Disney this week announced Josh D’Amaro, its parks chief, as the winner of its very public race to be its next CEO; he’ll take the reins from outgoing chief executive Bob Iger in March. But along with the glory of the CEO crown and the monumental task of running the complex entertainment giant, D’Amaro faces a tricky personnel challenge: becoming the boss of his former peer. Dana Walden, Disney’s TV and entertainment chief, was reportedly a fellow CEO contender he beat out for the job.
The Fortune 500 is littered with examples of wannabe CEOs who left their companies after being passed over for the top job. And leaving can be a natural response to such a snub. Famously, when GE named Jeff Immelt CEO in 2001, the three other internal candidates eventually departed the company for top jobs elsewhere. Former Apple retail chief Ron Johnson left to become CEO at J.C. Penney when the tech giant named Tim Cook CEO in 2011. Just last month, Walmart announced that its international CEO, Kathryn McLay, considered a CEO contender, was leaving the company following the appointment of John Furner as the retail giant’s next chief.
But in Disney’s case, Walden seems likely to stick around, at least for a while. In announcing D’Amaro as CEO, Disney also promoted Walden, a respected Hollywood insider, to president and chief creative officer. She’s the first to hold that title in the company’s 102-year history, and it gives her oversight of all of Disney’s movies and streaming series. Along with praising Walden’s creative and storytelling bona fides, the Disney press release notes that she “will report directly to D’Amaro,” the guy who beat her out for the CEO job.
