Right out of the gate, a couple of quick observations I liked about this book, even before reading a single page was the larger print size and the relatively short chapters length.
I purchased the book on pre-order and have incrementally been reading it over the past few weeks and finished the last chapter today.
While this is an autobiography of Marty Sklar, the narrative within the entire book doesnt at all seem self-effacing or self-aggrandizing by the author, but rather he describes his life more as a lifelong Disney story and journey and introduces the reader to so many other people into his narrative that you almost forget the book is about Marty Sklar. I felt very drawn into the situations Marty describes so vividly in his book, that I almost felt like I was attending the same meetings with him when he and other Disney Execs were travelling to meet prospective financiers for WDW and other major capital expenditure ventures. You get introduced to so many different people and personalities within the Disney organization that helped shape and influence Martys career and obviously many people he collaborated with and influenced.
In the early chapters of the book when he and so many other Disney employees were standing up
Disneyland, I really enjoyed hearing of the interactions between Walt Disney himself, Marty Sklar and many other innovators who made up his inner leadership circle. Many people can write about interactions with Walt Disney, but the dialogue may be heresay or many layers removed from the person actually engaged in the conversation with Walt and so you never really know if what is being described is fact or fiction. So we are treated to having the conversations recounted between Walt Disney and Marty and others primarily first hand.
I am very familiar with the majority of the names cited by Marty in his book, given my extensive Disney book collection (hobby) over 20 years, but what really stuck in my mind was how The Walt Disney Company was able to so successfully attract and retain some of the best and brightest talent at a time when theme park creation was very limited and the identification and hiring of such exceptional talent in both Imagineering and feature animation with the nine old men and many others is simply mind-boggling.
So as I progressed in reading through further chapters in the book, it becomes very obvious that even the Disney dynasty cannot rest on their laurels in being self-content with their prior successes in the construction of Disneyland and how the Florida Project and the construction of Disney World and attracting the right financiers was a lot of work for Marty and many other luminaries in the company. I think you get more of a collective we vs I when Marty discusses the level of effort to bring Imagineering innovations to life and other business related Imagineering ventures. Someone to be successful at Martys level not only has to have the technological know-how, but the business acumen and strategic planning abilities to make dreams a reality. But additionally, to be an effective leader, you need a lot of soft skills as well and I enjoyed reading Martys personal notes he hand wrote to people in his organization that he recognized for their efforts. This practice made me think how this inexpensive positive reinforcement practice is so lacking by many managers I have dealt with over the years . . . I intentionally left of the labeling of leaders in my description, because this is an Art that is barely practiced today from my experiences and is sorely needed in todays corporate leaders.
Clearly there was no love lost between Marty in Imagineering and some in Disney Operations, particularly in the discussion about the deterioration in the overall maintenance in some of the parks and the corporate reporting structure with Imagineering falling under the control of Operations at one point.
It really took someone who had Martys gravitas and deep history and personal working relationship with Walt, to stand-up to what he observed was wrong and have the political courage to recommend a course correction when short-term financial gains through merchandising superseded the long term development and nurturing of the creative content which allows for any long term merchandising to be successful in the first place.
When you finish reading this book and you begin the process of distancing yourself from the people, processes and technology innovation described throughout the book and you begin to analyze the underlying themes and messaging, the one pattern you can detect in almost every chapter is about leadership, as previously noted. While the book is about Marty Sklar and his lifelong working journey as the head of Disney Imagineering, but yet again, he cites very good examples of other bona fide risk takers and pioneering collaborators at Disney who created the magic throughout the Disney enterprise and cites their leadership successes (e.g. To name only a few noteworthy luminaries like John Hench, Herb Ryman, and particularly Marc Davis who was a double creative threat as both a master animator and Imagineer were all rock stars in their day and their legacy continues today) .
Walt Disney knew what he wanted in the end result, but I dont think from reading this book that he was in any way prescriptive in telling his direct reports, what exactly he wanted in the end product. Walt hired you for your creative talents and it sounded like he gave his people plenty of rope in the creative process, but it seems that his team were measured by their results and not necessarily their efforts and direct praise from him would be more the exception rather than the rule and communicated more circuitous than perhaps some would have preferred.
In conclusion, the only area that I personally would have liked to have seen discussed in the book was perhaps less of the Art of the Deal from a business focus and equal time given to discussions on what Imagineering does best and that is in its technological innovations. Perhaps a chapter or two discussing the Imagineering creative processes and perhaps discussion of the Imagineering that never was (similar to a book released many years ago describing the Disney animation that never was). Being a technical person, I would like to have heard about Imagineer successes and failures. But with that being said, I also realize that its a fine balance that has to be walked between a discussion in the abstract and the risk of divulging any proprietary Disney Intellectual Property (IP). Perhaps a sequel book for Marty to think about writing for his second book, might be taking a proverbial page out of Frank Thomas and Ollie Johnsons Disney Animation Illusion of Life book, but obviously discussing Imagineering not animation and would not duplicate other previous publications describing the Imagineering creative processes and product.
Has anyone else read part or the entire book and what are your individual thoughts so far?
