This paper will provide an analysis of the leadership style of Bob Iger, the former CEO of Disney. The paper will also focus on discussing how the leadership style of Bob Iger, fits into the current situation. The paper will further discuss how Bob Iger communicates with the stakeholders, analysis will also be made about his strengths, weak points, and the struggle he had to face while acquiring Pixar. Further recommendations will be made about how Bob Iger, can change their weak point. Analysis of the leadership style and various other elements that will be discussed in the paper will help establish valid conclusions, in the field of leadership development.
Bob Iger has a Jewish origin by birth, but he was born in the city of New York, in the year 1951. He is an established businessman in America, he was the former CEO of The Walt Disney Company, from 2005 to 2020, he was the CEO at a stretch, and has achieved a lot, in his career one of the biggest achievements is acquiring Pixar. Before this, he was the president of ABC Television between 1994 and 1995 and was working as a COO for ABC from 1995 until it was acquired by Disney in the year 1996 (Masterclass.com, 2022). In the year 2000, Bob Iger was declared the president and COO at Disney, and also succeeded the former CEO, Michael Eisner from the year 2005. During these 15 years of being the CEO of Disney, he expanded the intellectual properties of the organization, in the international markets, and also increased the market capitalization of the company from $48 billion to $257 billion. Apart from that Pixar, he also led the acquisition of Marvel Entertainment, Lucasfilm, and the entertainment assets of the 21st Century Fox in 2019 for approximately $71.3 billion. He also expanded their park resort in East Asia for instance the Hong Kong Disneyland Resort and Shanghai Disney Resort (2005 and 2016). Bob Iger, was also the main initiative taker to reinvigorate the Walt Disney Animation Studios. It also increases the investment and revenue of the direct B2C business that includes Disney+ and Hulu. Iger, call him a political centrist, while he was publicly acknowledged by the Democratic party (Perspectives, 2022). He also helped in fundraising for Hilary Clinton’s Presential Campaign, apart from that he was also a part of President-elect Trump’s Strategic and Policy Forum. In 2016, Iger switched his party from Democratic to independent (meaning no party affiliation).
Steven Spielberg, the renowned director and creator of the USC Shoah Foundation Institute for Visual History and Education, bestowed the Ambassador for Humanity Award on Iger in June 2012. Iger was honoured for his long-term generosity and leadership position in corporate responsibility, as well as his support for the institute’s efforts. In 2014, the Producers Guild of America (PGA) awarded Iger with The Milestone Award.
Iger was inducted into the 25th Annual Broadcasting & Cable Hall of Fame in May 2015. Iger was inducted into the Toy Industry Hall of Fame by the Toy Industry Association (TIA) in October 2015. Iger was selected Time’s Businessperson of the Year in December 2019. He was inducted into the Television Hall of Fame in the year 2020.
The kind of personality that Bob Iger has, has been assessed by the contemporary trait theories, as the Big Five Framework. The emotional level of maturity is strong in Iger, and this is the reason why he could take any decision, by keeping his head high, even after knowing the associated risk, according to neuroticism, any who has this kind of attitude, is endlessly enthusiastic, and creative in nature (De Raad, and Mlacic, 2015). Innovativeness, creativeness, strength to take risks, as the characteristics of such a person who has a strong emotional maturity, and Bob Iger, is one of them. Bob Iger, always appreciates new ideas, concepts that would be beneficial for the business, not necessarily it has to come from the upper level of the management, any normal employee of the company having a new idea, is also appreciated equally by Disney and the former CEO. Bob Iger, when he joined Disney, was always in search of an opportunity that would help him expand the business (Rahbi, Khalid, and Khan, 2017), and he did exactly what he thought, by acquiring a business or expanding the theme park resorts in the international market. Utilizing opportunities strategically, and the resources have made both Disney and Bob Iger create a history in the world. The meticulousness of Bib Iger could be seen through his ethical, systematic, and structured work. Researchers have shown that sociability, dominance, accomplishment, and reliability are traits of a strong and effective leader (Ali et al., 2015).
Similarly, the character or the personal trait of Bob Iger, is very strong and thus, he can primarily be declared a transformational leader, but his leadership quality in him is unique, which makes him more effective. In general, a transformational leader emphasizes the capacity and motivates the followers, to enhance their skills, and performance, for their individualistic benefit, and the benefit of the company as a whole (Nanjundeswaraswamy, and Swamy, 2014). Bob Iger believes in increasing his knowledge through experience, he feels that during the initial days of his career, he too made mistakes and he still does, but he has learned a lot from the experience, and self-reflection and so he wants people working under him to expand their knowledge, so that they can carry on their work properly (Iordanoglou, 2018).
Other traits that could be found in Bob Iger are ideal, charismatic, inspirational, and tailored thought (Kesting et al., 2015). The approach that Iger uses to conduct the company is an employee and customer-centric approach meaning, both the elements matter to him a lot because these two are inseparable units of a business, hence giving importance to one may not be sufficient, to succeed in the competitive environment. According to the Hershey and Blanchard Theory, Bob Iger can also be termed as a macro-manager, who supervises the team less, and lets them work accordingly, rather he always inspired his staff, so that they perform properly. As a transformational leader, Bob Iger stressed innovation and creativeness and also asked his teammates to follow this approach to solve problems (Blanchard, Olmstead, and Lawrence, 2021).
