The photography company was acquired.

The greatest courage in the world is grace under pressure. -Hemingway

? Recently, I often hear friends say that I am under great pressure: "I suddenly wake up at two or three in the morning, can't sleep, and wait for dawn with my eyes open."

"What kind of pressure do you feel?"

"The company said that it would lay off employees for a long time; I have a new job and have no idea at all; The interpersonal relationship of the unit is complex, so it is not easy to hit a person when he is down ... alas! There are simply too many! "

Where can this be solved?

Why don't we listen to a story first-

The CEO of a large multinational company arrived in Shanghai, China five days early from the headquarters in burbank, USA. We began to prepare for the groundbreaking ceremony of the biggest and most critical project invested by the company in the past century.

June 12, Sunday, evening. The CEO got the news that a vicious shooting incident occurred near Orlando Park, which has killed more than 50 people.

On Monday, June 13, preparations will be made minute by minute throughout the day. At the same time, the CEO is still paying attention to the latest progress in the filming of "Crossing the Ocean";

June 14, Tuesday, morning. He learned that two employees were killed in the shooting. Just as the appeasement work was arranged, a worse news came: the shooting was not a coincidence, and the suspect's target was his Orlando Park;

June 15, Wednesday morning. When introducing the new park to the distinguished guests, the CEO was told that there had been another crocodile attack on a two-year-old child in Orlando Paradise Resort, and the child's whereabouts were still unknown. "In any case, the child can't die." He prayed secretly.

On Thursday, June 16, park shanghai officially opened!

Excuse me: how much pressure is this CEO?

I didn't make up this story.

This is the real experience shared by Robert Iger, the newly-retired Disney CEO, in his new book A Journey of Life.

As soon as this book came out, it received a 2000-word recommendation from Bill Gates. It can be seen that its rich content and high gold content are rare in celebrity biographies.

In the book, Iger not only recorded his 45-year career, but also shared many important first-hand information about the rise and fall of Disney Company as many business ideas of company management.

Whether you are interested in the Disney brand, want to know your career development in a big company, or learn the secret of rapid growth from successful people. This book is well worth reading.

After reading this book, I have a particularly profound feeling that it is the choice of the weak to panic and complain when encountering unavoidable pressure. A really strong person will take three steps to deal with it calmly-stabilizing emotions, identifying problems and finding ways.

For example, when Shanghai Disneyland opened a garden, how did Iger handle the shooting and crocodile incidents?

At 4 am of the opening ceremony, Iger got up. He exercised for a while, sorted out his thoughts, and decided to personally express his condolences to the parents of the children instead of the "official response" in the past.

He contacted the parents of the victims at the first time: "I can't imagine the pain you are going through", "but I can assure you that similar incidents will never happen again!"

Later, Iger synchronized his promise to the team. Less than 24 hours later, ropes, fences and signs were tied all over Orlando Disneyland. To fulfill the promise of "never happening again".

At the same time, on the other side of the world, Iger tried to suppress his inner pain and took photos with the VIPs attending the opening ceremony in the amusement facilities ... "This is the most painful day of my career!"

In any case, a bad news that made everyone feel stressed was gradually transformed into a "solvable problem" by Iger.

In Iger's 45-year career, there are many similar stressful moments. This also proves my point just now-successful people are masters of dealing with stress!

You may say: these people are natural leaders, not ordinary people can compare.

In fact, there is no such thing as a favored child. Everyone's career begins with ordinary employees and is done step by step.

Although Iger always wanted to enter the film and television industry, his first job was just a weather announcer in a small county. Later, because my uncle was ill, I met the director of ABC TV station when I visited the hospital, and then I joined ABC as a lighting tester: I went to the studio at 4 o'clock every morning and debugged all the lights before the TV program officially started.

Who would have thought that it was such an ordinary employee who, after 30 years, became a giant who almost dominated the global film and television entertainment industry.

Therefore, the gap between ordinary people and successful people lies not in the number of difficulties encountered, but in the fact that the latter has mastered a set of effective strategies and methods to deal with difficulties.

"I usually don't get too anxious when something goes wrong."

"I am used to treating bad news as a problem that can be handled and solved, something that can be actively controlled, rather than something that comes to me."

For example, Edgar's experience from Chief Operating Officer (COO) to Chief Executive Officer (CEO) is comparable to any presidential election.

Is it so difficult to transfer the top management of a company?

In March 2004, the then CEO of Disney was eisner, and Iger was his second-in-command and chief operating officer of Disney. In fact, it is reasonable to say that it is natural for the CEO to step down and the chief operating officer to take over.

But the problem is that eisner did not retire with honor, but was ousted because of poor management. This led his current deputy, Iger, to either draw a clear line with the "former sinner" or give up the competition of Disney CEO.

But neither of these things is what Edgar wants. What should we do?

Edgar first told himself not to panic and stabilize his mood.

He remembered the five years of managing Disney with Eisner, and eisner taught him a lot. He can't blame eisner for his promotion.

In this case, Edgar once again turned his attention to the problem itself: everyone opposed the current crisis of the company, not a specific person. Our goal is to keep the company developing healthily. It is not contradictory in essence.

So, according to this idea, Iger came up with a solution: let the board of directors know their business philosophy of "focusing on the future" through campaign activities, and believe that they are the best candidates to lead Disney out of the trough!

