Making Ballmer angry

Have you ever wondered what makes Microsoft's CEO Steve Ballmer angry? I found out on Tuesday when I had another opportunity to interview Ballmer again (we met twice when I was at InfoWorld in San Francisco).

Today I got a copy of the speech he made to the Committee for Economic Development of Australia on Tuesday shortly after our interview. At one point he states,

"Now I get asked sometimes – are you a mature company?  I hate that question.  There’s no worse question in the world because it sort of implies that there’s nothing left to do.  No innovation that’s necessary."

Ah, now that would explain why my line of questioning about Microsoft's maturity and declining revenue growth (on a percentage basis) elicited such a combative response. The story (sub req.) made page 1 of the Fin today and I wore out my fingers transcribing the interview that ran in features on p 60 (but doesn't seem to be online, grr).

Comments

[Gavin]

The big man seems to be confusing maturity of business with the abilty to come up with new ideas.