Walt Disney Productions (a): The Walt Years

This case is a summary of the history of Walt Disney Productions from its founding by Walt Disney in the 1920s to 1984. Faced with declining performance in virtually all divisions of the company, top management must develop a long-term strategy for improving the company's performance. The case addresses the question of how to restore the value of the asset base built by Walt Disney. The case also addresses two broad issues: (1) leadership and (2) qualities of an "excellent" company. The case has sufficient material on the start-up and early days of Walt Disney Productions that students can assess some of the qualities that made Walt Disney a successful entrepreneur and creative leader. See also "Walt Disney Productions: The Arrival of Eisner and Wells" (BP-0339). Excerpt UVA-BP-0332 Rev. Jan 15, 2013 WALT DISNEY PRODUCTIONS (A): THE WALT YEARS I just want to leave you with this thought, that it's just been sort of a dress rehearsal…so if any of you start resting on your laurels, I mean, just forget it, because…we are just getting started. —Walt Disney, quoted in The Disney Management Style Almost 50 years after the company's founding, manicured lawns and ethereal quiet conveyed a campus-like atmosphere at Walt Disney Productions (WDP) in Burbank, California. Executives still arrived at work wearing Mickey Mouse polo shirts, animators still played the volleyball games Walt Disney encouraged on a studio lawn, Disney's favorite chili remained on the menu, and everyone still went by first names, but behind the façade was a very different company from the one Walt Disney left behind. . . .