New Apple CEO John Ternus on the advice that got him past impostor syndrome in 2001
John Ternus officially stepped into his new role as the CEO of Apple , succeeding Tim Cook after a 15-year tenure. In a recent interview with Fortune, Ternus recalled a pivotal lesson he learned 25 years ago when he first joined Apple’s executive team, the one that helped him overcome self-doubt and impostor syndrome, and ultimately guided his rise to the top of the $4.6 trillion tech giant. Ternus joined Apple in 2001 at just 26 years old, working on product design during a period of rapid technological innovation. Speaking to University of Pennsylvania’s engineering graduates in 2024, Ternus explained the approach that helped him to move ahead and push against self-doubt. He joined the company in 2001 as a 26-year-old engineer, in what was only his second job out of college, arriving just as the pace of technological change was accelerating rapidly. Ternus’s rise at Apple began on the product design team in 2001, shortly after a brief stint at Virtual Research Systems following his graduation from the University of Pennsylvania. By 2013, Ternus had become vice president of hardware engineering, overseeing both the iPad and Mac lines, and later contributed to the development of the iPhone Pro lineup and AirPods. Across his 25 years at the company, Ternus has played a central role in developing every generation of iPad and the original AirPods, while also overseeing hardware development across the iPhone, Mac, and Apple Watch lines. At 51, Ternus has had a hand in shaping products used by hundreds of millions of people worldwide, from the iPhones in their pockets to the AirPods in their ears.
This balance of confidence and humility, he said, gave him the courage to contribute while remaining open to learning. He admitted feeling intimidated by the caliber of people around him, questioning whether he belonged. The mindset that carried him forward was simple yet profound: “Always assume you’re as smart as anyone else in the room, but never assume that you know as much as they do. He has described the experience as both intimidating and exhilarating, and admitted he initially wondered whether he’d be able to keep up with the people around him. His early work included helping build the Cinema Display, a large plastic desktop monitor, before he moved into a managerial role within a few years and eventually led hardware engineering for the G5-era iMacs. Roughly two decades after joining the company, he moved into Apple’s executive ranks as senior vice president, reporting directly to Cook. In his final memo as CEO, Tim Cook expressed full confidence in his successor: “I take enormous comfort in handing the helm to someone as brilliant and wonderful and capable as John. Few people understand what it takes to build products that change the world the way John does. Having lived through Apple’s share of both hits and misses over the past quarter-century, he has pointed to that constant cycle of learning as something that shaped how he approaches problems — and as a habit he believes is worth carrying into any career, long after school ends. Get the latest technology news and updates. Download the TOI App.