等待中的 Windows 8 operating system 鼓掌致意（撰文时它还只是线上 release preview）。他喋喋不休地谈起对 Xbox 的期望，这款游戏机曾成功对垒 Sony PlayStation。接着又拿出 Windows Phone 7，尽管它广受用户称赞，但销量惨淡。随后的一段演示令人尴尬：设备的语音转文字短信功能失败，紧接着又出现故障，迫使一位 Microsoft 员工临场换机。媒体反响糟糕——一位知名博主写道，这家公司的最后一场演示是一场“cruel joke”。

IF YOU DON T PL AY the politics, it’s management

by character assassination,” says a Microsoft product manager.

“IF YOU DON T PL AY the politics，管理就会变成以人格为代价的斗争。”一位 Microsoft 的产品经理说。

Microsoft’s low-octane swan song was nothing if not symbolic of more than a decade littered with errors, missed opportunities, and the devolution of one of the industry’s innovators into a “me too” purveyor of other companies’ consumer products. Over those years, inconsequential pip-squeaks and onetime zombies—Google, Facebook, Apple—roared ahead, transforming the socialmedia-tech experience, while a lumbering Microsoft relied mostly on pumping out Old Faithfuls such as Windows, Office, and servers for its financial performance.

这一场“低能量”的谢幕秀，如果说有什么意义，那就是象征着过去十多年里错误与机遇错失的堆积，以及一个行业创新者蜕变为跟风销售他人消费产品的“me too”角色。在这些年里，昔日籍籍无名的小角色、甚至曾被视为“僵尸”的 Google、Facebook、Apple 高歌猛进，重塑了社交媒体与科技体验；而行动迟缓的 Microsoft，财务表现多半还要靠 Windows、Office 和服务器等“老本行”。

Amid a dynamic and ever changing marketplace, Microsoft—which declined to comment for this article—became a high-tech equivalent of a Detroit car-maker, bringing flashier models of the same old thing off of the assembly line even as its competitors upended the world. Most of its innovations have been financial debacles or of little consequence to the bottom line. And the performance showed on Wall Street; despite booming sales and profits from its flagship products, in the last decade Microsoft’s stock barely budged from around $30, while Apple’s stock is worth more than 20 times what it was 10 years ago. In December 2000, Microsoft had a market capitalization of $510 billion, making it the world’s most valuable company. As of June it is No. 3, with a market cap of $249 billion. In December 2000, Apple had a market cap of $4.8 billion and didn’t even make the list. As of this June it is No. 1 in the world, with a market cap of $541 billion.

在一个瞬息万变的市场中，Microsoft（对本文不予置评）成了高科技界的“底特律车厂”：当竞争对手在颠覆世界时，它还在装配线上不断推出花里胡哨的“老产品新款”。它的大多数“创新”不是财务灾难，就是对利润底线无甚影响。华尔街也给出了答案：尽管旗舰产品的销售与利润节节攀升，过去十年里，Microsoft 的股价却几乎一直徘徊在约 30 美元附近，而Apple 的股价比 10 年前高出 20 多倍。2000 年 12 月，Microsoft 的市值为 5100 亿美元，是全球市值最高的公司。截至 6 月，它位列第 3，市值 2490 亿美元。2000 年 12 月，Apple 的市值为 48 亿美元，甚至都排不进榜单；而截至今年 6 月，它位居全球第 1，市值 5410 亿美元。

How did this jaw-dropping role reversal happen? How could a company that stands among the most cash-rich in the world, the onetime icon of cool that broke IBM’s iron grip on the computer industry, have stumbled so badly in a race it was winning?

如此令人瞠目结舌的角色反转是如何发生的？一家坐拥全球最富现金的公司、曾以“酷”的象征打破 IBM 对计算机行业钢铁般掌控的企业，怎么会在一场本来领先的竞赛中栽得如此之惨？

The story of Microsoft’s lost decade could serve as a business-school case study on the pitfalls of success. For what began as a lean competition machine led by young visionaries of unparalleled talent has mutated into something bloated and bureaucracy-laden, with an internal culture that unintentionally rewards managers who strangle innovative ideas that might threaten the established order of things, By the dawn of the millennium, the hallways at Microsoft were no longer home to barefoot programmers in Hawaiian shirts working through nights and weekends toward a common goal of excellence; instead, life behind the thick corporate walls had become staid and brutish. Fiefdoms had taken root, and a mastery of internal politics emerged as key to career success.

Microsoft 的“失落十年”足以成为商学院关于“成功陷阱”的典型案例。这家公司起初是一台由才华横溢的年轻远见者领导的精干竞赛机器，后来却异化为臃肿且充满官僚气的组织；其内部文化无意间嘉奖那些扼杀可能威胁既定秩序的创新想法的管理者。到了新千年的黎明，Microsoft 的走廊里已不再是穿着夏威夷衬衫、打着赤脚、为共同的卓越目标通宵达旦工作的程序员的天下；相反，厚重企业围墙后的生活变得刻板而粗暴。林立的小王国已然扎根，精通内部政治成了职业成功的关键。

苹果是做好自己，微软是给别人赋能、做别人喜欢的产品，碎片化、臃肿是自然的结果。

In those years Microsoft had stepped up its efforts to cripple competitors, but—because of a series of astonishingly foolish management decisions—the competitors being crippled were often co-workers at Microsoft, instead of other companies. Staffers were rewarded not just for doing well but for making sure that their colleagues failed. As a result, the company was consumed by an endless series of internal knife fights. Potential market-busting businesses—such as e-book and smartphone technology—were killed, derailed, or delayed amid bickering and power plays.

那些年里 Microsoft 加大了打击竞争对手的力度，但——由于一连串令人咋舌的愚蠢管理决策——被“打残”的往往是 Microsoft 自己的同事，而不是别的公司。员工获得嘉奖不仅因为自己做得好，还因为确保同事失败。结果，公司被无休止的内部厮杀所吞噬。本可打破市场格局的业务——例如电子书与智能手机技术——在争吵与权力博弈中被扼杀、脱轨或一拖再拖。

That is the portrait of Microsoft depicted in interviews with dozens of current and former executives, as well as in thousands of pages of internal documents and legal records.

以上画像出自对数十位现任与前任高管的采访，以及成千上万页的内部文件与法律记录。

“They used to point their finger at IBM and laugh,” said Bill Hill, a former Micro-soft manager. “Now they’ve become the thing they despised.”

“他们过去指着 IBM 嘲笑，”前微软的经理 Bill Hill 说。“如今他们成了自己所鄙视的那种东西。”

Today, Microsoft stands at a precipice, an all-or-nothing opportunity that may be Ballmer’s last chance to demonstrate to Wall Street that he is the right man with the right plan to lead the sprawling enterprise into the future. With Surface, the recently unveiled tablet, Windows 8, Windows Phone 7, Windows Server 2012, and Xbox 720 in the offing, he could be on the verge of proving his strategies—including last year’s controversial, $8.5 billion acquisition of Skype. But whether these succeed or not, executives say, the Microsoft of old, the nimble player that captured the passions of a generation of techies and software engineers, is dead and gone.

今天，Microsoft 立在悬崖边上，面临成败在此一举的机会——这或许是 Ballmer 向华尔街证明他“人对、策也对”、能引领这家庞然大物迈向未来的最后机会。随着新近发布的平板 Surface、以及在途中的 Windows 8、Windows Phone 7、Windows Server 2012 和 Xbox 720，他也许即将证明自己的战略（包括去年颇具争议、耗资 85 亿美元收购 Skype）的正确性。但无论这些是否成功，高管们说，那个昔日的 Microsoft——那个曾以敏捷身手俘获一代技术迷与软件工程师热情的玩家——已经不复存在。

“I see Microsoft as technology’s answer to Sears,” said Kurt Massey, a former senior marketing manager. “In the 40s, 50s, and 60s, Sears had it nailed. It was top-notch, but now it’s just a barren wasteland. And that’s Microsoft. The company just isn’t cool anymore.”

“在我看来，Microsoft 就是科技界的 Sears 替身，”前资深市场营销经理 Kurt Massey 说。“在 20 世纪 40、50、60 年代，Sears 表现无懈可击，曾经是一流，如今却成了一片荒芜。而这就是 Microsoft。公司已经不酷了。”

Cool is what tech consumers want. Exhibit A: today the iPhone brings in more revenue than the entirety of Microsoft.

“酷”正是科技消费者想要的。最直接的证据：如今 iPhone 的营收超过了整个 Microsoft 的总和。

One Apple product, something that didn’t exist five years ago, has higher sales than everything Microsoft has to offer. More than Windows, Office, Xbox, Bing, Windows Phone, and every other product that Microsoft has created since 1975. In the quarter ended March 31,2012, iPhone had sales of $22.7 billion; Microsoft Corporation, $17.4 billion.

Apple 的一款产品——五年前还不存在——其销售额就超过了 Microsoft 能提供的一切。超过 Windows、Office、Xbox、Bing、Windows Phone，以及自 1975 年以来 Microsoft 所创造的所有其他产品。在截至 2012 年 3 月 31 日的季度里，iPhone 的销售额为 227 亿美元；Microsoft Corporation 为 174 亿美元。

Monopoly Money

垄断之财

While Microsoft was once the hippest company on earth, its beginnings could be traced to the Holy Bible for nerds— Popular Electronics.

