Jack Welch

"Six Sigma has forever changed GE. Everyone—from the Six Sigma zealots emerging from their Black Belt tours, to the engineers, the auditors, and the scientists, to the senior leadership that will take this Company into the new millennium—is a true believer in Six Sigma, the way this Company now works."

"United for Fair Economy, an advocacy group, described Welchs feudal wealth this way: "If Mr. Welchs $83 million total compensation in 1998 were represented by the height of the Empire State Building, how tall would the buildings represented by other GE workers be? The typical factory worker, earning $40,000 a year, would be represented by a building just eight inches tall. A well-compensated General Electric manager, earning $100,000 a year, would be represented by a building less than two feet tall. Considered globally, a typical employee working in a GE factory in Mexico and making $4,500 a year would be represented by a building less than one inch tall- smaller than an anthill."

"Being a CEO is the nuts! A whole jumble of thoughts come to mind: Over the top. Wild. Fun. Outrageous. Crazy. Passion. Perpetual motion. The give-and-take. Meetings into the night. Incredible friendships. Fine wine. Celebrations. Great golf courses. Big decisions in the real game. Crises and pressure. Lots of swings. A few home runs. The thrill of winning. The pain of losing. Its as good as it gets! You get paid a lot, but the real payoff is in the fun."

"In spite of his loathsome, King George personality, what is most appalling is how Jack Welch managed to become absolutely adored by corporate Americas white-collar suckers. His minions who stood absolutely nothing to gain and everything to lose by worshipping his philosophy of destroying tens of thousands in order to enrich a few, called themselves "Welch-heads" in another example of our Reagan-era peasant-like behavior."

"At the heart of this culture is an understanding that an organizations ability to learn, and translate that learning into action rapidly, is the ultimate competitive business advantage."

"I wanted to change the rules of engagement, asking for more— from fewer. I was insisting that we had to have only the best people...If you wanted excellence, at a minimum, the ambience had to reflect excellence."

"The best way to support dreams and stretch is to set apart small ideas with big potential, then give people positive role models and the resources to turn small projects into big businesses."

"One of the office worlds most celebrated plutocrats was General Electric CEO Jack Welch, who coined the famous Welchism that employees have unlimited juice to squeeze, and who loved to tell people to "face reality." He earned the nickname Neutron Jack for having fired one hundred twenty-eight thousand of his employees and later boasting that all that was left after his mass firings were the buildings. That, and an enormous amount of cash for Jack and his happy shareholders. Yuk-yuk-yuk. Some people may not find his kind of humor to their liking, but it probably bowled em over in Kennebunkport, or the Hamptons, or the Berkshires, or any number of corporate billionaire hangouts... Of course, this doesnt mean that Jack Welch doesnt have a heart. In his autobiography Straight From the Heart, a New Age-infused ego-romp that sold like hotcakes to the credulous masses, Welch did manage to share his thoughts with us on the importance of friendship... buried in the section "A Short Reflection On Golf." Just in case you didnt think he was, uh, human, you see."

"Loyalty to a company, its nonsense."

"The best Six Sigma projects begin not inside the business but outside it, focused on answering the question—how can we make the customer more competitive? What is critical to the customer’s success?... One thing we have discovered with certainty is that anything we do that makes the customer more successful inevitably results in a financial return for us."

"I enjoy challenging a persons ideas. No one loves a good and passionately fought argument more than I do. This isnt about being tough-minded and straightforward. Thats the job. But so is sensing when to hug and when to kick. Of course, arrogant people who refuse to learn from their mistakes have to go. If were managing good people who are clearly eating themselves up over an error, our job is to help them through it. That doesnt mean you have to take it easy on your top performers."

"Arrogance is a killer, and wearing ambition on ones sleeve can have the same effect. There is a fine line between arrogance and self-confidence. Legitimate self-confidence is a winner. The true test of self-confidence is the courage to be open—to welcome change and new ideas regardless of their source. Self-confident people arent afraid to have their views challenged. They relish the intellectual combat that enriches ideas."