Is Change An Opportunity or Threat...........................The Disney Tale

Well, it all depends on the way one views it. By now, many of you might have heard the glass and water story; a glass filled with water can be viewed as being half empty, half filled or contrary to conventional thinking, stagnant. By bringing forth the Disney tale in the 1980s, I would like to give an insight to what most companies (the big daddies included) do in face of the advent of a new technology and how change and innovations have been a nightmare for an industry leader.

My last blog read about the Pixar story where mention was made of John Lasseter who was previously working in Disney, before joining Pixar as their main animator. Lasseter was a visionary who saw the importance of computers in adding a new graphical dimension to the then 2- D cartoon world, but his work mostly went unappreciated and was brushed aside in Disney. Lasseter got a breather when he was hired by the Pixar team which was then a small humble team of people who believed in the power of graphical animations and wanted to introduce the world to a whole new experience of story telling. But then where does that leave us with Disney. Here's a look at their end of the story.

The 1980s saw a fall in Disney's revenue with most of its films flopping, a reason that can be partly attributed to their inability to succeed in entertaining their audience. Here, let us give a thought to what business Disney is into........entertainment and pure entertainment. They have over the years banked upon capturing the imagination of people transporting them to a world of fantasy and fun. But come the 80s, audience were treated to a grand visual treat of blazing lasers and space-ships, of robots and aliens. Yes, this hint would suffice for any movie buff to guess that the era saw special effects in a never before mode in Star Wars, Terminator and Aliens. These movies not just transported the audience to a different age but went down favourably with the critics too. The resounding success stories of Computer Graphics finally made Disney accept the change and adapt the new era of computation. However, as it goes, a stitch in time saves nine if only Michael Eisner saw what potential John Lasseter held, the audience wouldn't have abandoned a Disney Movie for a George Lucas or James Cameron.

Wouldn't it have been more appreciably(and a matter of common sense........!!) if the then leader had taken an initiative to be the one propelling the change, given the fact that they had the technology as well as the resources.But then how many times have we learned from others sour experiences........ such incidents have been repeated by many a great companies time & again.