Our free-market capitalist system is the world's greatest driver of prosperity, but it has a dark side. Under intense pressure to make the numbers, executives and employees face temptation to cut corners, fudge accounts, or worse. And in today's unforgiving environment, such lapses can be catastrophic. Fines and settlements have amounted to billions of dollars. Careers and companies have imploded.
In High Performance with High Integrity, Ben Heineman argues that there is only one way for companies to avoid such failures: CEOs must create a culture of integrity through exemplary leadership, transparency, incentives, and processes, not just rules and penalties. Heineman, GE's chief legal officer and a member of both Jack Welch's and Jeff Immelt's senior management teams for nearly twenty years, reveals crucial "performance with integrity" principles and practices that you can begin applying immediately, and shows how you can drive performance by integrating integrity systems and processes deep into company operations. Such principles and practices also create affirmative benefits: inside the corporation, in the marketplace and in society.
Concise and insightful, this book provides a much-needed corporate blueprint for doing well while doing good in the high-pressure global economy.
From our new Memo to the CEO series--solutions-focused advice from today's leading practitioners.
High Performance with High Integrity by Ben W. Heineman, Jr. deals with having integrity in business, starting in the highest echelons of a company. Heineman maintains that companies have to have a culture of integrity that starts with the CEO, and that such a culture will gradually permeate the business. Having such a culture is good for a business, as it helps in conducting business overseas, and keeps the company from becoming embroiled in scandal. Since Heineman had been involved with General Electric for many years as their general counsel before writing this book, he knows what he’s talking about! Heineman also makes a point of giving specific examples of things CEOs can do to create a culture of integrity, rather than making blanket statements about how integrity is a good thing to have. Although I skimmed large chunks of the book, I found that it gave me a lot of information about CEOs and business policies.
well its Harvard business school book,however it has some points missing i feel so and it doesn't show a clear plan for solving the corporate issues like in " foundation of the corporation" chapter How o fight corruption in the board or the different control roles that CEO should play !! its a little bet vague but i guess i have to finish it to find out !!
It's a book that only a compliance geek could love. The larger pool of business readers will find insights and may enjoy the admiration of Mr. Heineman's tenure at GE.