In the 33 years Jim Shull spent at Imagineering, his job was to pitch and then build new park attractions at Disney properties. He did this first under Eisner, then Iger, and just before retirement, Chapek. “I would go to Bob Iger and say, ‘Hey Bob, I have a good idea based on a movie. It’s family-friendly; we can get it there in four years.’ He’d look at me and say, ‘We need it sooner. Can you do this, this, and this to get it there sooner?’ He would be part of the process.” Chapek, on the other hand, says Shull, would kill the idea on the spot if there was not immediate agreement on Chapek’s terms of cost or timing. The conversation would end, and the idea wouldn’t see another day, says Shull.
Iger, says Shull, developed a cadence with the Imagineering team. He engaged in a negotiation, asking questions and pointing out what aspects of the pitch worked for him, what didn’t, and why, as well as what the team could possibly tuck away for later use. He showed interest; by Shull’s estimation, he always felt Iger was up for being convinced of the merits of a project. “It didn’t mean I always won, but he would listen and be engaged,” says Shull. “I would use the term ‘transactional’ for Bob Chapek. [He] thinks more along the lines of, how does that fit the box and how much does it cost?”
When Chapek’s role was chairman of parks and resorts, Shull says, he seemed nervous in pitch meetings. “He asked the types of questions you’d ask if you came from consumer products,” says Shull. “He talked in units. I felt like he was trying to understand a very different business from what he was used to.”