Specifically, "running for CEO", Iger has three core ideas:

First, high-quality content will become more and more precious in the future, and Disney should make every effort to create high-quality content;

Second, in the future, Disney should fully embrace technology, so that consumers can easily watch these high-quality content anytime and anywhere;

Third, diversify consumer groups, and Disney will be deeply rooted in the international market in the future.

In this way, after rounds of interviews by the board of directors, in March 2005, Iger finally succeeded in bypassing the dilemma of "confessing the past" and was appointed as the CEO of Disney!

So, can Edgar breathe a sigh of relief and become the CEO of his large multinational company?

Things are far from simple.

As the saying goes, a new official takes office with three fires.

Disney's new CEO doesn't have the common conceit and arrogance of new leaders. Because he knows very well that he inherited the lowest tide in Disney's history.

From 1995 to 2005, Disney spent 10+ billion dollars on animated films, and spent hundreds of millions on advertising alone. But as a result, none of these films are popular. On the contrary, in 10, Pixar animation was very popular, such as Toy Story, Bug Crisis, Monster Company and so on. Not only did it create a precedent for 3D animation, but it also set new box office records for animated films.

In the face of strong competitors, at this time, Iger once again took out his own "pressure three axes"-first sort out his emotions.

"If the fear of new things is taken as the starting point of action, then innovation is out of the question."

After calming down, further refine the question: what have we encountered?

The reason why Disney movies continue to slump is that no movies are as popular as Mickey Mouse and Donald Duck. On the contrary, the super IP launched by competitors, such as Buzz Lightyear, Marvel Universe, Star Wars and X-Men, are all popular among young people.

Now that these animated IPS have been successful, instead of trying to create a stronger screen image, it is better to buy these IPS that have been screened out by the market and become Disney assets, and then operate them.

In this way, Iger found a way to revive Disney, which is to fill Disney's shortcomings through mergers and acquisitions: first buy super IP, and then use them to create high-quality content.

He first found Jobs, then chairman of Pixar.

We might as well look at this transaction from the perspective of a third person:

The acquirer Disney has a large scale and abundant funds, but it has been in a downturn for a long time;

Pixar, the acquired party, has many super IPS, as well as a large number of world-class animation talents and advanced digital animation technology. At the same time, Iger also plans to let Pixar's two management backbones help Disney animation revival, and enhance the production ability and diversity of Disney animated films with Pixar's animation engineers, directors, screenwriters and advanced technologies.

In a word, this acquisition is basically bad for Pixar, which is on the rise. In addition, the previous cooperation with Disney broke down because of the disagreement between the top management of the two companies.

How should we talk about this business?

The result is still the first three steps, which makes Iger solve these problems perfectly.

Clear up your emotions first.

Everyone knows that Jobs is eccentric and difficult to talk to, plus he doesn't have much bargaining chip. Most people think of this and either give up or take a chance with resistance.

However, if you negotiate with emotions, the result will definitely be a collapse.

Iger took the initiative to show weakness and made a phone call to Jobs. Lower yourself, the big deal is to let the other party laugh. What if it succeeds?

As a result, I didn't expect Jobs to flatly refuse. Instead, I asked Iger to meet with Apple and discuss it in detail. After several rounds of in-depth communication, Iger learned that the cooperation between the two companies failed at the beginning because Jobs thought Disney's style was too bureaucratic, and the top management was not only inflexible, but also very inflexible in decision-making.

Therefore, in this acquisition negotiation, he attached great importance to protecting Pixar's tradition and culture.

The two sides extracted the cultural characteristics of Pixar one by one and finally formed a list. These include, but are not limited to, the tradition that Pixar employees continue to use their original email addresses, the Pixar logo hanging on buildings, and the monthly beer carnival.

Finally, in 2006, Disney bought Pixar for $7.4 billion. The deal not only gave Disney super IP, top talents and technology, but also gave Iger a valuable ally, Jobs, who joined the Disney board of directors.

Later, Iger led Disney to acquire Marvel Pictures and Lucasfilm. Even, it attracted the object of the initiative to ask for the acquisition.

In 20 17, Disney acquired 20th century fox with a total amount of 71300 million USD.

In this acquisition, Disney acquired a series of super IPs of X-Men, became the largest shareholder of Hulu, a streaming media platform, and also acquired a number of content companies around the world.

The only requirement for the other party to agree to the acquisition is: "Buy my company, but Robert Iger must be another CEO!"

As early as 20 1 1, Disney announced that Edgar would step down as CEO on 20 15. As a result, for various reasons, Iger's resignation was forced to be postponed for four times. Until February this year, Iger once again announced that he would step down at the end of 20021.

When he took office, he was questioned and went through hardships; When I left office, I was retained again and again, and I couldn't do it if I wanted to!

This superb method of coping with pressure not only helped Iger lead Disney out of the trough and become a leader in the global animation industry again, but also created a bright road to the peak of his career.

Specifically, it includes the following three steps-

Stabilize your mood: when facing the pressure of work and life, please keep a heartfelt sense of humility; No matter how powerful and important the world says you are, stick to your knowledge.

Distinguish the problem: what can I change; I can't control it. Then focus on what you can control.

Find a way: don't think about the feat in one step, you will have an inch of joy.

How's it going? Have you learned?

If you want to know more about Edgar and Disney, you might as well find a copy of Robert Iger's latest autobiography, A Life's Journey, and read it quietly in a leisurely afternoon.

In the castle of fairy tales, there are not only wonderful stories, but also thought-provoking and enlightening wisdom!