Philip Schiller has always wielded a lot of power at Apple, but his responsibilities have increased significantly since Steve Jobs left the company. Now, one new profile of him in Bloomberg Businessweek suggests this could be trouble for Apple.
Schiller, Apple's senior VP of worldwide marketing, is a member of Apple's elite board of executives and was one of Jobs' most trusted confidants. For that reason, BusinessWeek reports that no other executive (with the exception of Tim Cook) is "under more pressure to fill the void" left by Jobs.
Indeed, as BusinessWeek points out, Schiller has since taken over Apple's global advertising budget of nearly $1 billion annually and is expected to become a more public face for the company in the near future. While that may be good news for Schiller, some employees who have worked with him in the past think it could be bad news for Apple.
Here's the key paragraph from Businessweek's profile:
Schiller shares many of Jobs’s passions and impulses. The big question is how well he can channel them into new ideas and products. Four former Apple managers say many consider him overly controlling and worry that he lacks the bold creative instincts needed to maintain Apple’s edge. Particularly in his expanded marketing role, some fear he will be a more conventional leader, prone to hyping products in ways that tarnish Apple’s hard-won brand loyalty.
