Microsoft "discovered" Larson-Green after a few Softies attended a talk she gave comparing Microsoft compilers to Borland compilers and asked her to run a Visual C++ focus group for the company. In 1993, she ended up landing a job on the Visual C++ team, where focused on the integrated development environment. She moved to the Internet Explorer team (where she worked on the user experience for IE 3.0 and 4.0) and then, in 1997, to the Office team to work on FrontPage, where she got her first group program manager job. She also did a stint on the SharePoint Team Services team, back when SharePoint was known as "Office.Net."

Apple gives in to employee perks [THE WALL STREET JOURNAL]

Mr. Cook, who cuts a humbler figure than Mr. Jobs, has also gone out of his way to praise employees at Apple's media events.

He has gushed about them far more than Mr. Jobs did, saying "they are doing the best work of their lives."

Apple is moving to address long-standing employee gripes, like flexibility on what they work on. Mr. Cook has also signaled he is more open to letting employees take sabbaticals, according to an executive who has spoken to him about it.

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