尽管 Microsoft 曾经是地球上最“潮”的公司，它的起点可以追溯到极客们的“圣经”——Popular Electronics。

In December 1974, a 21-year-old college dropout named Paul Allen purchased the latest issue of the hobbyist magazine at a newsstand in Harvard Square and was barely able to contain his excitement. In bold letters, the cover headline screamed out that the world’s first minicomputer with the power to rival commercial models had been invented. Allen rushed six blocks to Harvard College, where his high-school chum Bill Gates was a student. The two had long wanted to write an operating program using the computer language called BASIC, but Gates had held off; he would start such a project, he told Allen, only when someone developed a computer with a fast processor. Allen thrust the magazine into Gates’s hands, and the two agreed: the moment had arrived.

1974年12月，一位名叫 Paul Allen、21岁的大学辍学生在 Harvard Square 的报摊买到了这本爱好者杂志的最新一期，激动得几乎难以自持。封面用粗体标题“呐喊”：世界上第一台性能可与商用机媲美的微型计算机被发明出来了。Allen 一口气跑了六个街区赶到 Harvard College，他的高中好友 Bill Gates 当时正在那里读书。两人早就想用一种名为 BASIC 的计算机语言编写一个操作程序，但 Gates 一直按捺着；他告诉Allen，只有当有人开发出配备高速处理器的计算机时，他才会启动这样的项目。Allen 把杂志塞到 Gates 手里，两人达成共识：时机已到。

Things moved quickly. Gates, Allen, and another friend wrote a program they called Alt air BASIC and persuaded the company that made the COMPUTER-MITS, in Albuquerque—to license it. They named their new company Micro-soft. Soon, the personalcomputer market was exploding. Micro-soft began selling its programs to bigger and bigger corporate players. Within two years, the company, renamed Microsoft, was setting the industry standards for microprocessor programming. Working at the young Microsoft was, by all accounts, thrilling, but also unnerving. Gates was relentless, demanding the same intense commitment of everyone he hired.

事情进展很快。Gates、Allen 以及另一位朋友写出了一个他们称作 Alt air BASIC 的程序，并说服位于 Albuquerque、生产该计算机的 MITS 公司——为其授权。他们将新公司命名为 Micro-soft。很快，个人计算机市场爆发式增长。Micro-soft 开始把自己的程序卖给越来越大的企业客户。两年内，公司更名为 Microsoft，并开始为微处理器编程设定行业标准。所有人的说法都是：在这家年轻的 Microsoft 工作令人兴奋，但也让人不安。Gates 咄咄逼人，对每一位被他雇用的人都要求同样强度的投入。

In 1980, IBM—then the world’s largest computer-maker—came to Gates and Allen and licensed their company to write the operating software for their soon-to-bereleased product, the IBM PC. It was Microsoft’s big break, bringing the company the riches it needed to finance its coming blast into the stratosphere.

1980年，IBM——当时全球最大的计算机制造商——找到 Gates 和 Allen，并授权他们的公司为其即将发布的产品 IBM PC 编写操作软件。这是 Microsoft 的重大突破，为公司带来了腾飞所需的资金弹药。

The same year, Gates and Allen decided that neither of them had the management skills or business savvy that Microsoft needed. So Gates turned to a Harvard friend, a boisterous, loud, hard-charging math-andeconomics major—Ballmer—to run the business side. Ballmer had worked as an assistant product manager at Procter & Gamble before enrolling at Stanford business school, from which he dropped out to join Microsoft. In his 2011 book, Idea Man, Allen remembers meeting Ballmer: “I thought, This guy looks like an operative for the NKVD [the secret police of the U.S.S.R.]. He had piercing blue eyes and a genuine toughness.”

同年，Gates 和 Allen 认为他们二人都不具备 Microsoft 所需要的管理技能或商业敏锐度。于是 Gates 找来一位 Harvard 的朋友——性格外向、嗓门洪亮、冲劲十足的数学与经济学专业学生 Ballmer——来主管业务。Ballmer 曾在 Procter & Gamble 担任助理产品经理，随后进入 Stanford 商学院就读，但中途退学加入 Microsoft。在他 2011 年的书 Idea Man 中，Allen 回忆初次见到 Ballmer 时的想法：“我当时想，这家伙看起来就像 NKVD（U.S.S.R. 的秘密警察）的特工。他有一双刺目的蓝眼睛，也确有一股硬朗劲儿。”

“MIC RO SOFT isn’t cool anymore,”

“MIC RO SOFT 已经不酷了，”

says a former manager.

一位前任经理如是说。

The company started doubling and tripling in size every year, and the operating systems from Microsoft grew in sophistication. MS-DOS was a text-based system,

公司的规模开始每年成倍增长，而 Microsoft 的操作系统也日趋成熟。MS-DOS 是一种基于文本的系统，

but then came Windows, which brought a graphic interface—desktops, icons, and the like—to P.C.’s and any other computer.

但随后 Windows 问世，为 P.C. 乃至其他任何计算机带来了图形界面——桌面、图标等等。

On August 24, 1995, Microsoft reached the pinnacle of cool, releasing what would then be its largest-selling operating system ever: Windows 95. Seeking to buy the first copies, computer geeks lined up at midnight around the block outside technology stores. Jay Leno showed up at Microsoft’s campus to celebrate, and the Empire State Building was lit in Microsoft’s colors—red, yellow, and green. Gates paid $3 million to the Rolling Stones for rights to use their classic “Start Me Up” as the theme song for ads and other presentations. Yes, a theme song. For software.

1995年8月24日，Microsoft 达到“酷”的巅峰，发布了当时其史上最畅销的操作系统：Windows 95。为了抢到首批拷贝，计算机极客们在午夜就在科技商店门外绕街排起长队。Jay Leno 现身 Microsoft 园区庆祝，Empire State Building 也点亮了 Microsoft 的标志色——红、黄、绿。Gates 向 Rolling Stones 支付了 300 万美元，取得将其经典歌曲“Start Me Up”用于广告和其他展示的权利。没错，一首主题曲。给软件用的。

By the end of 1997, Windows 95, along with Microsoft’s other operating systems, ran on 86.3 percent of the P.C.‘s in the U.S. (Apple’s Mac O.S., by contrast, then had only 4.6 percent of the market.) Worth $6.8 billion, Bill Gates had been named the richest man in the world by Forbes magazine in 1992. Nerds were now chic, and Microsoft exerted unprecedented power over American society. It seemed as if nothing could ever slow the software Goliath.

到 1997 年底，包括 Windows 95 在内的 Microsoft 各类操作系统已运行在美国 86.3% 的 P.C. 上（相比之下，Apple 的 Mac O.S. 当时的市场占有率只有 4.6%）。早在 1992 年，Bill Gates 以 68 亿美元的身家被 Forbes 杂志评为全球首富。极客如今也时髦了，Microsoft 对美国社会施加着前所未有的影响。似乎没有任何东西能减缓这个软件巨人的脚步。

On the other hand, investor Warren Buffett, the “oracle of Omaha,” didn’t get Microsoft. It was August 1997, and Jeff Raikes—the executive responsible for Microsoft’s sales, marketing, and service initiatives—was urging him to buy shares. Microsoft, Raikes wrote in an e-mail, was just like the Coca-Cola Company, one of Buffett’s best-known investments. Coke essentially received a royalty on swallows; Microsoft manned the toll bridge for almost every personal computer sold in the world.

另一方面，投资者 Warren Buffett，这位“oracle of Omaha”，却并不“看懂” Microsoft。时间是 1997 年 8 月，负责 Microsoft 销售、市场与服务计划的高管 Jeff Raikes 正在敦促他买入股票。Raikes 在一封电子邮件中写道，Microsoft 就像 Buffett 最著名的一些投资标的之一——Coca-Cola Company。可乐本质上是在每一口吞咽上收取“版税”；而 Microsoft 则把持着几乎每一台在全球售出的个人计算机的“收费桥”。

Still, Raikes conceded, there was a danger in Microsoft shares. The threat, he wrote, was from some unforeseen transformation of the tech market, the same phenomenon that had crippled IBM, the granddaddy of computer giants, when Microsoft burst onto the scene.

尽管如此，Raikes 也承认，持有 Microsoft 的股票存在风险。他写道，威胁来自科技市场某种不可预见的变革——当年 Microsoft 崛起之时，正是这种现象让电脑巨擘的老祖宗 IBM 元气大伤。

“I think [I.B.M’s] addiction to the power they had in previous generations of computing really blindsided them from the paradigm shift of the PC,” he wrote.

他写道：“我认为 [I.B.M’s] 对其在前一代计算时代所拥有权力的沉溺，确实让他们对 PC 的范式转移措手不及。”

That concern about Microsoft made sense to Buffett. Would the company fall prey to the arrogance that dethroned IBM? Would there be another paradigm shift that Microsoft didn’t see until it was too late?

这种对 Microsoft 的担忧让 Buffett 觉得有道理。公司会不会像 IBM 那样，栽在傲慢之下？是否会出现另一场范式转移，而 Microsoft 直到为时已晚才察觉？

Raikes acknowledged that he had the same worries. “I do wonder about the time period ten or twenty or more years down the road,” he wrote.

Raikes 承认他也有同样的担心。他写道：“我确实在想，十年、二十年甚至更久之后会怎样。”

He had good reason to fret. Signs that Microsoft would be missing the boat in the next decade were already emerging. That very moment at Microsoft’s headquarters, in Redmond, Washington, a group of executives were developing a device that, in 10 years’ time, would transform a multi-billion-dollar industry: an electronic reader that allowed customers to download digital versions of any written material—books, magazines, newspapers, whatever. But, despite its multiyear head start, Microsoft would not be the one to introduce the game-changing innovation to the market. Instead, the big profits would eventually go to Amazon and Apple.

