The Ride of a Lifetime: Lessons Learned from 15 Years as CEO of the Walt Disney Company

The way they conveyed their faith in me at every step made all the difference in my success.

Optimism. One of the most important qualities of a good leader is optimism, a pragmatic enthusiasm for what can be achieved. Even in the face of difficult choices and less than ideal outcomes, an optimistic leader does not yield to pessimism. Simply put, people are not motivated or energized by pessimists.

You can do a lot for the morale of the people around you (and therefore the people around them) just by taking the guesswork out of their day-to-day life. A lot of work is complex and requires intense amounts of focus and energy, but this kind of messaging is fairly simple: This is where we want to be. This is how we're going to get there.

When the unexpected does happen, a kind of instinctive triage kicks in. You have to rely on your own internal "threat scale." There are drop-everything events, and there are others when you say to yourself, This is serious, I need to be engaged right now, but I also need to extricate myself and focus on other things and return to this lat

The Relentless Pursuit of Perfection. This doesn't mean perfectionism at all costs, but it does mean a refusal to accept mediocrity or make excuses for something being "good enough." If you believe that something can be made better, put in the effort to do it. If you're in the business of making things, be in the business of making things

I had never had any real connection to Roy, but I detected vulnerability in him now. There was nothing to be gained by making him feel smaller or insulted. He was just someone looking for respect, and getting it had never been especially easy for him. It was so personal, and involved so much pride and ego, and this battle of his had been going on f

I talk a lot about "the relentless pursuit of perfection." In practice, this can mean a lot of things, and it's hard to define. It's a mindset, more than a specific set of rules. It's not about perfectionism at all costs. It's about creating an environment in which people refuse to accept mediocrity. It's about pushing back against the ur

Of all the lessons I learned in my first year running prime time at ABC, the acceptance that creativity isn't a science was the most profound. I became comfortable with failure not with lack of effort, but with the fact that if you want innovation, you need to grant permission to fail.

Curiosity. A deep and abiding curiosity enables the discovery of new people, places, and ideas, as well as an awareness and an understanding of the marketplace and its changing dynamics. The path to innovation begins with curiosity.