Pixar's Early Days - A Never-Before-Seen Interview With Steve Jobs, 1996
Key ideas
Jobs explains how Pixar left work-for-hire to own what it makes, and how it keeps scarce talent without contracts by making management serve them.
From a machine transcript of the audio. Quotes link to the moment they are said.
- 1
Leave work where you're paid once
Jobs says commercials were a good stepping stone for Pixar but a poor business, because it shared none of the upside when a client sold more and margins kept falling as competitors arrived. He says Pixar reluctantly quit commercials that year, since 25 great people could not be spared for work-for-hire when it had projects where it owned a share.
- 2
With rare talent, the hierarchy inverts
Jobs argues that people who are rare and in demand can leave at any time, so the CEO effectively works for them and management's job is to support those doing the work. He describes that work as creating the environment, removing obstacles, forming the right teams and holding quality high. His example is growing from about 175 to about 300 people in a year while trying not to lower the bar, with a dedicated recruiting group behind it.
- 3
Retain with stock, not contracts
Jobs says Hollywood retains people with contracts and Silicon Valley with stock options, and that Pixar examined both economically and for the culture each produces before choosing stock. He argues a contract lets you stop paying attention to someone until shortly before it expires, while stock forces constant concern with making the company a place no one wants to leave. He adds that anyone who does not want to be at Pixar should probably leave anyway.
- 4
Partner to learn what you can't buy
Jobs says Disney concluded decades ago that animation is too costly to overproduce, so a film has to be edited before it is made, and it developed techniques for doing that. He calls access to that experience the education Pixar could not have bought at any price, and says it has now absorbed and in places improved on it.
- 5
Technology ages, stories can renew
Jobs contrasts technology products, which he says are lucky to last a year or two, with Disney's Snow White, which still reached his son and other children about 60 years on. He thinks people will watch Toy Story in 60 years because of its story, not its graphics. He credits John Lasseter with teaching him that technology cannot fix a bad story.
In Steve’s words
“It's all work for hire. You don't share in any of the upside of what you create. You just get paid for the work once.”
Steve Jobs·Pixar's Early Days - A Never-Before-Seen Interview With Steve Jobs, 1996·Watch at 6:07(opens the original in a new tab)“If you don't treat them right, they can go get another job in 10 minutes. So this strange thing happens, which is that the hierarchy of power inverts. And the CEO is actually at the bottom.”
Steve Jobs·Pixar's Early Days - A Never-Before-Seen Interview With Steve Jobs, 1996·Watch at 9:40(opens the original in a new tab)“Every single day, we worry about how can we make Pixar a better company so that nobody will ever want to leave.”
Steve Jobs·Pixar's Early Days - A Never-Before-Seen Interview With Steve Jobs, 1996·Watch at 15:31(opens the original in a new tab)About this entry
- Published
- Nov 18, 2025
- Channel
- Steve Jobs Archive
- Type
- Video
- Length
- 22:37
- Language
- English
- Added
- Nov 2, 2026
- Source last checked
- Nov 2, 2026
What’s available here
Original source
Linked. Opens on YouTube.
Player on this page
Available. YouTube’s own player, loaded only when you press play.
Full text or transcript
Not reviewed. No license to show a text version here.
Our summary
Draft. Written by us with AI from a machine transcript of the video’s audio (Whisper) and checked against it. Machine transcripts can mishear; each quote links to the moment so you can hear it. Not yet rights-reviewed.
Ask questions with AI
Not reviewed. Off until there is licensed text to work from.