他有充足的理由感到不安。Microsoft 在未来十年将要错失良机的迹象已经显现。就在位于 Redmond, Washington 的 Microsoft 总部，一群高管正开发一款将在十年后改变一个数十亿美元产业的设备：一种电子阅读器，允许消费者下载任何书面材料的数字版本——书籍、杂志、报纸，等等。只是，尽管有数年的先发优势，真正把这项改变游戏规则的创新推向市场的并不会是 Microsoft。最终赚走大把利润的，将是 Amazon 和 Apple。

The spark of inspiration for the device had come from a 1979 work of science fiction, The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, by Douglas Adams. The novel put forth the idea that a single book could hold all knowledge in the galaxy. An e-book, the Microsoft developers believed, would bring Adams’s vision to life. By 1998 a prototype of the revolutionary tool was ready to go. Thrilled with its success and anticipating accolades, the technology group sent the device to Bill Gates—who promptly gave it a thumbs-down. The e-book wasn’t right for Microsoft, he declared.

这款设备的灵感火花来自 1979 年的一本科幻作品——Douglas Adams 的 The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy。该小说提出了一个构想：一本书可以容纳银河间的全部知识。Microsoft 的开发者相信，电子书将把 Adams 的愿景变为现实。到 1998 年，这个革命性工具的原型已准备就绪。技术团队为其成功而兴奋，预期会收获赞誉，便将设备送交 Bill Gates——后者当场否决。他宣称，这种电子书“不适合 Microsoft”。

“He didn’t like the user interface, because it didn’t look like Windows,” one programmer involved in the project recalled. But Windows would have been completely wrong for an e-book, team members agreed. The point was to have a book, and a book alone, appear on the full screen. Real books didn’t have images from Microsoft Windows floating around; putting them into an electronic version would do nothing but undermine the consumer experience.

“一位参与该项目的程序员回忆道：“他不喜欢这个用户界面，因为它看起来不像 Windows。”但团队成员一致认为，让 Windows 的样式搬到电子书上完全不合适。关键在于：全屏只呈现一本‘书’，仅此而已。真实的书里不会有 Microsoft Windows 的界面元素在四处飘；把这些塞进电子版本，只会破坏消费者体验。”

The group working on the initiative was removed from a reporting line to Gates and folded into the major-product group dedicated to software for Office, the other mammoth Microsoft moneymaker besides Windows. Immediately, the technology unit was reclassified from one charged with dreaming up and producing new ideas to one required to report profits and losses right away.

负责该项目的团队被从向 Gates 汇报的链路中剥离，合并进负责 Office 软件的核心产品部门——这是除 Windows 之外 Microsoft 的另一台巨额摇钱机。随即，这个技术单元的定位也从“构思并孵化新点子”，被改成了“立即对盈亏负责”。

“Our entire plan had to be moved forward three to four years from 2003-04, and we had to ship a product in 1999,” said Steve Stone, a founder of the technology group. “We couldn’t be focused anymore on developing technology that was effective for con-sumers. Instead, all of a sudden we had to look at this and say, ‘How are we going to use this to make money?’ And it was impossible.”

“我们整个计划不得不从 2003–04 年提前三到四年，我们被要求在 1999 年就发货，”该技术团队的创始人之一 Steve Stone 说。“我们已无法再专注于开发对消费者有效的技术。取而代之的是，我们突然被要求自问：‘我们要如何用这个赚钱？’但这根本不可能。”

Rushing the product to market cost Microsoft dearly. The software had been designed to run on a pad with touch-screen technology, a feature later popularized with the iPhone. Instead, the company pushed out Microsoft Reader, to run on the Microsoft Pocket PC, a small, phone-size device, and, soon after, on Windows. The plan to give consumers something light and simple that would allow them to read on a book-size screen was terminated.

匆忙推向市场让 Microsoft 付出了沉重代价。该软件原本被设计在带触摸屏技术的“平板”上运行，这一特性后来由 iPhone 普及。结果公司却推出了 Microsoft Reader，使其运行在 Microsoft Pocket PC（一个手机尺寸的小设备）上，随后又移植到 Windows。为消费者提供一款轻巧、简单、可在“书本尺寸”屏幕上阅读的产品的计划被终止了。

The death of the e-book effort was not simply the consequence of a desire for immediate profits, according to a former official in the Office division. The real problem for his colleagues was that a simple touch-screen device was seen as a laughable distraction from the tried-and-true ways of dealing with data. “Office is designed to inputting with a keyboard, not a stylus or a finger,” the official said. “There were all kinds of personal prejudices at work.”

据 Office 部门一位前高管称，电子书项目夭折并不只是出于对即时利润的渴望。对他的同事们而言，真正的问题在于：一个简单的触屏设备被视作偏离既定“数据处理正道”的笑柄。“Office 的设计就是用键盘输入，而不是用手写笔或手指，”这位高管说。“各种各样的个人偏见在作祟。”

哪个企业不是沿着既定的轨道往前走？电子书最有可能成功的地方是Amazon，就像YouTube最有可能成功的地方是Google，关注跟既定轨道不匹配的项目很可能只是浪费时间和精力。

Indeed, executives said, Microsoft failed repeatedly to jump on emerging technologies because of the company’s fealty to Windows and Office. “Windows was the god— everything had to work with Windows,” said Stone. “Ideas about mobile computing with a user experience that was cleaner than with a PC. were deemed unimportant by a few powerful people in that division, and they managed to kill the effort.”

确实，据多位高管称，Microsoft 屡屡错过新兴技术，根源在于公司对 Windows 和 Office 的“忠诚”。“Windows 是神——一切都必须与 Windows 协同，”Stone 说。“关于移动计算、关于比 PC 更干净利落的用户体验的构想，被该部门少数有权势的人视为不重要，他们最终将这项努力扼杀。”

This prejudice permeated the company, leaving it unable to move quickly when faced with challenges from new competitors. “Every little thing you want to write has to build off of Windows or other existing products,” one software engineer said. “It can be very confusing, because a lot of the time the problems you’re trying to solve aren’t the ones that you have with your product, but because you have to go through the mental exercise of how this framework works. It just slows you down.”

这种偏见渗透全公司，使其在面对新竞争者的挑战时难以及时行动。“你想写的每一丁点儿东西，都得建立在 Windows 或其他既有产品之上，”一位软件工程师说。“这会让人非常困惑，因为很多时候你试图解决的问题并不是你产品自身的问题，而是你必须先在脑子里过一遍这个框架是如何运作的。这只会拖慢你。”

But the power of the Windows and Office divisions in dictating the direction of product development was only one of the myriad problems unfolding within Microsoft that served to crush innovation.

然而，Windows 与 Office 部门主导产品研发方向的权力，仅仅是 Microsoft 内部层出不穷、扼杀创新的问题之一。

The far bigger issue, executives said, was a corporate culture that by 2001 was heading down the path of selfimmolating chaos.

更大的问题，据多位高管称，是公司文化——到 2001 年，这种文化正在走向自我焚毁般的混乱之路。

The Bubble Bursts

泡沫破裂

on the early 1990s, it I seemed as if every I Microsoft employee’s I computer ran an apI plication that left an image on their screens at all times: a cartoon depiction of a face whose expression changed depending on the direction of the company’s stock price. When shares increased in value, the face smiled; when they fell, it frowned.

在 1990 年代早期，似乎每位 Microsoft 员工的电脑都运行着一个应用程序，屏幕上始终留着一张卡通脸：公司股价向上，它就微笑；股价下跌，它就皱眉。

And no wonder. Almost every employee received a stake in the company through stock options. When the share price went up, everyone got richer. When it went down, everyone was—well, a little less rich. The mythology was true: in the early days Microsoft minted millionaires almost as quickly as it packaged software—the original 11 staff members besides Gates and Allen came away with sums ranging from $1 million to $100 million—and the result was that everyone ran full speed in hopes of pushing up the stock price a little bit more.

这并不意外。几乎每位员工都通过股票期权持有公司的权益。至于当股价上涨时，人人都更富有；当它下跌时，嗯，大家就稍微没那么富有了。传说确有其事：在早期，Microsoft 造就百万富翁的速度几乎与它打包软件一样快——除 Gates 和 Allen 外的最初 11 名员工，各自拿到的收益从 100 万美元到 1 亿美元不等——结果就是，所有人都全速奔跑，只为再把股价往上推一点点。

“People were eager and in a big hurry to capitalize on every opportunity to gather new revenue,” said Ed McCahill, who worked at Microsoft as a marketing manager for 16 years. “In every meeting, there were clear goals and clear outcomes, because everybody knew that the faster they could move the quicker the stock price would go up and the sooner they would be wealthy.”

“大家都踊跃且急于抓住一切机会创造新的收入，”在 Microsoft 担任了 16 年市场经理的 Ed McCahill 说。“每次会议都有明确的目标和明确的结论，因为人人都知道：动作越快，股价上涨越快，他们也就能越早变得富有。”

Resumes poured into Microsoft from business-school and engineering students lured by tales of vast riches, and the company went on a hiring binge. Many of the longtime executives let new employees handle the work while they themselves lolled around, waiting for the next vesting period when they could exercise more options—a behavior known derisively by the younger hires as “rest and vest.”

受“巨额财富”故事的吸引，商学院与工程专业的学生把简历像雪片一样投向 Microsoft，公司也掀起了招聘狂潮。许多老资格高管把工作交给新员工处理，自己则悠哉度日，等着下一次期权归属期来临好行权——这种行为被年轻员工嘲讽为“rest and vest”（休息等归属）。

Ballmer and Microsoft

Ballmer 和 Microsoft

Then everything changed. On December 30,1999, the face from the computer application frowned. Microsoft stock had hit its pre-split all-time high of $119.94 a share the day before, then started to fall. Even Microsoft, it turned out, was not immune to the dot-com crash.

