Creativity, Inc.
The co-founder and longtime president of Pixar updates and expands his 2014 New York Times bestseller on creative leadership, reflecting on the management principles that built Pixar’s singularly successful culture, and on all he learned during the past nine years that allowed Pixar to retain its creative culture while continuing to evolve.“Might be the most thoughtful management book ever.”—Fast Company For nearly thirty years, Pixar has dominated the world of animation, producing such beloved films as the Toy Story trilogy, Finding Nemo, The Incredibles, Up, and WALL-E, which have gone on to set box-office records and garner eighteen Academy Awards. The joyous storytelling, the inventive plots, the emotional authenticity: In some ways, Pixar movies are an object lesson in what creativity really is. Here, Catmull reveals the ideals and techniques that have made Pixar so widely admired—and so profitable. As a young man, Ed Catmull had a dream: to make the first computer-animated movie. He nurtured that dream as a Ph.D. student, and then forged a partnership with George Lucas that led, indirectly, to his founding Pixar with Steve Jobs and John Lasseter in 1986. Nine years later, Toy Story was released, changing animation forever. The essential ingredient in that movie’s success—and in the twenty-five movies that followed—was the unique environment that Catmull and his colleagues built at Pixar, based on philosophies that protect the creative process and defy convention, such as:• Give a good idea to a mediocre team and they will screw it up. But give a mediocre idea to a great team and they will either fix it or come up with something better.• It’s not the manager’s job to prevent risks. It’s the manager’s job to make it safe for others to take them.• The cost of preventing errors is often far greater than the cost of fixing them.• A company’s communication structure should not mirror its organizational structure. Everybody should be able to talk to anybody.Creativity, Inc. has been significantly expanded to illuminate the continuing development of the unique culture at Pixar. It features a new introduction, two entirely new chapters, four new chapter postscripts, and changes and updates throughout. Pursuing excellence isn’t a one-off assignment but an ongoing, day-in, day-out, full-time job. And Creativity, Inc. explores how it is done.
The Quest for the First Digital Dream
Ed Catmull’s lifelong dream was to create the world’s first computer-animated feature film, a journey that began at Lucasfilm and led to the founding of Pixar. He reflects that technical prowess alone was insufficient for success; the real challenge lay in building a sustainable creative culture. In the early days of Toy Story, he realized that the film’s triumph was more than a technological breakthrough. It was a testament to a management philosophy that prioritized human connection over hardware. This foundation set the stage for a studio that would redefine storytelling by blending cutting-edge computer science with deep, relatable emotional resonance and artistic integrity.
Prioritizing People Over Great Ideas
A core tenet of Pixar’s philosophy is that if you give a good idea to a mediocre team, they will screw it up, but if you give a mediocre idea to a brilliant team, they will fix it or find something better. Catmull argues that the quality of people and their interactions is significantly more important than the initial concept. Management’s role is not to prevent risks but to build a team capable of recovering when things inevitably go wrong. By focusing on talent density and interpersonal dynamics, a leader creates an environment where excellence becomes a natural byproduct of collaboration rather than a forced result.
The Power of Candor and the Braintrust
The Braintrust is Pixar’s primary mechanism for maintaining quality through peer review. It consists of experienced directors and storytellers who provide honest, candor-filled feedback on projects in development. Crucially, the Braintrust has no authority to mandate changes, leaving the director in final creative control. This dynamic removes the defensiveness often found in corporate reviews, fostering a culture where the problem is the enemy, not the person. By stripping away ego and focusing strictly on the needs of the story, Pixar ensures that every film is scrutinized by the best minds in the building long before it reaches a theater audience.
Embracing Failure as a Creative Catalyst
Fear of failure is the greatest enemy of innovation, and Catmull explains that in a creative industry, mistakes are both inevitable and necessary. If a studio is not failing occasionally, it means they are not pushing boundaries or taking enough risks. The goal of management is to make it safe for employees to fail by reducing the cost of mistakes and encouraging experimentation. By decoupling failure from shame, Pixar allows its artists to explore unconventional paths. This iterative process, where ugly babies eventually grow into masterpieces, is only possible when the organization views failure as a valuable learning opportunity rather than a disaster.
Identifying and Challenging Hidden Blind Spots
Even the most successful leaders have blind spots—things they cannot see because of their position or perspective. Catmull highlights the danger of assuming that because things are going well, the culture is healthy. He encourages leaders to actively seek out hidden problems by talking to employees at all levels and creating channels for honest communication. This vigilance is required to combat the natural tendency of organizations to become complacent or hierarchical. By acknowledging that they do not have all the answers, managers can foster a sense of shared ownership and collective responsibility for the health and creative future of the entire studio.
Feeding the Beast and Protecting the New
Production is a hungry Beast that demands resources, schedules, and efficiency. While the Beast is necessary to finish a film, it can easily crush new, fragile ideas that need time to develop. Catmull discusses the tension between the creative need for exploration and the institutional need for productivity. Leaders must act as protectors of the new, giving fledgling projects the space to breathe without the immediate pressure of perfection. Balancing these two opposing forces is a delicate act that requires constant adjustment to ensure that the drive for efficiency does not stifle the very creativity that fuels the company’s long-term success.
Mental Models and the Art of Management
Managers often use mental models to understand their roles, such as seeing a company as a machine or a garden. Catmull prefers the image of a garden, where the leader’s job is to provide the right environment for growth rather than controlling every outcome. He emphasizes that management is not about control; it is about creating a culture that remains healthy over time. By shifting the focus from results to the processes and people that generate those results, leaders can build organizations that are resilient, adaptable, and capable of sustained excellence across multiple decades and shifting, unpredictable market conditions.
Learning Through Rigorous Postmortems
To prevent the same mistakes from recurring, Pixar utilizes postmortems—detailed reviews held after a project's completion. While these meetings can be uncomfortable, they are essential for institutional learning. Catmull notes that postmortems should focus on data and specific experiences rather than blame. They allow the team to consolidate what they have learned, celebrate their successes, and identify structural issues that might impede future projects. By formalizing the reflection process, Pixar ensures that every film, whether a hit or a struggle, contributes to the collective wisdom of the entire studio and improves the creative workflow for everyone in the next production cycle.
Merging Cultures and the Disney Renaissance
When Disney acquired Pixar, Catmull and John Lasseter were tasked with revitalizing Disney Animation, which had been struggling for years. They applied Pixar’s principles—candor, the Braintrust, and people-first management—to the legacy studio. Crucially, they did not try to turn Disney into a Pixar clone; instead, they helped Disney find its own creative voice again. This transition demonstrated that Pixar’s success was not a fluke or tied to specific individuals, but was the result of a replicable philosophy that values the human element of creativity. The resulting Disney renaissance proved the universal power of these specific, culture-driven management principles.
Sustaining Vigilance in a Changing World
The book concludes with a call for eternal vigilance because a healthy culture is not a destination but a continuous process of adjustment. As organizations grow, they naturally drift toward bureaucracy and risk-aversion. Catmull warns that leaders must remain proactive in identifying and removing obstacles to creativity. By staying curious, fostering candor, and always prioritizing the health of the team, a company can survive the pressures of success and continue to innovate. The ultimate goal is to create an environment where everyone feels empowered to contribute their best work and help shape the future through shared honesty and mutual respect.