With the recent news from Glendale last Tuesday, May 15th, Re-Imagineering may have the most compelling reason to shut its doors to date.
• Former Research and Development Vice President Bruce Vaughn just grabbed the reigns from previous Chief Creative Executive Tom Fitzgerald.
• Former Vice President of Environmental Design and Show Engineering Craig Russell is now Chief Design and Delivery Executive at WDI.
• Former WDI President Don Goodman moves out of WDI and into his new role as executive Vice President for resort development. As Bruce and Craig collectively fill his shoes, there will be no President title moving forward.
Creative executives at WDI (Joe Rohde, Joe Lanzisero and Tony Baxter among others) now report directly to Bruce Vaughn, signaling for many the best news at WDI in years, as fledgling projects will now get pitched directly to upper brass without excess or superfluous management filters.Since the shake-up feelings over at Imagineering have ranged from cautiously optimistic to ecstatic. Regardless, the announcement is a substantial one and could signal the beginning of the end of WDI’s paranoiac, toxic and grade school culture as well as set the stage for the renaissance of WDI into the creative powerhouse and industry leader it once was.
As the days progress look for more restructuring at Imagineering. As Bruce has made clear his feeling that many in creative have been miscast, you can bet that more internal re-org memos will be hitting the inboxes at WDI for a while. And with them a much needed boost to morale at 1401 Flower.
Perhaps it is a Great Big Beautiful Tomorrow after all!
