After spending much of his career listening to others pitch programming ideas to ABC, Disney President Robert Iger has a proposal of his own: a reality show about the maneuverings to succeed his boss, Michael Eisner.
He says it could combine the corporate back stabbing of The Apprentice, the competitiveness of Survivor and the prize of Who Wants to Be a Millionaire His name for it: The Successor.
It's a rare joke from the 53-year-old perhaps best known as a humble sidekick to famous CEOs at Disney and at Capital Cities/ABC, which Disney bought in 1996. But Iger may get the last laugh: He appears to be the leading candidate to become the next Lion King of the $30 billion media giant when Eisner retires in September 2006.
Disney Chairman George Mitchell says Iger is the only candidate from inside Disney. That decision "allows me ... to focus on running the company," Iger says.
The board has hired search firm Heidrick & Struggles to help it to name a CEO successor by June 2005.
Iger's biggest stumbling block money-losing, last-place ABC is making a comeback. Its racy Desperate Housewives is the most-watched new fall show.
But he'll also have to win over many Disney shareholders who remain furious that shares have not appreciated over the last five years. Management has been under the gun this year: Smelling blood, Comcast made a run at a hostile takeover of Disney, but was unsuccessful. Several big state pension plans called for Eisner's ouster at the shareholders meeting in March. And 45% of shareholder votes were withheld for Eisner's re-election to the board.
Dissidents now want investors to get to nominate two independent directors.
Leading the Eisner jeering section are former board members Roy Disney and Stanley Gold, who have made it clear they see Iger as an Eisner puppet. They call Disney's succession plan a "smoke screen" for Eisner to try to keep control through Iger and maybe even reclaim the chairman's post.
Others question whether Iger offers a clean enough break or a fresh enough vision. To survive as Eisner's No. 2, Iger has had to be effective but not so prominent that he'd be seen as a threat, says Kim Masters, author of Keys to the Kingdom: The Rise of Michael Eisner and the Fall of Everyone Else. She calls Iger the "Colin Powell of the Eisner administration."
Even Eisner seemed lukewarm on his new employee in 1996. The CEO wrote in a letter to the board that if he were "hit by a truck" he might propose Iger for the top job. "He is not an enlightened or brilliantly creative man, but with a strong board he absolutely could do the job."
Now he says that, "As far as I'm concerned, Bob would be the absolute natural choice" to become CEO.
That endorsement won't impress Eisner's critics, who want the next CEO to be able to repair Disney's many frayed relationships, including those with Steve Jobs' Pixar Animation Studios and the movie-making Weinstein brothers of Disney's Miramax unit.
They also want someone who will lead ABC out of fourth place in prime time. While showing signs of life, it has suffered from a long series of misjudgments, including passing on hits such as CSI: Crime Scene Investigation and The Apprentice.
Iger's determined not to appear overeager. He stuck to guarded comments in an interview. "If any company is going to conduct a succession process right, it's this one," Iger says. "Particularly in this day and age. Because this will not only reflect on the person who gets the job, but on the board itself."
Diplomacy is key because, despite his many critics, the CEO job appears to be Iger's to lose. "The board will make some motions about going outside," Masters says. "But in the end it will be kabuki."
Iger already looks the part of a modern mogul. A fitness buff and triathlete, he's known to rise as early as 4:30 a.m. for workouts. He favors pricey suits and Porsches.
Supporters say there's plenty of substance behind his style.
Jay Rasulo,president of Walt Disney Parks & Resorts, credits Iger with cultivating a strong relationship with the Chinese government. Disney is expected to open a Hong Kong park in late 2005. "When I think about why I'm so bullish on the company, among my top reasons are India and China and what we'll be able to do there," Iger says.
Like many next-generation media executives, Iger is a tech buff and vows to aggressively apply technology "to our creative process." He won the respect of Hewlett-Packard CEO Carly Fiorina while working on the launch of "Mission: Space at Epcot" in Florida: "He crams a lot into a day. He does it with efficiency, grace and humor."
