Winning

[Jim]

It was OK if you want to uunderstand 6 Sigma and why they called him Neutron Jack.

[Dinesh]

wonderful sequence by jack welsch

how he turned around the company

[Azar]

Thanks for the review.

[Marks54]

I did not like the book that much, especially when compared to his early 2001 memoirs. I have no doubt that Welch was a very capable manager. I start having problems when a solid performance record gets turned through self-promotion into the tale of a "great" or "legendary" manager. That happens a lot in the genre of executive memoirs. I think that has happened with Welch and it obscures his real accomplishments at GE.

1) It is not accurate to say that he "turned around" GE, although such a claim is commonly made. GE was a strong company before Welch took over and was hardly on a death watch. He made changes to facilitate future growth, but that is what a CEO is supposed to do. Moreover, once he took over, he did not change meaningful performance as significantly as is claimed. For example, GE under Welch did not match the performance it has attained under Reg Jones for several years.

2) What Welch did do was to grow the size of GE substantially, although it is not clear at all that such growth was profitable in the long term. Some of the acquisitions have done quite well, while others have not.

3) Much of the GE profit growth towards the end of his tenure was tied up with the financial "bubble" at the end of the 1990s and the growth of the internet. This is especially the case with GE capital. How that links with his legacy is unclear.

4) Finally, Welch linked his performance to that of the GE share price and yet his memoirs have very little to say about how shareholders were managed.

[Mike]

Well,He was a great manager at least one of the greatest over the last 50 years. Look at where the company is and what it has accomplished since his retirement. And compare to where the company sat when Jack was at the helm. Jack did what he had to do to keep the company moving in the right direction. Some did not like his style especially cutting the bottom 10% of the worst performing employees.