Jack welch education
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Thursday, February 02, 2023
The strategic leadership of GE CEO Jack Welch
By Terence Tsai
The late former chairman and CEO of General Electric Jack Welch was heralded by many as the greatest leader of his era. During his two decades at GE's helm, he transformed the organisation from a $13 billion (USD) maker of appliances and lightbulbs into one of the most valuable companies in the world, while building a reputation for himself as a management guru.
What made Jack Welch so successful? And, what were the secrets and principles behind his approach to work and life?
Be #1 or #2: Fix, sell, and close
Jack Welch became GE’s CEO in 1981 at the age of 45. Upon taking office, he initiated a series of changes to improve the performance of GE’s diversified business portfolio, with the hope of fundamentally reshaping the company over the next five years.
Despite resistance to change within the company, Welch was aware that past performance could not define future success, and an organisation would not go anywhere without a sense of crisis. Transformation and innovation are keys
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Reginald Jones, one imagines, never backed anyone up against a wall. And he would never have been caught dead in North Palm Beach.
Did he see something in Welch that he could not find in himself? Was he so critical of his own tenure at America’s flagship corporation that he felt a hundred-and-eighty-degree turn was in order? The most charitable explanation is that the transition from Jones to Welch came at the end of one of the more unsettling decades in the history of American capitalism, and Jones may have felt that the sun had set on his brand of corporate paternalism.
After Welch, at age forty-five, was named the new C.E.O. of General Electric, Jones called him into his office to bestow some final words of wisdom. Another recent book about Welch, David Gelles’s “The Man Who Broke Capitalism” (Simon & Schuster), recounts the exchange:
“Jack, I give you the Queen Mary,” Jones said. “This is designed not to sink.”
Jack didn’t miss a beat.
“I don’t want the Queen Mary,” he snapped back. “I plan to blow up the Queen Mary. I want speedboats.”
Then Jones threw his suc
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Jack Welch
John Francis "Jack" Welch Jr. (November 19, 1935 – March 1, 2020) was an American retired business executive, author, and chemical engineer. He was chairman and CEO of General Electric between 1981 and 2001.[1]
In 2006, Welch's net worth was estimated at $720 million.[2] When he retired from GE he received a severance payment of $417 million, the largest such payment in history.[3]
Welch died on March 1, 2020 of renal failure at his home in Manhattan at the age of 84.[4][5]
References
[change | change source]- ↑"Jack Welch: 'I Fell In Love'". CBS News. Archived from the original on 2013-10-01. Retrieved 2017-12-11.
- ↑Storrs, Francis (March 2006). "The 50 Wealthiest Bostonians". Boston Magazine. Archived from the original on 2012-02-10. Retrieved 2008-10-03.
- ↑Green, Jeff (June 6, 2013). "Jumbo Severance Packages for Top CEOs Are Growing". Business Week. Retrieved 2014-07-10.
- ↑"Jack Welch, former chairman and CEO of GE, dies at 84". CNBC. March 2, 2020. Retrieved March 2, 2020.
- ↑Gryta, Thom
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