Throughout the 1980s, one of Ballmer’s top priorities was recruiting and retaining the world’s best computer programmers, salespeople and executives.

He would often tell audiences that “we need people who want to change the world.”

“He’s very demanding in terms of finding and keeping the best people at the top of the company,” says David B. Yoffie, a professor at Harvard Business School. “He has little patience for people who he doesn’t feel are living up to his standards.”

Hail to the Chief

Throughout the ’90s, Ballmer assumed almost every top management position at Microsoft apart from CEO, bringing his traditional energetic style and motivational leadership to all his endeavors.

In early 2000, after several years of being groomed to take over Gates’ position as Microsoft’s public spokesperson, Ballmer assumed the position of CEO when Gates stepped aside to become chief software architect.

Ballmer and Gates have been known as one of the most effective management duos in corporate America.

However, as Gates’ and Ballmer’s roles have become more defined, they have begun to distinguish themselves individually.

“Ballmer’s a passionate leader,” Yoffie says. “He’s a great motivator of people and he’s a real champion of the company.”

At one recent Microsoft conference, Ballmer appeared on stage, bursting out of a huge white cardboard cake. At another conference, Ballmer pranced around the stage, gesticulating wildly and chanting the word “developers” no fewer than 14 times.

It is also Ballmer’s connection with the consumers that has distinguished him from the more technologically-oriented Gates.

“Ballmer has as much stronger sense of what the customer needs and wants,” Yoffie says.

It was Ballmer and not Gates, Manse says, who recognized the profit potential of web services in 1991 and ensured that they would be Microsoft’s focus for the next decade.

But Manse says that no matter what corporate titles Gates and Ballmer assume in the future, “it’ll still be the Bill and Steve show.”

—Staff writer Nicholas F. Josefowitz can be reached at josefow@fas.harvard.edu.