然后一切都变了。1999 年 12 月 30 日，屏幕上的卡通脸开始皱眉。Microsoft 的股价前一天刚触及拆股前的历史高点每股 119.94 美元，随后转而下跌。事实证明，即便是 Microsoft 也未能幸免于互联网泡沫崩裂。

Sixteen days later, Bill Gates handed off the C.E.O. reins to Ballmer. “I was stunned when Bill announced that he was stepping aside to become ‘chief software architect’ in January 2000, with Steve Ballmer succeeding him as C.E.O.,” recalled Paul Allen. “While Steve had long served as Bill’s top lieutenant, you got the sense through the nineties that he wasn’t necessarily being groomed for Microsoft’s top spot. Ed say that Bill viewed him as a very smart executive with less affinity for technology than for the business side—that Steve just wasn’t a ‘product guy.’ “

十六天后，Bill Gates 将 C.E.O. 的职位移交给 Ballmer。Paul Allen 回忆说：“当 Bill 宣布在 2000 年 1 月退居二线出任‘chief software architect’，由 Steve Ballmer 接任 C.E.O. 时，我非常震惊。尽管 Steve 长期担任 Bill 的第一副手，但在整个 90 年代，你能感觉到他并不一定在被培养为 Microsoft 的最高负责人。有人说 Bill 认为他是个非常聪明的高管，但对技术的亲和力不如对业务——也就是说，Steve 并不是一个‘product guy’。”

A businessman with a background in dealmaking, finance, and product marketing had replaced a soltwarc-and-tcchnological genius.

一位具备交易撮合、财务与产品营销背景的商人，取代了一位软件与技术天才。

Within a year, Microsoft had lost more than half its value, never to return to its soaring heights of the past. The stock options—once the golden key to untold wealth—were underwater.

不到一年，Microsoft 的市值已蒸发过半，再未重返昔日高位。那些曾是通往巨额财富“金钥匙”的股票期权，统统处于价外。

The music had stopped. The Microsoft Millionaires were now working alongside the Microsoft Minions. One came to work bragging about his new Bentley; the other made do with a Dodge Neon. The days of shoulderto-shoulder teams fighting to beat the world were over. A financial fissure tore at already strained relationships between the Old Guard and the new blood.

音乐停止了。Microsoft 的百万富翁们如今与 Microsoft 的基层员工并肩而坐：前者上班时吹嘘自己买了新款 Bentley；后者则将就着开 Dodge Neon。并肩作战、力图打遍天下无敌手的日子一去不返。财务上的裂痕撕扯着本已紧张的“元老派”和“新鲜血液”之间的关系。

Small changes in corporate policy began to be perceived as slights to those who hadn’t been lucky enough to land at Microsoft in time to become millionaires. When the company decided in about 2003 to save money by no longer providing towels for employees using the company showers, the response was pure fury. The older employees had millions, and the younger ones couldn’t have towels?

公司政策的些微调整，开始被那些没赶上早期致富班车的员工视为轻慢。大约在 2003 年，公司决定为节省开支而不再为使用公司淋浴间的员工提供毛巾，随之而来的反应是彻头彻尾的愤怒：老员工腰缠万贯，年轻人连毛巾都没有？

“If you just add up the time people spent sending angry e-mails about the towels disappearing … I expect they lost a lot more money than the cost savings from the towels,” a former lead software-design engineer said.

“一旦把大家为‘毛巾不见了’而发怒气邮件所耗的时间加总起来……我估计他们损失的钱远超节省下来的毛巾成本，”一位前首席软件设计工程师说。

The towels returned, but the bitterness about cost-cutting didn’t end. Microsoft abandoned its gold-plated health-insurance plan—the enticement, some former employees told me, that had brought them there in the first place. Whiteboards grew scarcer. It even became harder to find office supplies.

毛巾是回来了，但对削减成本的怨气并未平息。Microsoft 放弃了“镀金式”的健康保险计划——一些前员工告诉我，这正是当初吸引他们加入的诱因。白板变得稀缺，连常用的办公用品都愈发难找。

Worse, the strategy for success at Microsoft was turned on its head. Where once creating innovations was both the thrill of the job and the path to riches through stock options, guaranteed financial success could now be achieved only the way it was at stodgy old General Motors or IBM—through promotions.

更糟的是，Microsoft 的成功路径被彻底颠倒。过去，做出创新既是工作的激情所在，也是依靠股票期权走向财富之路；而今，要获得“有保障”的财务成功，只有走守旧的老 General Motors 或 IBM 那条路——靠升职。

“People realized they weren’t going to get wealthy,” one former senior executive said. “They turned into people trying to move up the ladder, rather than people trying to make a big contribution to the firm.”

“一些人意识到自己不会再变得富有了，”一位前高级管理者说。“他们开始把重心放在职级攀升上，而不再是为公司作出重大贡献。”

And so, the bureaucratization of Microsoft began. Some executives traced the change to the ascension of Ballmer, but in truth Microsoft’s era of fast cash was almost certainly the actual driving force.

于是，Microsoft 的官僚化开始了。一些高管将这种变化归因于 Ballmer 的上位，但事实上，Microsoft 的“快钱时代”几乎可以肯定才是真正的推动力。

More employees seeking management slots led to more managers, more managers led to more meetings, more meetings led to more memos, and more red tape led to less innovation. Everything, one executive said, advanced at a snail’s pace.

更多员工追逐管理岗位→更多管理者；更多管理者→更多会议；更多会议→更多备忘录；更多繁文缛节→更少创新。一位高管说，一切都在蜗行牛步。

“There was this institutionalized system, and it was like designing software by committee,” said Prasanna Sankaranarayanan, a former Microsoft engineer. “Things moved too slowly. There were too many meetings.”

前 Microsoft 工程师 Prasanna Sankaranarayanan 说：“有一套被制度化的体系，感觉就像由委员会来设计软件。事情推进得太慢，会议太多了。”

Just as with e-books, opportunities for major product developments slipped away. Windows CE, an operating system distinct from Windows that was originally used for pocket devices like personal digital assistants, would ultimately be the foundation of the mobile operating system that would power Microsoft’s first smartphones. But despite the fact that Microsoft had the jump on its competitors with Windows CE, it still lost the race for the wildly successful smartphones.

与电子书一样，重大产品开发的机会悄然溜走。Windows CE 是一套不同于 Windows 的操作系统，最初用于诸如个人数字助理等掌上设备，最终成为驱动 Microsoft 首代智能手机的移动操作系统的基础。但尽管 Microsoft 凭借 Windows CE 领先对手，它仍然在轰动一时的智能手机竞赛中败下阵来。

“You look at the Windows Phone and you can’t help but wonder, How did Microsoft squander the lead they had with the Windows CE devices?” said McCahill. “They had a great lead, they were years ahead. And they completely blew it. And they completely blew it because of the bureaucracy.”

McCahill 说：“看看 Windows Phone，你不禁要问：Microsoft 怎么会把 Windows CE 设备带来的领先优势挥霍殆尽？他们曾领先甚多，领先了好几年。结果彻底搞砸了，而他们之所以彻底搞砸，就是因为官僚作风。”

The achingly slow processes at times bordered on the comical. Marc Turkel, a product manager, told me about an initiative he oversaw around 2010 that involved multiple groups. At the same time the new project began, workers were breaking ground for construction of a 12-story building that would occupy a square block; Turkel’s office window looked out on the construction site.

那些令人揪心的缓慢流程有时近乎滑稽。产品经理 Marc Turkel 告诉我，他在 2010 年左右负责过一项计划，涉及多个小组。就在这个新项目启动的同时，工人们也开始动工建造一幢占据整整一街区的 12 层大楼；Turkel 的办公室窗外正对着工地。

Turkel began negotiating with the different managers, then their supervisors, and then their supervisors as he tried to get the project finished. “It was amazing the amount of buyoff that was required,” he said. “It was something, without all that time we wasted, that should have taken six weeks at most.”

为推动项目完成，Turkel 先与不同的经理谈，再与他们的上级谈，再与上级的上级谈。“所需的层层‘批准’之多让人惊讶，”他说。“如果没有那些被我们浪费掉的时间，这件事最多应该用六周就能搞定。”

Finally, one day, Turkel was running another interminable meeting when he looked out the window. The building was finished. The project was not.

终于，有一天，Turkel 又在主持一场没完没了的会议，他望向窗外——大楼已经完工，而项目却没有。

“I pointed to the building and said, ‘When we started this, that building didn’t exist,”’ Turkel told me. “It was unbelievable.”

Turkel 告诉我：“我指着那栋大楼说，‘我们开始这个项目时，这栋楼还不存在。’这真是难以置信。”

Sometimes, though, the problems from burcaucracy came down to a simple reality: The young hotshots from the 1980s, techies who had joined the company in their 20s and 30s, had become middle-aged managers in their 40s and 50s. And, some younger engineers said, a good number of the bosses just didn’t understand the burgeoning class of computer users who had been children— or hadn’t even been born—when Microsoft opened its doors. When younger employees tried to point out emerging trends among their friends, supervisors sometimes just waved them away.

不过，有时官僚主义带来的问题归根到底源于一个简单的现实：那些 1980 年代风头正劲的年轻才俊——在 20 多岁、30 多岁加入公司的技术人——已成了 40、50 多岁的中年管理者。而据一些更年轻的工程师说，相当一部分老板根本不了解那一大批迅速增长的电脑用户——在 Microsoft 开门营业时，他们还是孩童，甚至尚未出生。年轻员工试图指出身边朋友中的新兴趋势时，主管有时只是摆摆手让他们走开。

“Most senior people were out of touch with the ways the home users were starting to use computers, especially the younger generation,” one software developer said.

