Apple's former CEO Tim Cook revealed in a new interview today that he passed on to John Ternus the same advice Steve Jobs gave him when he first transitioned into the CEO role.

Apple's co-founder Steve Jobs is famously known to have given Tim Cook some simple yet important advice when he passed on the top job at Apple in August 2011.

"Never ask what I would do, just do the right thing"

This seemingly left an impact on Cook, who used his strengths in operations to grow Apple into one of the biggest companies in the world and expand Apple's services division, rather than chasing the next big visionary product launch or get deeply involved in product development.

Of course, under Cook the company did release major product categories such as the Apple Watch, AirPods and Vision, but Cook was less hands-on with product development compared to his predecessor.

15 years later, in a new interview with The Independent, Cook said:

“I’ve told John the same thing. And the advice I’ve given him is, make it your own job. Put your time in the things that you can add the most value to around the company. And that means don’t mimic me. Just like I didn’t mimic Steve. We all have different strengths.

Ternus has already seemingly taken this advice onboard, by keeping Cook on as Executive Chairman managing worldwide policy so that he himself can focus on the products Apple releases.

Tim Cook also spoke about the reasoning behind stepping down as CEO just days before the company announced the iPhone Duo, an all-new iPhone form factor.

He explained that product launches help boost Apple's momentum and that he "wanted John to have some wind at his back", and said that the current "product cycle feels unbelievably great." In usual Tim Cook fashion, he didn't get into the details of the hardware itself, again another contrast to his successor John Ternus.

This interview was taken whilst Tim Cook was in London, to meet with The King to launch a new King's Trust initiative for young people.

He also spoke about the newly opened Apple Music Hall, calling it "uniquely Apple". The Hall was inaugurated by Sir Elton John last week on the 28th of September.

You can read the full interview between The Independent and Tim Cook here.

Thumbnail image includes image of John Ternus by Tessa Bury.