The Ride of a Lifetime: Lessons Learned From 15 Years as CEO of the Walt Disney Company by Iger Robert & Lovell Joel

Author:Iger, Robert & Lovell, Joel [Iger, Robert & Lovell, Joel]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Business, Biography, Self Help
Goodreads: 44525305
Publisher: Random House
Published: 2019-09-23T07:00:00+00:00

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ON A SATURDAY in March 2005, the board convened to make its decision. Most of the members called into the meeting; Michael and George Mitchell were together in a conference room at ABC in New York.

I woke up that morning thinking I might have convinced enough of the “undecided” members of the board to give me the job, but when I thought of all the drama and scrutiny around the process, it felt just as possible that they would go another way, that some of the skeptics would have argued forcefully for a change in the narrative, and they would name an outsider.

I spent the day with my two boys, trying to distract myself. Max and I tossed a ball around, went to lunch, and spent an hour in his favorite neighborhood park. I told Willow that if bad news came, I was getting in my car and taking the cross-country drive that I’d long dreamed of taking. A solo trip across the United States seemed like heaven to me.

As soon as that meeting ended, George Mitchell and Michael called me at home. Willow was with me in the office we shared. The job of CEO was mine, they said; it would be announced the next day. I appreciated that Michael was on the call. I knew it must have been painful for him. He’d poured himself into that job and wasn’t quite ready to relinquish it, but if he had to be succeeded by someone, I believe he was happy that that person was me.

I was grateful to George for the way he had treated me throughout the process. If not for him, I don’t think I would have gotten a fair shake by the rest of the board.

Mostly, I was thankful for Willow. I couldn’t have done it without her faith and wisdom and support. She was rooting for me the whole time, of course, but time after time, she told me this was not the most important thing in my life, in our lives. I knew she was right, but taking her words to heart took work, too, and she helped me do that. Once the call ended, Willow and I sat quietly for a moment, trying to savor it all. I had a mental list of the people I wanted to call right away, and I was fighting the urge to start dialing and instead trying to just be still, to breathe a bit, to let in both the elation and the relief.

Eventually, I called my parents in Long Island. They were proud, if a little incredulous that their son was going to be running the company founded by Walt Disney. Then I called my daughters in New York, and my old Capital Cities bosses, Dan Burke and Tom Murphy. And then I called Steve Jobs. It was an odd call to make, but it felt important to me to reach out to him, in case there might still someday be a chance of salvaging the relationship with Pixar.

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