BBQ & Big Ideas: Alan Waxman in Conversation with Bob Iger on Respecting the Past and Inspiring the Future

ALAN:

We can do this figuratively. But you open a barbecue place tomorrow.

BOB:

Bob's Big Boy is taken, right?

ALAN:

We have — I have to ask ChatGPT.

BOB:

All right, I think it is. I think it would be copyright infringement or something of the sort. I don't know, Alan, that's a tough one.

BOB:

How about just Bob's?

ALAN:

Okay, Bob's. I'd go to that.

ALAN:

Let's talk about the past and the future. So Disney — you know, incredible founder culture, Walt Disney. You've talked about it a lot, and just for the audience, describe the founder culture that existed at Disney. Just what it meant to you.

BOB:

Well, Walt founded the company in 1923, so the company's over 100 years old. He died in 1966. That was after Disneyland had opened and before Disney World had opened, and it was a relatively small company. He was a true force within the walls of Disney and actually in the end in the world. As an aside, some years back I discovered all the contents of his office had been kept in a vault on the Disney property. And all over the world, there was reporting on Walt Disney dying. In 1966, next to Muhammad Ali and maybe the Pope, he was one of the most well-known people in the world. Elvis Presley might have been up there at the time too. So you can imagine if the person running your company is one of the most well-known people in the world, their personality, their vision, their ethics, their everything is just imbued and it exists in every corner of the company that he founded, which is quite interesting, really, because sometimes you could argue that almost creates a cult-like culture. And I think to some extent that was the case with him. Now, he was very talented, very energetic, and clearly very communicative. And so he had his hand on everything. And that probably almost strengthened the cult in a way. Nothing happened at the company without Walt approving it, and when he died, they say it took 10 years to get over his death. For 10 years they spent asking what would Walt do, which is ridiculous — because if you've studied Walt, you'll discover he was an innovator and a futurist, someone never wedded to the past, except understanding what the past contained in terms of values. That was important to bring forward, but he knew the world was always changing and he was the ultimate innovator.

ALAN:

Talk about how you honor the culture, but still be innovative?

BOB:

Well, so it's interesting. So in 2005 I become CEO of the company. Walt is dead for 40 years, really. And while people aren't going around asking what he would have done, there's still adherence to the past that I thought was unhealthy. In effect, they were letting the past get in the way of innovation. So I tried to articulate both a respect for the past but a desire to move the company forward. And what I ultimately concluded was that the past should be respected but not revered — and there's a big difference. If you revere something, you might as well put it in a glass case, or a museum, and make sure it never changes. And so I said, let's respect the values that got us where we are. What is the essence of Disney? Who are we? And let's make sure we're not only bringing them forward, but they're core to everything we do. But let's not revere them to the point where we're not capable of doing different things. And that actually resonated. There was this belief that everything we did differently than years past, the empire was going to crumble.

ALAN:

At Sixth Street two years ago at our offsite, we talked about self-improvement at scale — a Japanese philosophy I've always lived by called Kaizen. You also have your own form of a Japanese philosophy that you followed called — my pronunciation is — Shokunin. Talk about what that is and what it means to you.

BOB:

That was that. That's basically the relentless pursuit of perfection. Yeah. And the inspiration for that term and that belief came not that long ago from a documentary about a sushi chef in Tokyo named Jiro — Jiro Dreams.

ALAN:

Great documentary.

BOB:

Here was a guy — he's now in his 90s — who at 88 years old, having earned three Michelin stars, was still trying to improve. And that just really resonated with me. I took a clip of the documentary and showed it at a Disney offsite to about 350 executives. That constant desire to learn more, to do more, to get better is incredibly powerful as a mechanism for propelling someone forward — and it's critical for a company. And I tried to teach that at Disney. If you have time and resources, then don't accept something that's only good. Work to make it great, for instance. Never accept mediocrity. And basically never stop trying to improve something. Then I was lucky, because when we bought Pixar in 2005, Steve Jobs became our largest shareholder. I had known Steve a bit but we were not friends, and I did not expect we would become friends — but he became a really dear friend to me. In learning about Steve, I discovered that's exactly who he was. He was a relentless perfectionist, and he could drive people crazy at times because he demanded such perfection from everybody else. But that quality of expecting perfection and demanding people work hard to make something better is very powerful. And that was Jiro for me, and Steve Jobs. [ALAN] You took a fractured relationship and built a special one with Steve Jobs. Talk about that.