Bob Iger, actively engages in all the activities of the business, and also lead by example as he feels that this would increase creativity and help people reach their goal. Communication is an important aspect of any business, and Bob Iger, because actively communicating by keeping oneself genuine would a lot of issues between them and the stakeholder.
Stakeholders can be internal and external, but communicating with them would keep them happy, as a result, led to less conflict and investment time in more productive work. Bob Iger while communicating with the stakeholders, keeps in mind their culture, tradition, he tries not to say anything offensive, because he knows it would hamper his business, especially when Disney as the company has an image and reputation of its own (Yahaya, and Ebrahim, 2016). For instance, while acquiring Pixar, Bob knew he would have to face Steve Jobs, and the relationship between them was not good, because of the previous predecessors of Disney, on the other hand, Bob knew this would be a great opportunity for Disney and he could not let it down, so he tried to present the business pitch in such a way, that Steve Jobs invited him personally, and become ready for the acquisition as he was one of the main stakeholders of Pixar. This is how tactfully, Bob Iger communicated and negotiated. Iger also believed that communication is the key element in his life, and all the achievement he has made is because of effective communication (Chorbadzhiyska, and Mironova, 2021), it has helped him solve issues, exchange ideas, and helped him maintain good relationships and image with the stakeholders (Businessinsider. in, 2022), whether it is any shareholder of the organizations, or investor, or the customers, or the employees.
While acquiring Pixar, Bob knew he would have to face Steve Jobs, and the relationship between them was not good, because of the previous predecessor of Disney, on the other hand, Bob knew this would be a great opportunity for Disney and he could not let it down, so he tried to present the business pitch in such a way, that Steve Jobs invited him personally, and become ready for the acquisition as he was one of the main stakeholders of Pixar. This is how tactfully, Bob Iger communicated and negotiated and acquired Pixar (Collis, and Hartman, 2017), even after a long-time struggle. The other struggles he faced is regarding uplifting the condition of Disney, when he became a CEO, he could notice a lot of issues going on within the organization, he had to take random decisions, which were risky, but could do nothing because he had to save the image of the company. Many people misunderstood him, called him experienced, immature, but he proved all of them wrong, it’s true he struggled a lot, to reach this level, but the values inside him kept him moving, made him successful till the end.
Bob’s mindset was different and demonstrated that audacious corporate leadership is not about power and self-promotion. It is all about separating the personal identity from the business that a person manages so that he/she can examine things as objectively as possible. This outlook has helped Bob fight struggle and achieves what he wanted (Perspectives, 2022).
Bob Iger is an Influencer (Id) personality by nature. He is confident in his ability to lead and eagerly offers his views. Iger has been regarded as a creative, motivated individual who enjoys chasing new prospects during his long tenure at Disney. To help him accomplish what he accomplished, he depended largely on his innate skills as an Influencer personality type. Apart from that he is very decisive in his approach, and very particular when making decisions and choices, even if it turns out to be wrong (Masterclass.com, 2022). There have been several times when he has taken risks, but those risks have turned out to be beneficial, and so another strength of his is risk-tolerant. He is very innovative and creative in his approach, and that has made them thrive in Disney for 15 years as a CEO. He is very optimistic in his approach. Though no strong evidence has been found against him about his mistakes, or negative aspect, in an interview with CNBC he said that he will step out from the position of the CEO because he has become a little dismissive of the opinions of the people. Though he was an active listener, he feels that late he started listening less, and also has become less tolerant of other people’s opinions, and have become overconfident, which might prove negative for the company (Businessinsider. in, 2022).
Bob Iger set the example for other leaders, according to the aforementioned leadership styles and stakeholder management. Depending on the situation, Bob adopts a different leadership style. Employees, trading partners, and customers are Bob’s major essential stakeholders, with whom they engage openly and meet their demands on a broad scale. However, there are several limits based on assumptions that Bob Iger must address to enhance his leadership styles and practices and maintain his position as the world’s number one leader in the future. Bob should concentrate on a few flaws, firstly he should not be overconfident about what he becomes, because it makes him turn his back on the people, it will create more dissatisfaction and might ruin his image, rather he should continue to listen and actively engage with the stakeholders (Gandolfi, and Stone, 2018), one more thing, taking risks in the situation is good, and it may have proven useful, but every time it may not prove useful and might affect business.
Conclusion
Thus, it can be concluded by saying that, Bob Iger’s leadership style may be described in a variety of ways, all of which reflect the concept of successful leadership. With his unique leadership style and challenge to traditional leadership ideas, Bob Iger’s leadership policies assisted Disney to remain at the top level of companies throughout the world. However, the negative in Iger’s’ leadership style should not be overlooked based on the assumption. Bezos is a charismatic, transformational, and innovative leader.
Reference
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