一位软件开发者说：“大多数资深人士不了解家庭用户开始使用电脑的方式，尤其是不理解年轻一代。”

An example—in 1997, AOL introduced its instant-messenger program, called AIM, a precursor to the texting functions on cell phones. Two years later, Microsoft followed with a similar program, called MSN Messenger.

举个例子——1997 年，AOL 推出了名为 AIM 的即时通讯程序，这是后来手机短信功能的前身。两年后，Microsoft 推出了类似的程序，称为 MSN Messenger。

In 2003, a young developer noticed that friends in college signed up for AIM exclusively and left it running most of the time. The reason? They wanted to use the program’s status message, which allowed them to type a short note telling their online buddies what they were doing, even when they weren’t at the computer. Messages like “gone shopping” and “studying for my exams” became commonplace.

2003 年，一位年轻开发者注意到，大学里的朋友只注册 AIM，并且大多数时候都让它保持在线。原因何在？他们想用该程序的状态消息功能，即使不在电脑旁，也可以打上一段简短文字，告诉在线好友自己在做什么。“gone shopping”“studying for my exams”之类的消息随处可见。

“That was the beginning of the trend toward Facebook, people having somewhere to put their thoughts, a continuous stream of consciousness,” said the developer, who worked in the MSN Messenger unit. “The main purpose of AIM wasn’t to chat, but to give you the chance to log in at any time and check out what your friends were doing.”

这位在 MSN Messenger 团队工作的开发者说：“那就是走向 Facebook 的趋势的起点——人们需要一个能放置自己想法的地方，一条连续不断的意识流。AIM 的主要目的不是聊天，而是让你随时登录，看看你的朋友在干什么。”

The developer concluded that no young person would switch from AIM to MSN Messenger, which did not have the shortmessage feature. He spoke about the problem to his boss, a middle-aged man. The supervisor dismissed the developer’s concerns as silly. Why would young people care about putting up a few words? Anyone who wanted to tell friends what they were doing could write it on their profile page, he said. Meaning users would have to open the profile pages, one friend at a time, and search for a status message, if it was there at all.

这位开发者得出结论：年轻人不会从 AIM 转到没有短消息功能的 MSN Messenger。他把这个问题向自己的老板——一位中年人——做了反映。主管把他的担忧斥为可笑：年轻人为什么会在乎写几句话？谁想告诉朋友自己在做什么，尽可以写在自己的个人资料页上。他的意思是，用户需要逐个打开朋友的个人资料页，去寻找是否有状态消息。

“He didn’t get it,” the developer said. “And because he didn’t know or didn’t believe how young people were using messenger programs, we didn’t do anything.”

“他不明白，”这位开发者说。“也正因为他不了解、也不相信年轻人是如何使用即时通讯程序的，我们什么也没做。”

“The Bell Curve”

“钟形曲线”

By 2002 the by-product of bureaucracybrutal corporate politics—had reared its head at Microsoft. And, current and former executives said, each year the intensity and destructiveness of the game playing grew worse as employees struggled to beat out their co-workers for promotions, bonuses, or just survival.

到 2002 年，由官僚主义滋生出的副产品——残酷的公司政治——在 Microsoft 抬头。现任与前任高管表示，随着员工为争取升迁、奖金，甚至仅仅保住饭碗而彼此较量，这种“权谋游戏”的激烈程度与破坏性每年都在加剧。

Microsoft’s managers, intentionally or not, pumped up the volume on the viciousness. What emerged—when combined with the bitterness about financial disparities among employees, the slow pace of development, and the power of the Windows and Office divisions to kill innovation—was a toxic stew of internal antagonism and warfare.

Microsoft 的管理层不管有意还是无意，都在放大这种恶性竞争。再叠加员工间财富差距引发的不满、研发推进缓慢，以及 Windows 与 Office 部门扼杀创新的权力，最终形成了一锅充满内耗与对立的“毒汤”。

“If you don’t play the politics, it’s management by character assassination,” said Turkel.

Turkel 说：“如果你不玩政治，管理就会变成靠人格暗杀来推进。”

At the center of the cultural problems was a management system called “stack ranking.” Every current and former Microsoft employee I interviewed every one—cited stack ranking as the most destructive process inside of Microsoft, something that drove out untold numbers of employees. The system—also referred to as “the performance model,” “the bell curve,” or just “the employee review”—has, with certain variations over the years, worked like this: every unit was forced to declare a certain percentage of employees as top performers, then good performers, then average, then below average, then poor.

这些文化问题的核心，是一种名为“stack ranking”的管理体系。我采访的每一位 Microsoft 现任或前任员工——无一例外——都将 stack ranking 视为公司内部最具破坏性的流程，导致无数员工被迫离开。该体系（也被称为 “the performance model”、“the bell curve”，或干脆 “the employee review”）多年来虽有变化，其基本运作方式却是：每个团队都被迫将一定比例的员工评为“顶尖”“良好”“一般”“低于平均”“差”等级。

“If you were on a team of 10 people, you walked in the first day knowing that, no matter how good everyone was, two people were going to get a great review, seven were going to get mediocre reviews, and one was going to get a terrible review,” said a former software developer. “It leads to employees focusing on competing with each other rather than competing with other companies.”

一位前软件开发者说：“如果你在一个 10 人团队里，你上班第一天就知道——不管大家表现多好——会有两个人拿到极好的评语，七个人拿到平庸的评语，还有一个人会拿到糟糕的评语。这会让员工把重心放在彼此内斗，而不是与其他公司竞争。”

Supposing Microsoft had managed to hire technology’s top players into a single unit before they made their names elsewhere—Steve Jobs of Apple, Mark Zuckerberg of Facebook, Larry Page of Google, Larry Ellison of Oracle, and Jeff Bezos of Amazon—regardless of performance, under one of the iterations of stack ranking, two of them would have to be rated as below average, with one deemed disastrous.

假设 Microsoft 曾在这些人成名之前，把科技界的顶尖人物都招到同一个团队里——Apple 的 Steve Jobs、Facebook 的 Mark Zuckerberg、Google 的 Larry Page、Oracle 的 Larry Ellison、以及 Amazon 的 Jeff Bezos——不论他们表现如何，在某个版本的 stack ranking 下，其中两人仍会被评为低于平均，还有一人会被判定为“灾难性”。

For that reason, executives said, a lot of Microsoft superstars did everything they could to avoid working alongside other top-notch developers, out of fear that they would be hurt in the rankings. And the reviews had real-world consequences: those at the top received bonuses and promotions; those at the bottom usually received no cash or were shown the door.

因此，多位高管指出，许多 Microsoft 的明星员工竭尽所能去避免与其他顶尖开发者并肩工作，唯恐自己的排名受损。而这些评审有切实后果：排名靠前者得到奖金与升迁；排名垫底者往往拿不到现金奖励，甚至被请出门去。

Outcomes from the process were never predictable. Employees in certain divisions were given what were known as M.B.O.’s—management business objectives—which were essentially the expectations for what they would accomplish in a particular year. But even achieving every M.B.O. was no guarantee of receiving a high ranking, since some other employee could exceed the assigned performance. As a result, Microsoft employees not only tried to do a good job but also worked hard to make sure their colleagues did not.

这一流程的结果从来不可预测。某些部门的员工会拿到所谓的 M.B.O.’s（management business objectives，管理业务目标），即对其当年应完成事项的预期。但即便完成了所有 M.B.O.，也未必意味着高评级，因为可能另有员工超额完成指标。于是，Microsoft 的员工不仅努力把自己的工作做好，还会努力确保同事“做不好”。

“The behavior this engenders, people do everything they can to stay out of the bottom bucket,” one Microsoft engineer said. “People responsible for features will openly sabotage other people’s efforts. One of the most valuable things I learned was to give the appearance of being courteous while withholding just enough information from colleagues to ensure they didn’t get ahead of me on the rankings.”

一位 Microsoft 工程师说：“这种制度滋生的行为，是人们竭尽所能避免落入末档。负责某些功能的人会公开破坏他人的工作成果。我学到的一条最‘有用’的经验，就是表面上彬彬有礼，同时有意克制信息分享的分寸，恰到好处地扣住一些关键点，确保同事在排名上别超过我。”

Worse, because the reviews came every six months, employees and their supervisors—who were also ranked—focused on their short-term performance, rather than on longer efforts to innovate.

更糟的是，由于评审每六个月进行一次，员工及其上级（他们也要被排名）都把注意力集中在短期表现，而不是更长周期的创新投入上。

“The six-month reviews forced a lot of bad decision-making,” one software designer said. “People planned their days and their years around the review, rather than around products. You really had to focus on the six-month performance, rather than on doing what was right for the company.”

“一位软件设计师说：‘六个月一次的评审迫使大家做出许多糟糕的决定。人们把一天、乃至一整年的安排都围绕评审，而不是围绕产品。你确实不得不把精力放在这六个月的表现上，而不是放在对公司真正有益的事情上。’”

There was some room for bending the numbers a bit. Each team would be within a larger Microsoft group. The supervisors of the teams could have slightly more of their employees in the higher ranks so long as the full group met the required percentages. So, every six months, all of the supervisors in a single group met for a few days of horse trading.

