????史蒂夫?鮑爾默擔任微軟（Microsoft）總裁已經十幾年。期間，他的形象并不總能反映現實情況，而在他的卸任前夕，這一點體現得前所未有的明顯。

????任何看過他在會議上講話【或電視屏幕上的形象：他在今年的動畫連續劇《南方公園》（South Park）中以漫畫形象出場】的人都知道，鮑爾默是一位有著傳奇色彩的人物。在公眾眼中，他傲慢、無理，有時候近乎粗魯。對大多數人而言，他的言行舉止比他的管理水平更加出名。

????不過細看之下，你會發現真正的史蒂夫?鮑爾默在就任微軟首席執行官期間做出了一系列不為人知的戰略決定。他的接班人入主這家位于華盛頓州雷德蒙德的公司之后的很長一段時間內，這些決定依然會對這家公司和這個行業產生影響。

????比如，是鮑爾默在2000年1月就任時總裁決定優先處理公司面對的數百起反壟斷、集體訴訟和其他法律訴訟。是鮑爾默在2001年力挺微軟進軍用戶的客廳，推動Xbox游戲主機業務的開展。鮑爾默是讓微軟蛻變為企業服務公司的關鍵人物，他很早就意識到了招徠IT工程師在財務和戰略上的重要性。鮑爾默還把微軟公司的嚴謹作風帶到了一個新的高度，砍掉了大量無法證實自身盈利能力的產品和業務部門。

????公平地說，鮑爾默也在公開場合多次承認他對Longhorn項目監管不力。這個工程項目拖延數載，最終以Windows Vista操作系統的形式登場，結果卻飽受詬病。不過在最近接受《財富》采訪時，他堅稱在任職總裁的13年間，他所做出的正確決策要多于錯誤的判斷。

????我們不妨先來算算金錢帳：在鮑爾默的領導下，微軟的利潤實現翻番，而收入達到了之前的三倍。鮑爾默最近在他雷德蒙德的辦公室跟我座談、同時也有可能是他作為首席執行官的最后一次采訪時說：“過去的五年中，蘋果（Apple）也許比我們賺得更多。但在過去的13年中，我打賭我們賺的錢比這個星球上的任何人都要多。坦白地說，這是我引以為豪的資本。”

????微軟在盈利過程中也碰到過挫折。比如，微軟在2007年以60億美元的價格收購了在線廣告公司aQuantive。五年后，由于無法利用其產品和服務，微軟不得不進行62億美元的非現金資產減記。此外，微軟在2008年收購了移動服務公司Danger，然而借此開發的微軟Kin系列手機在市場上只存活了很短的時間。

????還有幾次差點達成的收購。比如微軟于2008年出價450億美元收購雅虎（Yahoo），最終交易并未達成。但是也有幾次交易確實獲得了成功。比如微軟2008年以12億美元收購了FAST Search & Transfer，并將其技術與微軟盈利頗豐的SharePoint的企業搜索技術進行了整合。另一個案例是微軟2002年以15億美元收購了Navision，最終把它變成了如今蒸蒸日上的企業資源規劃業務Dynamics ERP的核心產品。

????鮑爾默問道：“我們的收購決定大部分是不是都不錯？答案是肯定的。我們的收購決定大部分確實都很好。我們在FAST上花了十億，賺了不少錢。我們在Dynamics上進行了兩筆收購，每一筆花費剛過十億——相信我，它們看起來真的不錯。其中一些收購花了稍微長一點的時間才開始起到效果。收購aQuantive呢？顯然那不是一次成功的收購。但是它在微軟內部反響還行，因為它不只是關于收購成本和價格，還達到了收購的戰略目的。這方面我們一直做得很好。”??

????On the eve of his exit as chief executive officer of Microsoft, after more than a decade on the job, it is more evident than ever that Steve Ballmer's image does not always reflect reality.

????As anyone who has ever seen him speak at a conference (or portrayed on television, as he was in cartoon form on the animated series South Park this year) knows, Ballmer is a larger-than-life kind of guy. His public persona is brash, bombastic, and, at times, bordering on boorish. To most people, he is known more for his manner than his management.

????But look closely, and you'll notice that the real Steve Ballmer is responsible for making a handful of largely unsung strategic decisions during his tenure as CEO of Microsoft (MSFT) that will continue to affect the company and industry long after a new leader takes the helm of the Redmond, Wash.-based company.

????For example, it was Ballmer who made it a priority to settle the hundreds of antitrust, class-action, and other lawsuits facing the company when he was appointed chief executive in January 2000. It was Ballmer who championed Microsoft's foray into the living room, starting in 2001 with the Xbox gaming console. Ballmer was key to Microsoft evolving into an enterprise powerhouse, grasping early the financial and strategic importance of courting IT professionals. Ballmer also brought a new level of business rigor to the company, which led to it shedding a number of products and business units that couldn't demonstrate their "monetizability."

????To be fair, Ballmer has admitted publicly and repeatedly that he goofed badly with managing and overseeing Longhorn, the delayed engineering project which ultimately debuted as the ill-received Windows Vista operating system. But in a recent interview with Fortune, he adamantly insisted he got more right than wrong during the 13 years he ran Microsoft.

????Starting with money: Under Ballmer, Microsoft's profits doubled, revenues tripled. "In the last five years, probably Apple (AAPL) has made more money than we have," Ballmer says during a sit-down in his office in Redmond, in what's expected to be his final press interview as CEO. "But in the last 13 years, I bet we've made more money than almost anybody on the planet. And that, frankly, is a great source of pride to me."

????There have been missteps along the way to those profits. Like Microsoft's $6 billion acquisition in 2007 of the online ad firm aQuantive, on which the company took a $6.2 billion write-down five years later after failing to capitalize on its products and services. Or the purchase of mobile services company Danger in 2008, which spawned the short-lived Microsoft Kin family of mobile phones.

????There were some close calls, too, such as Microsoft's scrapped purchase of Yahoo (YHOO) for $45 billion in 2008. But there have been several decisions that did pan out. One of those was FAST Search & Transfer, which Microsoft bought in 2008 for $1.2 billion and integrated into the enterprise search technology at the heart of Microsoft's very profitable SharePoint family. Another was Navision a/s, which the company bought in 2002 for $1.5 billion and ultimately turned into the heart of its now thriving Dynamics ERP business.

????"Have we made mostly good acquisitions?" Ballmer asks, rhetorically. "The answer is yes. We really have made mostly good acquisitions. We spent a billion dollars on FAST; we make good money. Dynamics, we did two acquisitions, each just over a billion -- believe you me, they look really good. Some of them take a little longer to kick in. The aQuantive acquisition? Obviously not a good acquisition. But in the company we were, it's about acquiring in addition to managing costs and getting price. And we have been very good at that."??