The Walt Disney Company Board of Directors introduced that it has elected impartial director Mark G. Parker as Chairman of the Board, efficient following the Annual Meeting of Shareholders. This put up shares the official announcement plus our commentary and context about how this matches into the larger image of the Battle of the Bobs and Iger’s succession planning.
Mark Parker is a seven-year member of the Walt Disney Company’s Board and the Executive Chairman of Nike. Parker will succeed Susan E. Arnold, who’s ineligible for re-election pursuant to the 15-year time period restrict beneath Disney’s Board Tenure Policy. Rather than filling the empty seat, the scale of Disney’s Board of Directors will contract to 11 members.
“Mark Parker is an incredibly well-respected leader who over seven years as a Disney director has helped the Company effectively navigate through a time of unprecedented change,” Ms. Arnold stated. “During his four decades at Nike, Mark has led one of the world’s most recognized consumer brands through various market evolutions and a successful CEO transition, and he is uniquely positioned to chair the Disney Board during this period of transformation.”
“Mark Parker’s vision, incredible depth of experience and wise counsel have been invaluable to Disney, and I look forward to continuing working with him in his new role, along with our other directors, as we chart the future course for this amazing company,” stated Robert A. Iger, Chief Executive Officer, The Walt Disney Company. “On behalf of my fellow Board members and the entire Disney management team, I also want to thank Susan for her superb leadership as Chairman and for her tireless work over the past 15 years as an exemplary steward of the Disney brand.”
Said Mr. Parker: “I am honored to have the opportunity to serve as Disney’s Chairman, and I look forward to working closely with Bob and his management team on a strategy of growth that balances investment with profitability, while preserving Disney’s core mission of creative excellence, to deliver shareholder value. At the same time, it is the top priority of mine and the Board’s to identify and prepare a successful CEO successor, and that process has already begun.”
The Walt Disney Company Board has continued to evolve to make sure it has the appropriate mixture of backgrounds, ability units and views to information the Company into the longer term. Today, Disney’s administrators deliver expertise throughout a related vary of disciplines, together with model, advertising and marketing and retail, direct-to-consumer experience, and expertise and innovation.
The Board is nominating for re-election on the Company’s Annual Meeting incumbent administrators Mary T. Barra, Safra A. Catz, Amy L. Chang, Francis A. deSouza, Carolyn Everson, Michael B.G. Froman, Robert A. Iger, Maria Elena Lagomasino, Calvin R. McDonald, Mark G. Parker and Derica W. Rice.
In the identical press launch, Disney additionally made the wholly unsurprising announcement that it opposes activist investor Nelson Peltz’s try to affix the board. Late final 12 months, Peltz’s Trian Group took an $800 million stake in Disney and started pushing for a board seat. Trian is searching for operational enhancements and cost-cutting, whereas additionally opposing Bob Iger’s return as Disney’s CEO. On that foundation alone, it was fairly apparent that Disney was going to rebuff Trian’s makes an attempt to realize affect on the corporate.
“The Walt Disney Company remains open to constructive engagement and ideas that help drive shareholder value. While senior leadership of The Walt Disney Company and its Board of Directors have engaged with Mr. Peltz numerous times over the last few months, the Board does not endorse the Trian Group nominee, and recommends that shareholders not support its nominee, and instead vote FOR all the Company’s nominees,” Disney said in its press launch.
This additional ups the ante in what’s prone to be a giant and messy energy wrestle. We virtually actually haven’t heard the final of this, and it might turn out to be a subject of competition as quickly because the earnings name subsequent month. However, it is a fan weblog and never Bloomberg, so we’ll desk that subject for now.
More notably to the way forward for the corporate, incoming Chairman of the Board Mark Parker can even head the newly created Succession Planning Committee of the Board. This will advise the Board of Directors on CEO succession planning, together with assessment of inside and exterior candidates. Mr. Parker served as Nike’s Chairman and CEO till 2020, when he turned Executive Chairman.
This is a giant deal. In the unique announcement that Bob Iger was returning, the Walt Disney Company said that it was “with a mandate from the Board to set the strategic direction for renewed growth and to work closely with the Board in developing a successor to lead the Company at the completion of his term.” This was undoubtedly a aware inclusion, as Iger had infamously averted correct succession planning, arguably pushing apart a number of worthy heir-apparents and increasing his personal reign in consequence.
Even when you’re not a Nike fan, you may acknowledge the title Mark Parker. That’s as a result of he got here up throughout the entire Battle of the Bobs palace intrigue again in November. There had been leaks then that some members of Disney’s Board wished to interchange Chapek and appoint Nike chairman Mark Parker as a stopgap CEO in the course of the search course of.
However, sources point out that Parker declined the position a number of occasions. General Motors govt Mary Barra additionally advocated changing Chapek on the June assembly of the board.
However, not each member of the board was on board with changing Chapek over the summer season. Most notably, departing Board Chairman Susan Arnold advocated for Chapek. According to studies, she sided with Chapek from the start, even earlier than Iger left. At each flip, she bolstered her perception that Chapek ought to be given an opportunity to run the corporate.