BOB:

Well, so much to unpack here. By the time I became CEO — and close to when I became CEO — the relationship between Disney and Pixar had fractured. I realized that relationship was essential. One, if you look at the history of Disney, as animation goes, so goes the company. The company is really big these days. It doesn't depend on any one animated film, but it's incredible how the perception of those films rubs off on the company. So I needed to fix Disney animation. I also was a big believer in using — in fact, it was one of my strategic pillars — in using technology for three things: to make our product better, to reach consumers more ubiquitously and effectively, and to make the company more efficient. And I thought Pixar was a great example of using technology to make product better. I wanted to send that signal to Disney overall. I also thought if I could figure out how to do business with Steve, I'd learn a thing or two from him. So it was somewhat selfish in nature. The idea I had was: why not take every episode of every TV show ever made and create an iTunes-like platform for it? Back then it would have been a website — no mobile devices could do it. So I decided to call Steve.

ALAN:

Is this the first call?

BOB:

I called him the day before it was announced that I was —

ALAN:

You gave him a heads-up.

BOB:

Going to be CEO, because I wanted to say I'd like the opportunity to fix this relationship. Then I called him and said I had this idea. He says, it's not that crazy an idea. I'd like to come down and talk to you. He comes down, takes a new iPod out of his pocket. He shows me it's got a screen that can project video. He said, if Apple brings this product out, would you license your content to it? I said, absolutely — and we did a deal in five days to put Disney shows and movies onto that platform. That spoke volumes to him — that I was interested in Apple, in technology, and open-minded about taking the company forward, because that was a huge move in disrupting traditional distribution — TV networks, movie theaters, etc. I didn't realize at the time how much it impressed him, but it earned me major points and credibility. So six months passes. Now I'm CEO of the company. The first or second day, I have a Disney board meeting and they want to know my priorities. My number one priority is to fix Disney animation. And I lay out three ways to do that. One of them is to buy Pixar. Silence in the room. I realized they never thought that could ever happen. I did say to the board it could be expensive. They said, how much? I said, I don't know, six, seven billion dollars. They thought it was such a crazy idea they never said no — because they didn't think it would ever happen. I took that to mean I could explore it. The next day I called Steve and said, I've got another crazy idea. Next thing I know I'm up at Apple in front of a whiteboard, writing down the pros and cons of the deal — and we did a deal to buy Pixar for $7.3 billion.

ALAN:

You have to communicate and maybe even over-communicate with your people.

BOB:

It's something I learned when I became CEO. I thought initially I was saying things too often and getting tired of my own words. I got advice from a good communications executive who asked, do you still believe in those words? I said yes. Are they still relevant? Yes. Then don't stop saying them. She said, keep repeating them. You may be tired of them, but they're important. So the first thing is you have to communicate, over-communicate, have real clarity of voice and purpose — and what you communicate needs to be digestible. You obviously have to walk the talk. You have to set an example while you're communicating — you have to do what you say you want other people to do. Not just showing up, but showing up in the best possible way, in all directions. You have to have a core group of people you trust implicitly, who hear you most and understand what's driving you — and you have to demand that they communicate too. I think a leader also has to set an example and make sure people see that. So it's not just communicating and showing up — it's making sure that what you say is who you are, what you say is what you do, and everybody understands that. And you have to essentially be demanding.

ALAN:

When you're evaluating leaders, obviously communication is key. What are some of the things when you're deciding, of 350 executives, who's going to be the next 100? What are you looking at? What's your process for doing that?

