Pixar’s boss Ed Catmull agreed. “People encountered each other all day long, inadvertently, which meant a better flow of communication and increased the possibility of chance encounters. You felt the energy in the building.”35 No doubt that is true. But something else matters just as much as serendipity: autonomy. Junior staff were able to stand up to Steve Jobs, the owner, the legend, the control freak’s control freak—and to get their own way about something that mattered to them. That was more important than all the riveted steel and elegant brickwork Pixar’s success could buy.
