Business Lessons from How Marvel Makes Movies

HBR IdeaCast

Harvard Business Review

Leadership, Entrepreneurship, Communication, Marketing, Business, Business/management, Management, Business/marketing, Business/entrepreneurship, Innovation, Hbr, Strategy, Economics, Finance, Teams, Harvard

4.4 • 1.9K Ratings

🗓️ 16 July 2019

⏱️ 28 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Spencer Harrison, an associate professor at INSEAD, says that managers in any industry can learn from the success of the Marvel movie franchise. While some sequels lack creativity, Marvel manages to make each of its new releases just different enough, so consumers are not just satisfied but also surprised. Research shows that several strategies drive this success; they include bringing in different types of talent while also maintaining a stable core creative team then working together to challenge the superhero action-film formula. And, Harrison argues, leaders in other industries and functions can easily apply them to their own businesses. He is the co-author of the HBR article "Marvel's Blockbuster Machine."

Transcript

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0:00.0	Kurt Nick is here from Ideacast. I want to tell you about the Big Take
0:05.1	podcast from Bloomberg News. Each weekday they bring you one important story
0:10.0	from their global newsroom like how AI will upend your life and why China's
0:15.4	targeting the US dollar. Check out the big take from Bloomberg wherever you listen. Welcome to the HPR Ideacast from Harvard Business Review. I'm Allison Beard. It's summer in the northern hemisphere.
0:44.0	It's summer in the northern hemisphere.
0:51.0	For some of us, that means hitting the beach. For others it means lining up to see
0:54.6	the latest blockbuster, one of those big budget movies full of stars and special effects
0:59.2	that are guaranteed to blow you away. One studio has both dominated and reinvented
1:05.2	this genre over the past decade, with characters
1:07.9	whose voices you might recognize.
1:09.8	You want my property.
1:10.7	You can't have it.
1:11.8	But I did you a big favor I have successfully
1:14.9	privatized world peace and you're a tree a race of noble warriors heroes heroes
1:20.6	noble warrior heroes the wise Heroes. Nobel Warrior heroes.
1:24.0	The wise built bridges,
1:26.0	where the foolish built barriers.
1:29.0	Are you mocking me?
1:31.0	Are you marking me?
1:32.0	Are you marking me? Is you stop me? Is it stop it? You just didn't do it again?
1:35.1	He's trying to copy it.
1:37.0	Enough!
	...

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