Unlike Eisner with his reputation as a micromanager Iger is willing to share power and credit with others, members of his executive team say.
George Bodenheimer, chief of ESPN and ABC Sports, says Iger provides "me and ESPN with a great deal of support, yet allows us to operate autonomously."
Anne Sweeney, president of Disney-ABC TV, says Iger gave her "100% support" as she expanded the Disney Channel to 22 channels serving 67 countries.
Iger knows that his candidacy may rise and fall with ABC. After joining in 1974, he worked his way up at ABC Sports. He caught the eye of Thomas Murphy, then Capital Cities/ABC CEO, for keeping the 1988 Winter Olympics on track as warm weather disrupted events. "He was cool under fire," Murphy says.
Now many blame Iger for ABC's four-year slide At an investors meeting two years ago, the former ABC president pledged to "roll up his sleeves" and fix the network. Gold and other critics have thrown that promise in his face ever since.
Iger "has to take partial blame" for ABC's woes, says Murphy, who retired from Disney's board this year. He adds, though, that his former protégé has presided over the growth of cable network ESPN.
If Disney hadn't bought Capital Cities/ABC, Murphy says, he would have recommended Iger as his successor. "I spent my life betting on brains," he says. "Bob has brains."
Thanks to shows like Housewives and the adventure series Lost, ABC is up 3% in total viewers for the first five weeks of the season ended Oct. 24. It's up 6% for viewers 18 to 49 years old and 7% for ages 18 to 34 groups advertisers covet.
The result: ABC might turn a profit in fiscal 2005 after an estimated loss of $150 million this year and a $500 million loss in 2003, says analyst William Drewry of Credit Suisse First Boston.
But Iger no longer takes personal responsibility for ABC's performance. He says the key is to empower its new management team: Sweeney and Steve McPherson, president of prime-time entertainment. They took over in late April after Iger pushed out ABC Chairman Lloyd Braun (the two reportedly butted heads over the costly Lost pilot) and President Susan Lyne.
"The only way to fix it is to choose the right people," Iger says. "You have to let them do it themselves and let them come to you for help and guidance."
Iger's detractors say Braun and Lyne deserve credit for developing Housewives and Lost. But supporters point out that Sweeney and McPherson scheduled and marketed them, and McPherson oversaw creation.
Due partly to ABC's gains, Disney shares are up 7.5% to $24.87 since the Sept. 21 news it will launch a formal search for Eisner's successor. The S&P 500 is down 1% in the same period. Disney recently reiterated its forecast of 50% growth in earnings per share for fiscal 2004 and double-digit growth through 2007.
Iger also is emerging as the new face of Disney on Wall Street. "We had a meeting with both Eisner and Iger, and Michael let Bob do most of the talking," says Larry Haverty, managing director of State Street Research, which owns 3 million Disney shares. "That told me all I needed to know right there."
That hasn't stopped talk about other candidates.
Hollywood is buzzing about Terry Semel, the ex-Warner Bros. chief turned Yahoo CEO. He was mum when asked about Disney at a recent analyst session.
Frank Biondi, who was CEO of Universal and Viacom, says he's interested but hasn't been contacted. "It's a great brand," he says, adding that he would want to check the books for any "hidden land mines."
There's also a trio of former Disney executives who've been "sprinkled with fairy dust," as they say at Disney's Burbank lot: Stephen Burke of Comcast, Paul Presser of Gap and eBay's Meg Whitman.
Among other sometimes-mentioned names, ex-Viacom No. 2 Mel Karmazin tells USA TODAY he has "no interest" and News Corp. No. 2 Peter Chernin recently re-upped in a long-term deal.
"Let Bob Iger throw his hat in the ring, and may the best man win," says Cynthia Richson, corporate governance officer for the Ohio Public Employees Retirement System.
