Ideas matter. Very few modern leaders have given them — or the creative process that conceives them — the kind of respect that Steve Jobs did.

In a spectacularly touching tribute in the Wall Street Journal, Sir Jony Ive puts it memorably: “As thoughts grew into ideas, however tentative, however fragile, he recognized that this was hallowed ground. He had such a deep understanding and reverence for the creative process. He understood creating should be afforded rare respect—not only when the ideas were good or the circumstances convenient.”

In the same piece, Sir Ive mentions the special vantage point from which he drew his observations: “We worked together for nearly 15 years. We had lunch together most days and spent our afternoons in the sanctuary of the design studio. Those were some of the happiest, most creative and joyful times of my life.”

One might wonder what some of those lunchtime conversations involved. Thankfully, Sir Ive tells us elsewhere (at Apple’s “Celebration of Steve” on October 19, 2011). “Steve used to say to me — and he used to say this a lot — ‘Hey Jony, here’s a dopey idea.’ And sometimes they were. Really dopey. Sometimes they were truly dreadful. But sometimes they took the air from the room, and they left us both completely silent. Bold, crazy, magnificent ideas. Or quiet, simple ones, which in their subtlety and detail, were utterly profound. And just as Steve loved ideas and loved making stuff, he treated the process of creativity with a rare and a wonderful reverence. You see, I think that he, better than anyone, understood that while ideas ultimately can be so powerful, they begin as fragile, barely formed thoughts: so easily missed, so easily compromised, so easily just squished.”

When you think of Steve Jobs, do you think of “truly dreadful” ideas? Of course not! You think of life-changing products and category-defining innovations. But how did he get there? He afforded the creative process “a rare and wonderful reverence,” manifested in his willingness to share “really dopey” and “truly dreadful” ideas with one of the greatest designers in the world. Not rarely. Not occasionally. “He used to say this a lot.”

He knew what few do: if you want to get to genius, you’ve got to embrace goofy.

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