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Savings Experiment: Snow RemovalWalt Disney Co. (NYSE: DIS) has a unit called the Disney Institute. It trains workers and management from other companies and government agencies. Recent customers include Miami International Airport, General Motors Corp. (NYSE: GM), IBM (NYSE: IBM), and the IRS.
The corporate culture at Disney of emphasizing customer service and attention to detail "are transferable across industries, across cultures, and across different sizes and shapes of organizations," the head of the Institute told The New York Times. A typical trainer at the organization has averaged 10 years with Disney.
But, operating the training company may be be in Disney's best interests.
Disney's revenue in the June quarter was over $9 billion. The parks and resorts segment brought in $2.9 billion. Most of the company's "trainers" for consumer services undoubtedly come from this unit. Does it really benefit the company to move managers from such an important business so that they can train people at other companies.
The revenue from Disney Institute is not material enough to show up in the Disney 10-Q.
Why is Disney training management at other companies? There probably is not a good answer for that. And, it is a bad idea. It takes resources away from a critically important part of the company.
Douglas A. McIntyre is a partner at 24/7 Wall St.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
10-02-2007 @ 9:03PM
LJ said...
Disney gets paid for these seminars. If they charge the same way they do for other things in their parks, they are no doubt making a bundle. Why is this seen as a problem? Certainly most seminars would not last more than a few days. Exactly how many companies are going to pony up the money for such a thing? In other words, is this division of Disney booking corporate training session back-to-back? If they are, they are raking in the cash. If they are not, their personnel are available to be put to work in other areas of Disney where their talents would be needed. It sounds win-win to me. In addition, I feel like Disney people are exceptionally well trained, especially in customer service. If their concepts were spread to other American corporations I can only think that would be a very good thing.