The Ride of a Lifetime - Robert Igor
One of the more powerful books on leadership I have read in recent times. It’s a fascinating read of an experiential business journey of Walt Disney Company’s 11th CEO, Bob Iger who took the reins from Michael Eisner in 2005 and recently retired a few months back as its long serving successful CEO. Headquartered in California, Walt Disney Company was founded in October 1923. The company must have done something right to survive for 100 years. What started as a kids animation studio, in the last 100 years has grown into a powerhouse in the world of Media and entertainment.
American public companies like Walt Disney with a deep history, especially when the founders are no longer at the helm of affairs, are pretty much run by investors with a sole goal of maximizing the return on their investments. Back in 2005, Walt Disney’s stock was in the low range of $20s but in the next 15 years of Bob Iger’s leadership, the company saw a 7X increase in stock price with roughly $200B in its valuation. Bob Iger’s key contributions were the strategic acquisitions of Pixar, Lucas Films, Marvel Studios and 20th century Fox. He pivoted Disney’s future strategy on three core pillars of the business: Content (e.g. movies production), Digital Platforms (Disney+) and Physical Distribution Network (Disney Parks) and considerable focus on these three domains finally led to a complete turnaround for Disney's fortunes.
For a change, it was refreshing to read a book on the Media and Entertainment industry. Living in the bay area, you are overfed on tech companies and start associating them as the sole movers and shakers in the new age world. There is a big happening world outside the bay area and it’s good to keep it in view, not be self obsessed and have a balanced view of the world.
There were three big ideas that stuck with me while reading the book.
The 10 “Leadership” traits - where do you fit?
Many people say you are born to be a leader. This statement is not true. Everyone is born with leadership traits. It’s the situations and phases of life which exhibit different leadership styles. Also, leadership behavior is manifested in many different ways, so it’s important to establish the narrative right when we talk about leadership. While you may be a hero in your personal life, you may struggle exhibiting similar traits in the corporate world as the rules of engagement are quite different. Similarly, leaders that were strong in one phase of the company may not remain strong in other phases of the company. In many ways the seed of your failures are also sown in your success and vice versa. Ample evidence of it if you observe the career trajectory of many CEOs who did well early on but failed to lead towards the end phase of their stint.
Study of leadership traits is fast evolving into a key area of study. Everyone has been trying to codify what makes a great leader. The book reiterates top 10 qualities of a leader - Optimism, Courage, Focus, Curiosity, Decisiveness, Fairness, Thoughtfulness, Authenticity, The relentless pursuit of perfection and Integrity which seem like a fairly comprehensive and succinct list. The recent COVID disruption is one real life scenario which can help you assess where you currently stand in your leadership quotient. Did you exhibit either one of these traits more often than others? How many leadership traits did you exhibit? While you may have a slow start, can you bounce back and adopt some of these traits to be reflected more in your life?
To grow fast you need depth but to survive you need breadth
Most companies start diversifying into business as soon as they realize their core business has started peaking. It is good for startups to go deep in one domain as the only way for them to start their journey is to disrupt the market but to survive and grow in the long term, diversification is critical. Most big companies that rose from the ground were in the beginning based on one core idea - Google with search, Amazon with an online book store, Walt Disney Company with animation movies, GE - with electricity back in the 1890s, Facebook with college social networks, Apple with Personal computers and likewise many others. As these companies grew, they started diversifying across different industries and sectors.
More diversified the company is, the better its chances of surviving in modern times as cycles of technology can be disruptive. Also, many traditional tech companies have started foraying into the world of media, news and entertainment. They are all fast realizing that disruption need not come only from technology advancements, it can come from changing political ideologies and consumer behaviors too. Imagine the power celebrated by these companies and the political narrative they can shape in a country. No wonder Jeff Bezos acquired the Washington Post to help create a narrative and use it as a negotiation tool to further expand his business interests. Similarly, all the non tech companies (media, pharma, retail, banking et al) are all fast moving into the technology space as they are realizing their core business is getting disrupted with technology advancements. Perfect example is also the recent covid disruption - companies with diversified business will survive, rest will be forced to pivot to best suit the changing needs of the world.
We thought Brand advertising was dead, but seems it’s making a comeback
There are two conflicting themes playing out in the business world today. One is the exponential growth in the long tail of businesses that are hyper localized and feeding to ever increasing consumer choices and the other one is the globalized big businesses that are being forced to rediscover and cater to changed consumer needs and behaviors. One had assumed that with technology and democratization of consumer platforms, the focus would move away from brand play to lead generation models as shown by search companies like Google, but on the contrary brand advertising is becoming even more sophisticated and an important play for big businesses to stand out of the noise. In the past, companies leveraged brand advertising to reach out to a mass audience as the channels of communication were limited and expensive. But now, even though the channels of communication are many and may be cheap but now have to compete for the limited eyeballs that are getting tired with an ever increasing influx of choices. In the world of paradox of choices, brand advertising can help make it simpler for customers.
