Autocratic Decision Speed Over Analysis

"Some journalists who wrote about him claimed it was due to the streak of gray hair he combed back, which enhanced his stately bearing. Businessmen attributed the nickname to his tendency to pounce on some coveted asset or to rush into a new venture; his decisions seemed based more on animal instinct than on any analysis. “If you propose an idea to him, right then he tells you whether he’ll buy it or whether he thinks you’re stupid,” said Ambassador Agustín Barrios Gómez, who worked for many years at Televisa. “He never says ‘Call me Monday.’ It’s ‘Let’s do it’ or ‘Fuck off.’” Rather than spend time reading up on a subject, Azcárraga preferred to seek out experts, bombard them with questions, and then make a quick, Solomonic decision."

"Moreover, for most of his reign, Televisa was subject to a highly centralized decision-making system, even by Latin American standards. When Azcárraga left the country, as happened frequently, operations beyond day-to-day entertainment production practically ground to a halt. The court barely functioned without the king. Co-investment projects lost momentum, the launch of subsidiaries was delayed, and new programs piled up waiting for the green light. To the repeated frustration of its foreign partners, clients, and suppliers, the refusal to delegate decisions was emulated by executives across much of the company."

"This was Emilio Azcárraga’s greatest irony: while he was obsessed with control, his whims often got out of hand. Despite being a visionary entrepreneur—a keen theorist of long-term scenarios and a deft prophet in communications—he was very erratic as an administrator. As he liked to tell his executives: “A true entrepreneur always has more projects than money.” He was fascinated by the fertile world of business and enjoyed predicting how the seeds he had sown would germinate and flourish in the years to come, but he was also quickly bored by details—that is, having to invest time in the watering and pruning of his fields—and if he did not see an immediate planting, he often lost interest."