Oh I know he isn’t one, hence the quotations, but as the leader of a creativity-based company, he really should be. But he isn’t and that’s why we’re at where we’re at. His decisions are purely money motivated. I just don’t get why enough is never enough for people like him.
I do not say this in defense of him, but I do think Disney fans sometimes need to realize that we do indeed have it better than a lot of folks do when it comes to the leadership of the thing we love. You're right, enough is never enough, but we could have someone a
lot worse on this front than him.
Bob Iger has a long, long list of issues. Lots of things that I and many others dislike him for, maybe even feel stronger than dislike for. But he also was not the worst case scenario for Disney when he got this gig and he is not the worst case scenario for it now.
He is not a creative, but he
is someone who has a long history with the company and he
does value the company to some degree. If he didn't, he wouldn't have used his tenure to do the things that he did. Not all of those things were successful or good, but it would've been incredibly easy for him to take the job, do absolutely nothing, and leave with his millions, but he had enough interest (I won't say care per say, but interest I think is appropriate) in the brand to continue to try and evolve it.
He is very motivated by earning money (as he was hired to be), but he has also been very willing to spend it. And while in some cases that has gone awry, in some cases it has brought us some wonderful things.
There are some CEOs out there of major entertainment companies who just take and gut and run. They don't spend, they don't maintain, they don't do anything but chew down to the bone and then throw the body away when there's no more meat left. Like at people who were SeaWorld fans and the state their parks are in these days. It could be
much worse for Mouse fans than it is.
That is not me saying we need to accept every poor choice leadership makes. Not at all. He has done a lot of really awful things, and he deserves to be questioned for it and they should indeed be a discussed part of his legacy.
But it would do all of us well to remember that outside of our bubble, we could've gotten a lot worse than we did. Iger came to power at a time where it was not at all uncommon for outside raiders to come in, take control, squeeze all the juice out, and leave the company to die. The fragile state it was in when Eisner left made it a ripe candidate for that.
I think it's very easy for us to say it's the worst because it's happening now, but I do think in ten, twenty, thirty years from now, Iger's legacy will not be seen as a complete negative. It will be seen for what it actually was which was a period of highs and lows that were reflective of the changing world that it existed within.
