What can todays CEOs and aspiring small business entrepreneurs learn from Walt Disney?
If you used Walt Disney as a case study in a business course, he would probably be a prime example of all the things a CEO should not do. Walt had no patience for organization charts or economies or efficiencies or the delegation of authority. He was always in financial hot water. But he did have one overriding characteristic that ultimately resulted in tremendous success and rapid growth for his company: Walt never lost sight of his vision. Walt Disney trusted himself. He reinvested the company’s revenue and his own in the studio. He didn’t listen to naysayers, including his own wife, who told him that his plans wouldn’t work because Walt’s idea was that the studio wasn’t worth running if he couldn’t realize his plans. In short, Walt Disney made an awful lot of money in the final analysis by never prioritizing the making of money and by insisting on his own vision. From the Hardcover edition.