其中也有些“腾挪空间”。每个团队都隶属于 Microsoft 的更大业务组。只要整个业务组达到规定的比例，各团队主管就可以把自己手下略多一些的人放进高评级。于是，每隔六个月，同一业务组的所有主管都会开上几天“讨价还价”的会。

On the first day, the supervisors—as many as 30—gather in a single conference room. Blinds are drawn; doors are closed. A grid containing possible rankings is put up— sometimes on a whiteboard, sometimes on a poster board tacked to the wall—and everyone breaks out Post-it notes. Names of team members are scribbled on the notes, then each manager takes a turn placing the slips of paper into the grid boxes. Usually, though, the numbers don’t work on the first go-round. That’s when the haggling begins.

第一天，多达 30 位主管会聚在同一间会议室。拉上百叶窗，关上房门。墙上会挂出一个评级方格——有时在白板上，有时是一张钉在墙上的海报板——每个人都拿出便签纸，把团队成员的名字写在上面，然后轮流把便签贴到方格中。通常第一轮数字就不“对数”。这时，讨价还价便开始了。

“There are some pretty impassioned debates and the Post-it notes end up being shuffled around for days so that we can meet the bell curve,” said one Microsoft manager who has participated in a number of the sessions. “It doesn’t always work out well. I myself have had to give rankings to people that they didn’t deserve because of this forced curve.”

一位多次参加过此类会议的 Microsoft 经理说：“会上会有相当激烈的争辩，便签纸会被来回挪动好几天，只为把曲线凑成‘钟形’。结果并不总是令人满意。我本人也不得不按照这种强制曲线，给一些人打上并不配得上的评级。”

The best way to guarantee a higher ranking, executives said, is to keep in mind the realities of those behind-the-scenes debates—every employee has to impress not only his or her boss but bosses from other teams as well. And that means schmoozing and brown-nosing as many supervisors as possible.

多位高管表示，想拿到更高评级的最好办法，是记住这些幕后争执的“游戏规则”——每位员工不仅要讨好自己的直接上司，还要取悦其他团队的上司。这意味着要尽可能与更多主管“打点关系”“拍马逢迎”。

“I was told in almost every review that the political game was always important for my career development,” said Brian Cody, a former Microsoft engineer. “It was always much more on ‘Let’s work on the political game’ than on improving my actual performance.”

前 Microsoft 工程师 Brian Cody 说：“几乎每次评审我都被告知，玩好‘政治游戏’对我的职业发展至关重要。讨论的总是‘怎么搞政治’，而不是如何提升我的实际绩效。”

Like other employees I interviewed, Cody said that the reality of the corporate culture slowed everything down. “It got to the point where I was second-guessing everything I was doing,” he said. “Whenever I had a question for some other team, instead of going to the developer who had the answer, I would first touch base with that developer’s manager, so that he knew what I was working on. That was the only way to be visible to other managers, which you needed for the review.”

和我采访过的其他员工一样，Cody 说公司文化的现实让一切都慢了下来。“最后我几乎对自己做的每件事都要反复犹豫，”他说。“每当我需要向别的团队提问时，我不会直接找知道答案的开发者，而是先去打招呼那位开发者的经理，让他知道我在做什么。只有这样才能在其他经理面前‘露露脸’，而你在评审时需要这种‘能见度’。”

I asked Cody whether his review was ever based on the quality of his work. He paused for a very long time. “It was always much less about how I could become a better engineer and much more about my need to improve my visibility among other managers.”

我问 Cody，他的评审是否曾基于他工作质量本身。他沉默了很久。“评审的重点从来都不是我如何成为更好的工程师，而是我如何在其他经理当中提升自己的‘可见度’。”

In the end, the stack-ranking system crippled the ability to innovate at Microsoft, executives said. “I wanted to build a team of people who would work together and whose only focus would be on making great software,” said Bill Hill, the former manager. “But you can’t do that at Microsoft.”

多位高管表示，最终，stack-ranking 体系削弱了 Microsoft 的创新能力。前经理 Bill Hill 说：“我曾想打造一支同心协力、只专注于做好软件的团队。”“但在 Microsoft，你做不到。”

Why, Jim Allchin wanted to know, was Apple’s technology so much better than Microsoft’s?

Jim Allchin 想知道，为什么 Apple 的技术会比 Microsoft 好那么多？

“I would buy a Mac today if I was not working at Microsoft,” Allchin, a senior member of Microsoft’s leadership team, wrote in a January 7, 2004, e-mail to Gates and Ballmer. “Apple did not lose their way.”

Microsoft 领导团队的高级成员 Allchin 于 2004 年 1 月 7 日写给 Gates 和 Ballmer 的一封电子邮件中说：“如果我不在 Microsoft 工作，我今天就会买一台 Mac。Apple 并没有迷失方向。”

Truly, for senior management, the problems didn’t make sense. Microsoft had some of the smartest people in the technology business. It had billions of dollars at its disposal, and the ability to throw that money into any project the executives chose. How was Apple avoiding Microsoft’s pitfalls?

的确，对高层管理者而言，这些问题难以理解。Microsoft 拥有科技行业里最聪明的一群人，也掌控着数十亿美元资金，能够把钱投入任何他们选择的项目。Apple 又是如何避开 Microsoft 的这些陷阱的？

The answer wasn’t hard to find. Current and former executives said that, each year, they tried to explain to Microsoft’s top executives why the company was struggling in the quality of its innovation compared with Apple, Google, and other competitors.

答案并不难找。多位现任和前任高管表示，他们年复一年地尝试向 Microsoft 高层解释，为何公司在创新质量上落后于 Apple、Google 等竞争对手。

The information was conveyed through employee surveys conducted every six months. Time and again, the message from the responses was the same: groups at Microsoft that are supposed to be working together aren’t, a symptom of the stack-ranking program. And in response the company did … nothing in particular. “Microsoft keeps surveying the employees, hearing about the problem, trying to fix it the same way every time, and it never works,” said Turkel.

这些信息通过每六个月一次的员工调查传达出去。一次又一次，反馈传递的都是同一个讯息：那些理应协同工作的 Microsoft 团队并没有协同，而这正是 stack-ranking 计划的症状。作为回应，公司所做的……并无实质之举。Turkel 说：“Microsoft 一直在做员工调查、一直听到这些问题、也一直用同一套方式尝试修复，但从来没有奏效。”

混乱的企业文化并没有改变Windows和Office的经济特性和前景。

Ballmer and Microsoft

Ballmer 和 Microsoft

And so Microsoft kept getting slammed by the competition. Apple released the iPod music player in 2001; two years later, senior managers at Microsoft were still trying to figure out how to compete.

于是 Microsoft 不断被竞争对手重击。Apple 在 2001 年发布了 iPod 音乐播放器；两年之后，Microsoft 的高层仍在琢磨如何应对。

“Because we are going to be so late with a music service, we are going to be behind others almost forever it seems like,” Bill Gates wrote in a November 2, 2003, e-mail to a group of managers. “People won’t want to give up their hardware.”

“因为我们的音乐服务会来得太晚，看来我们几乎会永远落在别人后面，”Bill Gates 在 2003 年 11 月 2 日写给一组经理的邮件中说。“人们不会想放弃他们已经拥有的硬件。”

The result, Gates wrote, was that they wouldn’t be able to persuade customers to use a Microsoft system: “I don’t see enough that we are doing that will help us be viewed as a leader…. People I know (a rich group, I admit) are getting iPods with thousands of songs on them.” Herb Allen Jr., the billionaire investment banker with Allen & Company, had purchased dozens of iPods for his friends, Gates said. “Warren Buffett just loves the thing,” he wrote.

Gates 写道，其结果就是他们无法说服客户使用 Microsoft 的系统：“我没有看到我们做了足够多的事情能让我们被视为领导者……我认识的人（我承认，是一群有钱人）都在买 iPod，上面有成千上万首歌。”据 Gates 所说，Allen & Company 的亿万富翁投行家 Herb Allen Jr. 给朋友买了几十台 iPod。“Warren Buffett 就特别喜欢这个东西，”他写道。

Less than two weeks later, Allchin tried out a music device being developed for Microsoft by an independent hardware vendor. He reviewed the experience in a November 13 e-mail to a group of executives. “I have to tell you, my experience with our software and this device is really terrible,” he wrote. “Apple is just so far ahead.”

不到两周之后，Allchin 试用了由一家独立硬件供应商为 Microsoft 开发的音乐设备。他在 11 月 13 日发给一组高管的邮件中评价了这次体验。“我得告诉你们，我使用我们软件和这台设备的体验真的很糟糕，”他写道。“Apple 的领先实在太远了。”

Years passed. Finally, on November 14, 2006, Microsoft introduced its own music player, called Zune. Fifty-four days later, Steve Jobs unveiled the iPhone, which combined a mobile phone, a music player, Internet capability, a camera, and other features not available on Zune. But the iPod was still around for customers who didn’t want a phone. In fact, Apple had already introduced its fifth-generation iPod, its less expensive iPod Mini, and was about a year away from marketing the least costly of its music players, the iPod Nano.

几年过去。终于在 2006 年 11 月 14 日，Microsoft 推出了自家的音乐播放器 Zune。54 天后，Steve Jobs 发布了 iPhone，它把手机、音乐播放器、上网功能、相机以及 Zune 所不具备的其他功能集于一身。不过，对不想要手机的用户来说，iPod 仍在。事实上，Apple 已经推出了第五代 iPod 和更便宜的 iPod Mini，并且距离将其最便宜的音乐播放器 iPod Nano 推向市场还有大约一年。

Zune was blown away. By 2009, iPod maintained an astonishing 71 percent of the market, the kind of numbers rarely seen anywhere outside of a North Korean election. Meanwhile, Zune limped along with less than 4 percent. Last October, Microsoft discontinued it, in hopes that customers would instead purchase a Windows Phone that, like the iPhone, has a music player.

