Wednesday 25 April 2007

A book not so bad

Some time ago, I ended up with a copy of a book by Jack Welch. I have no idea how I got it. I don't remember buying it, and there is no price sticker on it to give me some clue which bookshop it came from.

Around the time I got it, his reputation was being shredded over an affair or something. I can't remember. What I do remember is reading the first 10 pages, then sticking it back on the shelf and thinking that it was a book best avoided.

For some reason, I picked it up again this week. I didn't make the mistake of reading the first chapter, which is always about the small town in which they grew up, and the influence of mum and dad and the local baseball coach etc, and nothing about their business career. I picked up when he was at uni, and from that point, found it to be a good read. Not a ripping yarn, but a good read.

With Welch no longer in charge, GE doesn't get the same press and rave reviews that it used to get. It even seems to have disappeared from the radar of "great companies we should emulate". How the mighty have fallen.

I have only met one person in my business career that worked for GE. He was my boss for a few short months, until he saw the light and moved on to another company. I only spoke to him twice, but they were both good one on one interviews, and I liked the guy. Pity he didn't stick around, but I guess he found himself in a situation that he couldn't change or fix, so he split.

Funnily enough, so did the 5 or 6 managers that came after and before him.

Anyway, I was hoping he would stick around as I wanted to see if some of the "GE way" was going to rub off on us. I thought I could pick up some good pointers from him.

Then I read about the A-B-C rating system in Jack's book, and wondered if he left because he was a "C"?

If you want to know what I am talking about, read the book. It's not that bad - really.

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