Managment principles and how Walt Disney Company applyed them

1. Flea Effect—Never Limit Yourself

1. Origin:

This principle originates from a popular biology experiment. Here is a brief summary of it:

At the very beginning, a number of fleas were placed in a jar. The natural reaction of these fleas was to jump out.

After that, a glass lid was placed on the top of the jar. Now the fleas jumped high, hit the lid and fell back down into the jar. After a while, fleas adjusted and began jumping lower in order not to hit the lid anymore.

Three days later, the glass lid was removed. However, since the fleas had already learnt to limit themselves from jumping high, a lid was not needed anymore to keep them inside.

They have believed that they can’t escape from the jar. Therefore, no matter whether the lid is on or off, the fleas will stay in the jar forever. Moreover, their offspring’s will duplicate the behavior and will not jump high either.

1. Inspiration:

The fleas have the ability to jump out of the jar, but after a few failures, they are brought down and never try to jump higher anymore. The key is that they limit their expectations and don’t believe they can make it, then the thing will become truly impossible for them.

In a Chinese television program called Challenge Impossible, we can see many things we originally thought impossible are achieved by someone. As what is advocated in the advertisements of Adidas—nothing is impossible, people’s potential is unimaginable, and once we break the limitation and start to believe something, we get the chance to achieve it.

It is the same with companies. This is an era changing rapidly. Even for those great companies, they have their good times and bad times. The reason why they can be enduring lies exactly in the flea effect. When difficult time occurs, they don’t lose faith. Instead, they learn from those failures and try to succeed next time. When they are in their good times, they won’t stop exploring either. They always believe they can provide even better products and services. They are always fighting towards a higher target.

1. Application—The Innovations in Disney Animations:

Disney is never satisfied with the present success. It keeps exploring and moving forward. From Disney, we can see how the spirit of always pursuing better can distinguish a company.

1. Technical Innovation:

• Walt Disney was given the Academy Honorary Award in 1938 "for Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs [1937], recognized as a significant screen innovation—the first full-length animated feature film, which has charmed millions and pioneered a great new entertainment field for the motion picture cartoon." Adjusted for inflation, it is one of the top ten performers at the North American (US and Canada) box office.
• Walt Disney and his partners were given the Academy Honorary Award in 1941 "for their outstanding contribution to the advancement of the use of sound in motion pictures through the production of Fantasia." When they re-recorded it in 1982 to make it the first animated movie in Digital sound.
• In 1929, Steamboat Willie was a pioneer in “full synchronized” sound cartoon. In 1988, ABC (Disney group) airs the first network broadcast in high definition television (101 Dalmatians).
• To shoot A Bug's Life, animators create mini-cameras to observe the sunshine in ants ‘eyes. In Zootopia, they develop a new technology to make animal hair crystal clear.

1. Content Innovation:

• With the awakening of female consciousness, the female characters in Disney animations also change from princesses like Snow White and Cinderella who only wait passively for some magical creatures and their princes saving them from oppressions to more independent girls like Hua Mulan, Bella and Elsa who dare to be different, to chase their dreams bravely.
• More than fairy tales, more than musicals. Films like Up, Big Hero 6, Zootopia, reflect the phenomena in modern society, such as artificial intelligence, racial discrimination, stereotyped images and the contradictions between our dreams and the reality.

Although innovation always comes with great commercial risks, for example, technical improvements may require huge costs while get little payback and an unconventional story is less likely to be accepted by the audience than a familiar one, Disney believe without adventures, better animations can never be produced. Therefore, it keeps trying and surpassing itself. Because of innovation, it maintains its dominant status for more than 90 years.

1. Law of 250—Attach Importance to Every Customer

1. Origin:

It is put forward by a famous American sales man —Joe Girard, who is listed in the Guinness Book of World Records as “the world’s greatest salesman” for selling 6 cars on average everyday lasting for 12 years.

He discovered this law starting from a funeral. It was a Catholic funeral. Mass cards were given out to all those in attendance. Girard asked the funeral director how he decided the amount of Mass cards needed to print up for each funeral. The funeral director told him that the number of people attending a funeral always seems to slightly fluctuate around 250, so that’s how many he prints up each time. A few days later, Girard sold a car to a Protestant funeral director. When he asked how many people typically attend a Protestant funeral, he got the same answer: about 250. Soon after that, when he attended a wedding, he asked the minister the same question. The answer was again about 250 on the bride’s side and 250 on the groom’s side.

...