Zune 被彻底击败。到 2009 年，iPod 仍保持着惊人的 71% 市场份额——这种数字在 North Korean 的选举之外几乎难见。与此同时，Zune 蹒跚维持着不到 4% 的份额。去年 10 月，Microsoft 将其停产，希望客户改而购买像 iPhone 一样带有音乐播放器的 Windows Phone。

Jobs Creation

Jobs 的创造

Apple blasted ahead even on operating systems—Microsoft’s bread and butter—during the lost decade. In May 2001, Microsoft undertook a project code-named Longhorn, which was expected to ship in late 2003 under the name Windows Vista. Executives had a number of objectives for Longhorn, including competing with the free operating system called Linux by supporting a programming language named C#, which allowed for easier development of other software; creating a Windows File System, or WinFS, which could save different types of hies into a single database; and creating a display system, code-named Avalon, that would give software the same appearance as a Web site.

在“失落的十年”里，Apple 甚至在操作系统这一 Microsoft 的“看家本领”上也疾速领跑。2001 年 5 月，Microsoft 启动了一项代号为Longhorn 的项目，原定于 2003 年底以 Windows Vista 之名发布。高管们为 Longhorn 设定了多项目标，包括：通过支持名为 C# 的编程语言来对抗免费操作系统 Linux（这有助于更容易开发其他软件）；创建 Windows File System（WinFS），可以把不同类型的文件保存到同一个数据库中；以及打造代号为 Avalon 的显示系统，使软件看起来像一个 Web site。

As development took off, Microsoft engineers dumped a grab bag of functions into Longhorn. Huge teams were assigned to the effort, but despite all the work, the launch was postponed again and again. The program took as long as 10 minutes to boot up. It was unstable and frequently crashed.

随着开发推进，Microsoft 工程师把一大堆功能往 Longhorn 里塞。尽管投入了庞大的团队与精力，发布仍一拖再拖。该程序启动甚至要花上 10 分钟。它并不稳定，还频繁崩溃。

Then, in June 2004, Steve Jobs announced that Apple was releasing its new operating system, called “Tiger.” And inside Microsoft, jaws dropped. Tiger did much of what was planned for Longhorn—except that it worked.

随后在 2004 年 6 月，Steve Jobs 宣布 Apple 即将发布名为 “Tiger” 的新操作系统。Microsoft 内部目瞪口呆。Tiger 完成了许多 Longhorn 规划中的事情——而且它能正常工作。

E-mails hew around Microsoft, expressing dismay about the quality of Tiger. To executives’ disbelief, it contained functional equivalents of Avalon and WinFS.

电子邮件在 Microsoft 内部飞来飞去，表达对 Tiger 品质的震惊。令高管难以置信的是，其中包含与 Avalon 和 WinFS 功能等效的组件。

“It was fucking amazing,” wrote Lenn Pryor, part of the Longhorn team. “It is like I just got a free pass to Longhorn land today.”

Longhorn 团队成员 Lenn Pryor 写道：“这他妈太震撼了。就像我今天拿到了一张通往 Longhorn 国度的免费通行证。”

Vic Gundotra, another member of the group, tried out Tiger. “Their Avalon competitor (core video, core image) was hot,” he wrote. “I have the cool widgets (dashboard) running on my MAC right now with all the effects [Jobs] showed on stage. I’ve had no crashes in 5 hours.”

该团队的另一位成员 Vic Gundotra 试用了 Tiger。他写道：“他们对标 Avalon 的东西（core video、core image）太强了。我现在在我的 MAC 上跑这些酷炫的 widgets（dashboard），舞台上 [Jobs] 展示的所有效果我这儿都有。5 个小时里一次崩溃都没有。”

The videoconferencing function? “Amazing,” Gundotra wrote. Scripting software? “Very cool.”

视频会议功能？“Amazing，”Gundotra 写道。脚本软件？“Very cool。”

The Gundotra e-mail was sent to executives throughout Microsoft headquarters, including Allchin. He forwarded it to Gates and Ballmer, adding his name and one word: “Sigh…”

Gundotra 的这封邮件被发给了 Microsoft 总部的高管们，包括 Allchin。他把邮件转发给 Gates 和 Ballmer，并署上自己的名字与一个词：“Sigh…”

Longhorn was doomed. A few months later, Allchin brought together the Longhorn team and made the announcement: Microsoft couldn’t complete Windows Vista in time to hit the latest planned release date. In fact, the company couldn’t foresee any launch date. So a decision had been made at the most senior reaches of Microsoft: after three years of work, throw everything out and start over. It was decided, at least for now, to drop or modify many of the original objectives; no more using C#, abandon WinFS, and revise Avalon.

Longhorn 注定无果。几个月后，Allchin 召集 Longhorn 团队宣布：Microsoft 无法按最新计划节点完成 Windows Vista。事实上，公司无法预见任何发布日期。因此，Microsoft 最高层做出了决定：三年努力付诸东流，一切推倒重来。至少就当时而言，许多原始目标被删除或修改；不再使用 C#，放弃 WinFS，并重做 Avalon。

Apple was already in the market with those features; Microsoft was basically giving up in its effort to figure out how to make them work. More than two years passed before Vista was available in stores, and the public response was scathing. PC World, the industry magazine, declared it the biggest tech disappointment of 2007. Apple had won hands down on Microsoft’s playing held for operating systems.

Apple 已经把这些功能推向市场；Microsoft 基本上放弃了继续探索如何让它们可行。又过了两年多，Vista 才上架开售，而公众反响尖刻。行业杂志 PC World 宣布它是 2007 年最大的科技失望。Apple 在 Microsoft 的操作系统赛场上轻松获胜。

Then came Bing. Cue the evil laughter and organ music.

接着就是 Bing。请配上阴险的笑声和管风琴伴奏。

By the fall of 2004, Microsoft faced a huge challenge from Google, because the smaller enterprise was snagging so many talented young software designers. Google was emerging as the new “It” company, with lots of cachet. The search-engine titan had gone public in August and, just like the Microsoft of old, was minting millionaires from stock options dished out to employees. And, it seemed, day after day, a few more Microsoft executives announced their plans to jump ship to the upstart competitor.

到 2004 年秋天，Microsoft 面临来自 Google 的巨大挑战，因为这家规模更小的公司正网罗大量优秀的年轻软件设计师。Google 正崛起为新的 “It” company，风头无两。这家搜索引擎巨头在 8 月完成上市，而且就像早年的 Microsoft 一样，靠向员工发放股票期权大批制造百万富翁。并且似乎是一天接一天，又有几位 Microsoft 高管宣布要跳槽到这家后来者竞争对手。

One topflight engineer, Mark Lucovsky, met with Ballmer on November 11, 2004, as a courtesy to let him know that he had accepted an offer from Google, which at the time was led by Eric Schmidt. And, according to a sworn statement submitted by Lucovsky in an unrelated lawsuit, Ballmer exploded.

一位顶尖工程师 Mark Lucovsky 于 2004 年 11 月 11 日与 Ballmer 会面，出于礼貌告知他自己已接受来自 Google 的聘用（当时由 Eric Schmidt 领导）。根据 Lucovsky 在一桩无关诉讼中提交的宣誓陈述，Ballmer 当场爆发。

He threw a chair against the wall. “Fucking Eric Schmidt is a fucking pussy!” Ballmer yelled, according to the court document. “I’m going to fucking bury that guy! I have done it before and I will do it again. I’m going to fucking kill Google.”

他把一把椅子朝墙上砸去。根据法庭文件记载，Ballmer 大喊：“他妈的 Eric Schmidt 是个他妈的懦夫！我要他妈的把那家伙埋了！我以前这么干过，我还会再来一次。我要他妈的干掉 Google。”

T nternet search emerged as Microsoft’s newX est top priority. At that point, the company already had a mediocre search engine, called MSN Search, but it didn’t hold a candle to Google. So, Microsoft developed Windows Live Search, which also proved inferior. Following more revisions, with a few features discontinued, Microsoft announced its new platform, called Live Search. Finally, in May 2009, Ballmer unveiled Bing. But by then the unit working on online search had become encrusted with Microsoft bureaucracy and the usual destructiveness that came along with it.

Internet 搜索成为 Microsoft 的 newX est 头等优先事项。那时，公司已有一个平庸的搜索引擎，叫 MSN Search，但根本比不上 Google。于是，Microsoft 开发了 Windows Live Search，结果也证明不如人意。经过更多修订，并砍掉一些功能后，Microsoft 宣布了名为 Live Search 的新平台。最终在 2009 年 5 月，Ballmer 发布了 Bing。但到那时，从事在线搜索的业务单元已被 Microsoft 的官僚体制以及随之而来的种种破坏性所裹挟。

“It was a bloated mishmash of folks,” said Johann Garcia, a former Microsoft product manager who worked on the Bing project. “They had two or three times the number of people they needed. There were just so many layers of people.”

曾参与 Bing 项目的前 Microsoft 产品经理 Johann Garcia 说：“那是一锅臃肿而混乱的人事拼盘。他们的人手是所需的两到三倍。层级实在太多了。”

Working in the online division evolved into a miserable experience, members of that unit said. Most of the homegrown innovations were shoved aside. Instead, managers spent their days studying Google and telling the employees working on Bing to match whatever that competitor brought out.

该部门成员称，在在线业务部门工作成了一种糟糕透顶的体验。多数自研创新被搁置一旁。相反，管理者整日研究 Google，并要求 Bing 团队去“对标”对方推出的任何东西。

“There was this never-ending demand to keep up with Google, and after a while we saw no more innovation for Bing,” Garcia said. “Google was so far ahead and we had so much infighting. A lot of people became so unhappy and just lost all momentum.”