In the aftermath of Rice’s firing, Arnold launched a supposedly unanimous assertion of board “confidence and support” for Chapek. At that point, business chatter famous that the assertion was hole and not using a contract renewal for Chapek, which was the true present of confidence. “You let the CEO get within a year of his contract being up,” one business energy participant stated on the time. “That by itself is a statement of non-support. A vote of confidence is nonsense.”
When the board mentioned Chapek’s contract final June, some wished to increase it for less than two years. Arnold argued that might undercut Chapek, so a compromise was reached: Chapek’s contract was prolonged for 3 years however backdated. That left barely greater than 2 years remaining on his take care of Disney. Of course, everyone knows how that ended.
Arnold’s allegiances to Chapek make me marvel if she would’ve been out as Chairman of the Board even had been she not ineligible pursuant to the 15-year time period restrict beneath Disney’s Board Tenure Policy. Iger looks as if one to worth loyalty, and never take kindly to perceived slights. It’s additionally possible that he’ll need to consolidate energy and have allies on the Succession Planning Committee of the Board.
Since his return, there was limitless hypothesis about potential successors to Iger. Internal CEO candidates have already been recognized who may be capable of take the job over time by Disney’s Board. That truly occurred whereas contemplating tips on how to exchange Chapek, however the Board didn’t need to put somebody new in that place given all numerous pressures on the corporate.
There are senior executives at Disney who could possibly be groomed into chief govt materials, together with Dana Walden, Disney’s tv chief, and Josh D’Amaro, Disney’s theme park chairman. But the Board doesn’t assume both is sort of prepared.
None of this could come as an enormous shock to those that have been following this saga. In Experts Predict Big Changes for Disney in 2023, Hollywood insiders shared their expectations for the corporate this 12 months, and though they had been in every single place, the final vibe was considered one of tumult. The business is anticipating govt management shake-ups, mergers, and extra in 2023 for the Walt Disney Company. It would appear that has begun, solely 11 days in!
In 5 Businesses Disney Should Buy or Sell, we recommended that Disney ought to purchase Candle Media primarily as a expertise acquisition play for Mayer and Staggs. That duo serving as co-heads of Disney with an Eisner-Wells dynamic is a dreamlike state of affairs. It’s a terrific prediction from a ‘things that should happen’ perspective, however I’m far much less sure of it from a ‘things that will happen’ perspective. Definitely a protracted shot, however Iger does take large swings.
Some insiders have speculated that McCarthy’s intimate relationship with the board may result in Iger selecting her as his successor for CEO. In Disney CFO Rumored to Succeed Bob Iger as CEO, we primarily pleaded with Disney to not make the identical mistake twice. Disney wants a charismatic storyteller in its prime spot, not a numbers particular person. That doesn’t imply McCarthy is a foul CFO. To the opposite, what she did to navigate Disney by the tough waters of 2020 was masterful.
Ultimately, the creation of the Succession Planning Committee of the Board is an efficient transfer by the Walt Disney Company. The largest blemish on Bob Iger’s legacy is his failure to do that prior to now, which resulted in Bob Chapek’s Reign of Terror. As a lot as we’re comfortable to have Iger again on the helm, we additionally don’t belief him to lastly get succession planning proper on his personal. He’d in all probability simply preserve extending his tenure repeatedly if left to his personal units.
When it got here out again in November that Susan Arnold had backed Chapek behind the scenes, I figured she wouldn’t be round for much longer. (Granted, I had no clue she was approaching her 15-year time period restrict.) That was additionally when Mark Parker’s title got here onto my radar as he was floated as an interim CEO, so I did a little bit of studying about him. (Here’s a terrific profile on Mark Parker from Fast Company.)
Based on that and different profiles, I’ve gotta say that Mark Parker being Chairman and heading up the Succession Planning Committee is admittedly excellent news. In his time at Nike, Parker turned synonymous with the corporate’s fast progress, expertise progress, and product innovation. He was first employed as a footwear designer in 1979, labored on a wide range of massively influential merchandise, and continued top-shelf designs for HTM, a collaboration between he and two different famend designers.
Parker turned Nike CEO in 2006 and remained closely concerned in product, design, advertising and marketing, expertise offers, and the corporate’s Innovation Kitchen. (Not a kitchen for meals–extra like Imagineering’s R&D lab.) Even although they’re dramatically totally different corporations, it certain appears like Parker obtained the well-rounded skillset at Nike that it might take to attain success at Disney. He additionally sounds precisely like the kind of obsessive inventive chief that might be an ideal match for the Walt Disney Company and its wealthy legacy. Perhaps it’s unlucky that he didn’t take the interim position, however at the very least he’ll head the search and collection of Disney’s subsequent CEO.
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YOUR THOUGHTS
What do you consider Mark Parker being named Chairman of Disney’s Board? Thoughts on the Succession Planning Committee or the rest mentioned right here? Optimistic that Iger will lastly get selecting a successor proper? Are you bullish or bearish concerning the firm’s future because the Walt Disney Company enters its a hundredth 12 months? Think issues will enhance or worsen all through 2023? Do you agree or disagree with our evaluation? Any questions we might help you reply? Hearing your suggestions–even while you disagree with us–is each attention-grabbing to us and useful to different readers, so please share your ideas under within the feedback!