Disrupting the Game

Sometimes you have to stand your ground – even when your boss disagrees.

Reggie Fils-Aimé was instrumental in Nintendo’s US launch of the Wii Remote. The product was noteworthy for its motion-sensing technology. Fils-Aimé worked with Leo Burnett, a New York ad agency, to design an advertising campaign that featured two Japanese businessmen touring the United States to show the new device to American consumers.

Fils-Aimé felt certain the ads would be a hit, but shortly before they began airing, his boss – Nintendo president Satoru Iwata – called from Japan at the last moment to say the ads had to be changed. In Japan, Iwata said, executives would never interact as casually with customers as the people depicted in the ad. Fils-Aimé pushed back, but his boss initially stood his ground. Fils-Aimé insisted that Westerners have a much different view of social interactions. His boss relented, and the ads and the product were a hit.

As a leader who prided himself on disruption and innovation, Fils-Aimé repeatedly butted heads with his bosses and with entrenched ways of doing business. The Wii launch press conference...