rotmanmagazine.ca / 91culture. We didn’t have the values or habits that encouraged
vigorous questioning of the status quo and challenges to our
assumptions about the future. Part of the reason for that was
management turmoil.
Reflecting on my time there, I do not feel that senior
management — me included — worked well enough togeth-
er to develop a coherent and competitive strategy to analyze
trends, set long-range objectives and monitor performance.
As a result, we didn’t articulate a vision for the industry and
our place in it.
I will say that it is extremely difficult to imagine one’s
demise when you are enjoying the success that we were
having in 2004. It was textbook, really. When you look at
companies that get into trouble, you usually find that the
problems were well known internally but — as was the case
at Wells Fargo — the right questions were not asked or an-
swered; programs that should have been killed were allowed
to continue; and management was too focused on profits.
Ironically, at one point, Blockbuster could actually have
bought Netflix for $50 million. It is now worth — depend-
ing on the day — $130 to $160 billion. As a result of my own
experiences, I strongly encourage every leader to do two
things: Develop a challenge culture; and regularly imagine
your company’s demise.
Nigel Travis is the Chairman of Dunkin’ Brands and was CEO from
2009 through 2018. He was previously CEO of Papa John’s and
President and Chief Operating Officer of Blockbuster. He is the
author of The Challenge Culture: Why the Most Successful Organizations
Run on Pushback (PublicAffairs, 2018).
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