...most notably, in what Pixar calls its “Braintrust.”

A small group that meets every few months or so to assess a movie in process, provide candid feedback to the director, and help solve creative problems, the Braintrust was launched in 1999, when Pixar was rushing to save Toy Story 2, which had gone off the rails. The Braintrust's recipe is fairly simple: a group of directors and storytellers watches an early run of the movie together, eats lunch together, and then provides feedback to the director about what they think worked and what did not. But the recipe's key ingredient is candor. And candor, though simple, is never easy.

Second, despite their frustrations, these production managers felt that they were making history and that John was an inspired leader. Toy Story was a meaningful project to work on. That they liked so much of what they were doing allowed them to put up with the parts of the job they came to resent. This was a revelation to me: The good stuff was hiding the bad stuff. I realized that this was something I needed to look out for: When downsides coexist with upsides, as they often do, people are reluctant to explore what’s bugging them, for fear of being labeled complainers. I also realized that this kind of thing, if left unaddressed, could fester and destroy Pixar.

The first principle was “Story Is King,” by which we meant that we would let nothing - not
the technology, not the merchandising possibilities - get in the way of our story. We took
pride in the fact that reviewers talked mainly about the way Toy Story made them feel and not about the computer wizardry that enabled us to get it up on the screen. We believed that this was the direct result of our always keeping story as our guiding light.

The other principle we depended on was “Trust the Process.” We liked this one because it was so reassuring: While there are inevitably difficulties and missteps in any complex creative endeavor, you can trust that “the process” will carry you through. In some ways, this was no different than any optimistic aphorism (“Hang in there, baby!”), except that because our process was so different from other movie studios, we felt that it had real power. Pixar was a place that gave artists running room, that gave directors control, that trusted its people to solve problems. I have always been wary of maxims or rules because, all too often, they turn out to be empty platitudes that impede thoughtfulness, but these two principles actually seemed to help our people.

And yet, as we made those unconventional choices, everyone agreed, we needed to outline
better, more explicit steps to train and prepare those we felt had the necessary skills to make
movies. Instead of hoping that our director candidates would absorb our shared wisdom through osmosis, we resolved to create a formal mentoring program that would, in a sense,
give to others what Pete and Andrew and Lee had experienced working so closely with John
in the early days. Going forward, every established director would check in weekly with his
mentees - giving them both practical and motivational advice as they developed ideas they
hoped would become feature films.

Those first classes were such a success - of the 120 people who worked at Pixar then, 100 enrolled - that we gradually began expanding P.U.’s curriculum. Sculpting, painting, acting, meditation, belly dancing, live- action filmmaking, computer programming, design and color theory, ballet - over the years, we have offered free classes in all of them. This meant spending not only the time to find the best outside teachers but also the real cost of freeing people up during their workday to take the classes.