BOB:

It's interesting, because Disney just went through a succession process and chose a successor to me, Josh D'Amaro. So we talked a lot as a board about what we want in the next leader of Disney. Clearly there are attributes needed for that job — respecting and appreciating creators and the creative process. But I think there's a commonality you look for in all leaders. One, you want someone to be really authentic. You want someone to be really curious. I've found over time that's one of the most powerful traits a person can have. You don't innovate, you don't try new things, you don't really survive in a disrupted world without being curious, in my opinion. I think you have to be accessible to people. You can't cocoon yourself or hide behind a corner office, for instance. You have to have tremendous energy. You have to have not just the ability to manage today, but to look around corners and prepare to manage for tomorrow. Very, very important to balance that. Meeting really high standards in terms of not only what you expect of people, but what you expect of the product. Significant integrity is important. I could probably go on and on. I happen to believe you need to be optimistic too.

ALAN:

That's important. We talk about here energy signature. Energy signature being the energy someone brings into a meeting. As a leader, was that something you were born with?

BOB:

I wrote about this. My father, who died over a decade ago, had some significant issues — meaning he was probably bipolar. He was off. He fought depression a good part of his life. And he had trouble holding a job because of that. But he turned out to be a very decent man and a great father. But he had a terrible temper that I witnessed a lot. I was never a victim of it per se, but I witnessed it as a child. And I'm pretty certain from my memory that I committed to myself to not being that. To maintaining some control over my own temper. I don't know whether that's contributed to a calmness, I'm not sure. I've also worked for people who tend to overreact, to be histrionic, to fly off the handle — and I just don't think that's all that productive, nor do I think it's very attractive in a leader. So I probably worked over the years, aside from my upbringing, to instill a sense of calmness in me, and to appropriately deal with crises, which is critical. But there are times when you have to almost use tension to deal with a crisis. But I don't think it's a particularly effective way to behave.

ALAN:

Yep, I agree. Agreed.

ALAN:

What is no one talking about that you think will actually be more impacted by AI than people understand?

BOB:

Well, on the positive side, I think what will survive in media is great distribution. Obviously, quality content and brands. They're sort of tied together — high quality brands. And the third category is connection to audience — knowing who the audience is, enabling the distributor to get closer to them, and vice versa. I think AI is going to be very, very powerful right there. It will bring people in and enable you to reach people much more effectively — aside from algorithms and tailoring products very specifically to people's interests. I think that's so far somewhat underestimated as a value. Everybody's focused now on the disruptive side. And the disruptive side is, I think, mostly aimed at creativity. And there it's — will the machine ultimately replace the human being and the human creative mind? I tend to be a little more conservative about this. I don't believe an AI program is going to replicate the creativity of the human mind in its highest form. I could be proven wrong over time, but I just don't believe that's the case. And having sat in on pitches by creators of original ideas — for instance, you go to Pixar, meet with directors, and the directors pitch their ideas to you. It's a director-driven business, and it's the directors who come with the ideas for the movies they ultimately direct. You're sitting in a room and a director pitches an idea about the emotions inside the brain of an 11-year-old girl. He talks about his daughter, who's 11, and what's going on in her mind. And you say, tell me more. What emotions are you talking about? Happiness and joy and anger — and it goes on and on. Then you start asking, what are they going to look like? Where do they live in the brain? Do you go into her brain? Do you go out of her brain? All that's an unbelievably original idea. Now, maybe every human being's idea is derivative of all their experience in life, and therefore nothing is really original — but that's, I guess, not a very good way to view creativity. I happen to believe that yes, we are the product of our experiences, and everything that comes out is the result of everything that has gone in. So an original idea is original, and it's an amalgamation of all these things that go into the brain of a person. But I just don't see an AI program actually coming up with that. I tend to be optimistic about the ability of the human creator to continue to create things for humankind in the highest form.

ALAN:

I hope that's right.

BOB:

Going back to the question. I do think we're all going to get smarter. I think it's going to be powerful. AI will be a powerful tool for collaboration. It's going to speed things up, clearly, and make us more efficient as well. I think those are all positives.