• by Dana Blankenhorn , January 13, 2003

When AOL bought Time Warner three years ago I wrote a column about it called “The Dumbest Merger Ever.”

I called it a move by bureaucrats to freeze out Ted Turner, who had been promised the succession to Gerald Levin when he sold Turner Broadcasting some years before.

I called it a decision designed to insulate the company from the cold winds of the market. I predicted Steve Case would be isolated and purged.

I caught a lot of flack for that. The column was said to be a bit angry, a little over-the-top. But in fact the deal marked the apex of the dot-com bubble, and the price pricked that bubble like an Exacto knife.

Enough of my brag. What should Time Warner do now?

I hope Ted Turner is finally given the chairmanship in May, because he has the answer in his gut.

Find another entrepreneur.

What I’d like to suggest is that Ted Turner take charge. Turner is the kind of guy you want running this kind of business. He is the ultimate media entrepreneur.

Everyone knew who ran Turner Broadcasting, and they knew what the man wanted. He wanted big ideas, big risks with big pay-offs. He wanted something you could understand in a sentence.

That’s his way. He bet the farm to launch the Superstation, and bet it again on CNN. He bet it again for the MGM library that became TCM and again to get the Hanna-Barbera library that became Cartoon Network.

That’s also the way of the media business generally. This business doesn’t work well with committees. Someone has to be in charge, someone with big ideas, grand visions, and their own money on the line.

Time Warner itself grew that way, from Henry Luce to Steven Ross. It’s a myth that entrepreneurship is a “stage” that companies “outgrow.” That’s the thinking of small men, of bureaucrats, and there are no great committees.

Entrepreneurs are what Time Warner’s rivals have. Sumner Redstone, Rupert Murdoch, even Michael Eisner. There’s one man on the bridge, one vision, one “golden gut,” and everyone else is evaluated based on how well they carry out orders.

Gerald Levin never stared bankruptcy and ruin in the face. Neither has Richard Parsons, not really. Managers try to turn business into a no-lose game, and it’s not that way. It’s battle, it’s struggle, it’s live-or-die with an army behind you. (Why do you think they green light stuff like “Braveheart”?)

Turner’s just 62, a decade younger than Murdoch and two younger than Redstone. If he’s got the fire in the belly, put him in charge.

Or just give him this charge.

Find us another Turner. Buy a small, but fast-growing outfit run by a hard-charging young go-getter. Find someone who has bet the farm and made-out by the skin of his teeth. Buy his company, and put him in charge of a division. See if he’s got the stuff.

You want to look in that man (or woman’s) eyes like you’re looking in the mirror. And you want those eyes to argue with you, challenge you, and refuse to back down.

When you find that man, or woman, Ted, then give them the reins and ride off into the sunset, because then (and only then) your legacy will be secure.