Garcia 说：“有个没完没了的要求——一定要跟上 Google。过了一阵子，我们就看不到 Bing 的创新了。Google 领先太多，而我们内部内耗严重。许多人非常不开心，整个人完全失去动力。”

To date, Bing has lost about $6 billion for Microsoft; add in the earlier search products and the amount of money poured into the effort rises to almost $10 billion. Microsoft did have some success making deals for Bing, in particular with Yahoo. In 2009 the two reached an agreement—controversial among investors—under which the Bing search engine would power the Yahoo Web site and the two would share revenues.

到目前为止，Bing 已经让 Microsoft 蒸发了约 60 亿美元；把更早的搜索产品算进去，这项投入的总额接近 100 亿美元。Microsoft 在为 Bing 谈判合作上确实取得过一些成功，尤其是与 Yahoo。2009 年双方达成协议——在投资者中颇具争议——由 Bing 搜索引擎为 Yahoo 网站提供支持，双方共享收入。

In the years since, Microsoft has boasted that Bing’s share of the search marketplace has grown significantly. All of Microsoft’s search sites accounted for 15.3 percent of the domestic market in March, according to ComScore Inc., up from 11.7 percent in March 2010. Dig a little deeper, though, and the numbers aren’t quite as impressive. During that same time, Google’s share of the market went up. Most of the increase in business for Bing came from users switching from Yahoo.

此后多年，Microsoft 一直宣称 Bing 的搜索市场份额显著提升。根据 ComScore Inc. 的数据，3 月份 Microsoft 所有搜索网站合计占据美国本土市场的 15.3%，高于 2010 年 3 月的 11.7%。但深入一点看，这些数字并不那么亮眼。同一时期，Google 的市场份额也在上升。Bing 业务的大部分增长，实际上来自用户从 Yahoo 转移而来。

Bing’s improved performance was coming at the expense of Yahoo, its erstwhile partner. Microsoft was eating its own.

Bing 的改善是以曾经的合作伙伴 Yahoo 为代价的。Microsoft 正在“吃自己的盟友”。

When Apple introduced the iPhone, Steve Ballmer laughed. “No chance that the iPhone is going to get any significant market share,” he said in 2007, adding that same year, “iPod is a hot brand—not Apple.”

当 Apple 推出 iPhone 时，Steve Ballmer 笑了。他在 2007 年说：“iPhone 不可能获得任何显著的市场份额。”同年他还补充说：“iPod 是个火热的品牌——不是 Apple。”

He pooh-poohed the iPad when it came out, in 2010, and it has been busting down the barn doors ever since, selling more than 55 million units. As for Google, Ballmer’s predictions were equally off base—according to court records, in 2005 he proclaimed, “Google’s not a real company. It’s a house of cards.”

他在 2010 年 iPad 问世时嗤之以鼻，而自那以后它势如破竹，销量已超过 5,500 万台。至于 Google，Ballmer 的预言同样离谱——根据法庭记录，他在 2005 年宣称：“Google 不是一家真正的公司。它是一座纸牌屋。”

Plenty of people can make predictions that prove boneheaded. But Ballmer’s bad calls have been particularly damaging for him inside Microsoft. Until his dying days, Steve Jobs could not only predict the direction the marketplace would be heading, but help drive it there. Google continues to pop out feature after feature and is now shooting directly at Microsoft’s main business lines: Google Docs is a free Web program competing with Microsoft Office. Google Chrome OS is a free operating system targeted at Windows.

很多人的预言事后被证明愚不可及。但 Ballmer 的误判在 Microsoft 内部对他伤害尤甚。直到生命最后时刻，Steve Jobs 不仅能预判市场将走向何方，还能推动市场朝那个方向前进。Google 继续不断推出新功能，如今已直接瞄准 Microsoft 的主营业务：Google Docs 是与 Microsoft Office 竞争的免费 Web 程序；Google Chrome OS 是对标 Windows 的免费操作系统。

With the competitors showing that kind of success—and winning so many accolades— Ballmer’s confidently proclaimed errors have been hugely embarrassing for Microsoft’s technical specialists, fueling muttered complaints that their C.E.O., a man with little technological background, was undermining them within the techie community.

在竞争对手连连告捷、广受赞誉的映衬下，Ballmer 先前自信满满的误判令 Microsoft 的技术专家倍感尴尬，也助长了私下的不满——他们的 C.E.O. 技术背景薄弱，在技术圈里拉低了他们的“面子”。

“Steve has a knack for putting his foot in his mouth and being made to look incredibly foolish, and that just always grated on people at Microsoft,” said a former program manager who left the company last year to work at Google. “When he makes these predictions that are so horribly wrong, and you know it at the time, it is hard to forgive that, because it means he is hopelessly out of touch with reality or not listening to the tech staff around him.”

“一位去年离职去 Google 工作的前项目经理说：‘Steve 总有把话说砸、让自己显得极其可笑的本事，而这一直让 Microsoft 的人很反感。’‘当他做出那些离谱到不行的预测，而且你当时就知道不对时，这很难原谅——因为那意味着他已与现实严重脱节，或者根本没在听身边技术人员的意见。’”

Ballmer’s key business philosophy for Microsoft was so antiquated as to be irrelevant. The Microsoft C.E.O. used to proclaim that it would not be first to be cool, but would be first to profit—in other words, it would be the first to make money by selling its own version of new technologies. But that depended on one fact: Microsoft could buy its way into the lead, because it always had so much more cash on hand than any of its competitors.

Ballmer 为 Microsoft 奉行的核心商业哲学老旧到几乎失去意义。这位 C.E.O. 曾经宣称，公司不会第一个去“酷”，而是第一个去赚钱——换言之，要率先通过销售自家版本的新技术来变现。但这建立在一个事实之上：Microsoft 可以靠砸钱买到领先地位，因为它的账上总比任何对手都更有现金。

No more. The advantage that Ballmer relied on for so long is now nonexistent. Google has almost the same amount of cash on its books as Microsoft—$50 billion to Microsoft’s $58 billion. Apple, on the other hand, started the year with about $100 billion. Using superior financial muscle to take over a market won’t work for Microsoft or Ballmer anymore.

如今不再如此。Ballmer 长期倚重的优势已经不复存在。Google 账面现金几乎与 Microsoft 持平——500 亿美元对 580 亿美元。另一方面，Apple 在年初的账上约有 1,000 亿美元。依靠更强财力去拿下市场，这条路对 Microsoft 或 Ballmer 已行不通。

But, strangely, Ballmer may be invaluable for the company’s future. Because the time may be coming when the sprawling Microsoft empire will have to be busted up, like any other company that has spread itself too thin into too many product lines. And a deal-maker like Ballmer is just the type to lead that kind of massive corporate reorganization.

但奇怪的是，Ballmer 可能对公司未来反而至关重要。因为也许很快就会到来这样一个时点：庞杂的 Microsoft 帝国将不得不被拆分，就像任何一家产品线铺得过散的公司最终要做的那样。而像 Ballmer 这种擅长撮合交易的人，正适合主导那样的大规模公司重组。

Ballmer has said he plans to stay in the saddle until 2018, but whether he and the rest of Microsoft’s management want it or not, change will almost certainly come as Wall Street tires of the company’s unfulfilled promises. Already there are rumblings that the time for him to go could be in the offing.

Ballmer 曾表示他计划一直掌舵至 2018 年，但无论他本人及 Microsoft 管理层其余成员是否愿意，随着华尔街对公司一再跳票的承诺感到厌倦，变革几乎一定会到来。已经有风声称，他离开的时刻可能不远了。

In Walter Isaacson’s authorized biography Steve Jobs, Jobs acknowledged Ballmer’s role in Microsoft’s problems: “The company starts valuing the great salesmen, because they’re the ones who can move the needle on revenues, not the product engineers and designers. So the salespeople end up running the company…. [Then] the product guys don’t matter so much, and a lot of them just turn off. It happened at Apple when [John] Sculley came in, which was my fault, and it happened when Ballmer took over at Microsoft. Apple was lucky and it rebounded, but I don’t think anything will change at Microsoft as long as Ballmer is running it.”

在 Walter Isaacson 授权传记《Steve Jobs》中，Jobs 指出 Ballmer 在 Microsoft 问题中的角色：“公司开始重视优秀的销售，因为他们才能真正拉动收入指标，而不是产品工程师和设计师。于是销售最终掌控了公司……[接着] 产品人不再那么重要，很多人索性心灰意冷。这在 Apple 发生过（当 [John] Sculley 接手时，那是我的错），在 Ballmer 接管 Microsoft 时也发生过。Apple 运气好，后来复苏了，但我不认为只要 Ballmer 还在掌权，Microsoft 会有什么改变。”

Most interesting, however, is that Jobs put the ultimate blame on Bill Gates: “They were never as ambitious product-wise as they should have been. Bill likes to portray himself as a man of the product, but he’s really not. He’s a businessperson. Winning business was more important than making great products. Microsoft never had the humanities and liberal arts in its DNA.”

不过更有意思的是，Jobs 最终把责任归咎于 Bill Gates：“他们在产品上从未有过应有的雄心。Bill 喜欢把自己描绘成一个产品人，但他其实不是。他是个商人。赢得生意比打造伟大产品更重要。Microsoft 的基因里从未有‘人文与艺术（liberal arts）’。”

非常准确的判断。

2012-08 Kurt Eichenwald.Microsoft's lost decade

2012-08 Kurt Eichenwald.Microsoft's lost decade

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