4 Key Steps to Design a Strategic Life Apple Style

You probably have at least one Apple product in your home. Or if you don’t have one, you know someone who does. Apple has become shorthand for ubiquitous, sustainable success and instant recognizability.

Apple has a small stable of products that they do exceptionally well. They are focused and strategic in their product development and marketing. And their big not-so-secret weapon? They invent something and then keep refining it. 

• This approach to innovation and incremental change is something you can easily adapt to your own life. Here’s how.

Keep it Simple

Steve Jobs made a strategic decision to keep Apple’s focus tight. He simplified their product lines down to four computers.

You can easily simplify your life right now by eliminating the elements that waste your time and resources. Start by cutting down or cutting out TV and video games, which are both low-return uses of your time.

Then think of how you can downsize your resources from switching to a smaller car, a smaller house, de-cluttering, to not buying more stuff you don’t need. Free up time by shopping in bulk and batch cooking.

Learn to Iterate

Any psychologist will tell you that small, incremental lifestyle changes are much more successful than the big sort that tries to change everything at once. Think of how successful most New Year’s resolutions are.

Make a commitment to a significant life change, like early retirement or budgeting for more vacations. You can make a series of small changes, like switching from an-on-the-way-to-work coffee to having one at home. Then add in complementary changes, like cutting down on takeout, downgrading your subscriptions and buying a smaller car. Small iterations compound over time and can make a massive impact on your life.

Be curious

One of Apple’s big successes is its research and development capacity. They are committed to not missing an opportunity to learn and grow and improve over time.

Stay ahead of the pack by being curious, by always being open to learning and change, looking for new opportunities, tweaking your goals, and always staying committed to improvement.

Being Okay with Imperfection.

One of Apple’s mottos is ‘just ship’ meaning that they don’t wait to get a product absolutely perfect before they launch it into the world.

Being okay with imperfection doesn’t mean you just leave it there and turn out low-quality work. It means you keep hustling. You give it your best shot, get it out, and then make improvements. You keep moving, keep thinking, keep improving.