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When Bob Iger took office as CEO of Walt Disney Co. (DIS) in October 2005, he had a hard act to follow.
Under Michael Eisner from 1984, Disney movies have been blockbusters for years, and the Broadway spinoffs have been rewarded. ESPN scored touchdowns continuously. Attendance at theme parks has skyrocketed. The management turmoil has reduced the stock by one-third over the last five years.
The resurgence of Disney
Many have considered Iger to gentle manners like an Eisner puppet without the strength or creative instinct to change things. But over the last 13 years, he's been directing nine # 1 movies, including "Black Panther" from 2018, as well as 11 of the 20 biggest-ever hits in the world of all time. Disney parks have eight of the top 10 most visited. He has acquired Pixar Animation Studios, the super-factory of Marvel Studios, the franchise "Star Wars" Lucasfilm Ltd., and received in 2018 the approval of the purchase of 21 billionst Century Fox. The stock jumped from 24 to 110 recent stocks. Iger, 67, has announced that he will retire in July 2019 (after repeated contract extensions).
"Bob Iger's gift is the ability to grow the organization while juggling with several different companies simultaneously," said J. Jeff Kober, CEO of World Clbad Benchmarking, former director of the Disney Institute and author of "Disney, Leadership and You", at IBD. "It does so by giving others the power to lead, by surrounding themselves with competent people, guiding them in the right direction and allowing them to do what they can to get the best possible results from their creative teams."
Rising Star
Iger was born in New York and grew up in Oceanside, a city on Long Island. He graduated with great distinction from Ithaca College with a B.S. on television and radio in 1973. He dreamed of becoming a news presenter and worked as a weather forecaster for a local station for five months. He then worked at ABC in New York as a studio supervisor for game shows and soap operas. It's there that he discovered that he had the knack for production.
Legendary sports journalist Roone Arledge sponsored him. Iger quickly made progress in developing programs to become executive vice president of the network in 1988 at the age of 37. His reputation for being a fierce work ethic (he always gets up at 4:30 am) and get results without the usual showbiz drama led him to be named executive vice president at from the acquisition of ABC by Capital Cities Broadcasting in 1993. The following year, he became President and CEO of Capital Cities / ABC.
Facing adversity
In 1996, Disney bought Capital Cities / ABC and renamed it ABC Inc., whose president was Iger until 1999. At that time, Iger was known to have had success as long as "Who wants to be a Millionaire "," Home Improvement "" Doogie Howser, MD "," The Drew Carey Show "and" America's Funniest Videos ".
But Disney had been in financial decline since 1995, in part because of the death of President Frank Wells the year before and the ensuing power struggle between Eisner and other senior executives, according to James Stewart in " DisneyWar ". In 1999, Iger was named president of Walt Disney International, which oversaw operations overseas, while chairing the ABC group. Less than a year later, he was appointed president and chief operating officer of Walt Disney Co.
It's increasingly focused on integrating advanced technology into every aspect of Disney's products and activities. For example, he has made the ESPN sports network available in high definition. He also undertook to expand the company's presence in Asia, notably by opening Disneyland Hong Kong. ABC rebounded during the 2004-2005 season with the debuts of "Desperate Housewives", "Lost", "Gray's Anatomy" and "Dancing with the Stars".
The Iger era begins
After taking the helm in 2005, Iger wasted no time making changes. He reorganized the company and fired or transferred directors to other responsibilities. At the same time, he gave new leaders time to test their skills in unknown situations. He let them take risks knowing that short-term failures are part of the long-term success process.
Responding to complaints that strategic planning had stifled creativity through micromanagement, it removed the division and encouraged operational units to report on their own decisions and execution.
"Nothing is more important than the creators, the creative process and the creative production," he told Time. "Basically, you bet on people and ideas versus something else."
Encourage collaboration
He also encouraged the units to borrow new technologies from each other. Under Iger, patents quadrupled. Best known to the public: MagicBands, free plastic wristbands with an RFID chip that allow Disney World visitors to Orlando to do anything: interactions with employees disguised as Disney characters or quick navigation in the four parks attractions.
Iger has undertaken to improve the relationship with Steve Jobs, majority shareholder of Pixar Animation Studios, dissatisfied with the production and distribution agreement with Disney. Iger places ABC shows on Jobs' brand new iTunes platform for Apple Inc. (AAPL) before any other major content provider. At the beginning of 2006, Disney had bought Pixar for $ 7.4 billion worth of shares and entrusted its directors with responsibility for all Disney animations. The results included the three most successful animation films of all time: "Frozen", "Beauty and the Beast" and "Incredibles 2".
A vision for new universes
The purchase of Marvel Studios in 2009 for $ 4.3 billion and Lucasfilm Ltd. in 2012 for 4 billion seemed for foreigners to be very expensive. But they led to the dominance of the list of the most profitable films of all time with titles such as "Star Wars: The Force Awakens" (No. 3, $ 2.068 billion) and "Avengers: Infinity War" ( No. 4, 2.048 billion dollars). The Iger management style has inspired creative staff to create stunning suites, as well as new whole universe visions of franchise characters.
"It's not that I'm a daredevil," Iger told the Los Angeles Times for his calculated risk-taking. "But I'm not usually a fearful person, I do not lead my life worryingly about what could happen."
The magical empire
The biggest acquisition in the history of entertainment, out of 21st Century Fox, have come together for three main reasons. First of all, it resulted from the ability to make real friendships with powerful people. Second, the founder, Rupert Murdoch, worried about the future of his media empire. And third, Iger had a bold vision of the merger that he could achieve. The transaction is expected to be finalized in March 2019.
"Bob has always been the most strategic and the most curious in the industry," Peter Chernin, former high-ranking lieutenant and former general manager of Chernin, told The New York Times in Murdoch. "He is the man least interested in maintaining the status quo and by the one who really tries to fight against the direction the world is taking."
The most important part of what Fox will bring is considerable additional content. This will be at the heart of Iger's plans to offer unbundled programs, instead of exclusively excluding traditional packages from the most popular and the least popular. And the new content will help his plans for three streaming services. After establishing a partnership with Netflix Inc. (NFLX) to create online shows, Disney has decided to oppose Amazon.com (AMZN) in the space they dominate.
"Bob Iger is a great thinker who understood that Disney had to reach a whole new level," said Nicholas Zaldastani, managing director of Zaldastani Ventures. "And that meant making monster bets on a vision of where the content and technology would go."
Zaldastani added that Iger needed to anticipate acquisitions that would produce the most synergistic results in the long run.
"It also became clear that Disney had a distribution system that could be used for anybody's content," Zaldastani said. "And (Disney) is introducing a new consumer streaming service that will offer vast and more flexible choices."
Of course, everything did not come under the guidance of Iger. ABC has gone through the turbulence of evaluations. ESPN broadcasts many live events and has been accessed by 200 million Americans in recent months across all platforms, as well as by more than 200 countries. But he faces challenges in a world of ropes cut more and more unbundled.
Disney's revenues for the year ended September 30, 2018 amounted to $ 59.4 billion, an increase of 7.8% over the previous year. Net profit was $ 12.6 billion, up 40.3%.
The keys of Iger
CEO and President of Walt Disney Co.
topped: Lower morale due to micromanagement of the creative process.
Lesson: Encouraging collaboration, rather than rivalry, between business lines produces better results.
"There is no science in creativity – if you do not give yourself the opportunity to fail, you will not innovate."
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