Jack Welch Quotes

If you can't energize others, you can't be a leader.

In order to lead a country or a company, you've got to get everybody on the same page and you've got to be able to have a vision of where you're going. America can't have a vision of health care for everybody, green economy, regulations - can't have a bunch of piece - meal activities. It's got to have a vision.

Failing to differentiate among employees — and holding on to bottom-tier performers — is actually the cruelest form of management there is.

People always overestimate how complex business is. This isn't rocket science. We've chosen one of the world's simplest professions.

An organization's ability to learn, and translate that learning into action rapidly, is the ultimate competitive advantage.

The art of managing and leading comes down to a simple thing. Determining and facing reality about people, situations, products, and then acting decisively and quickly on that reality. Think how many times we have procrastinated, hoped it would get better. Most of the mistakes you've made have been through not being willing to face into it, straight in the mirror that reality you find, then taking action on it. That's all managing is, defining and acting. Not hoping, not waiting fro the next plan. Not rethinking it. Getting on with it. Doing it. Defining and doing it.

There's no such thing as work-life balance. There are work-life choices, and you make them, and they have consequences.

I actually think that the economy has got some positives. It's got the market. It's got consumer confidence and it's got banks throwing - I mean central bankers throwing money at it around the world.

Getting candor right - with your reports, your peers, and your boss - is a skill that can make or break your career.

Ideally, the star will be replaced within eight hours. This sends the message that no single individual is bigger than the company.

The world belongs to passionate driven people.

The world will belong to passionate, driven leaders - people who not only have enormous amounts of energy, but who can energize those whom they lead.

There are only three measurements that tell you nearly everything you need to know about your organization's overall performance: employee engagement, customer satisfaction, and cash flow...It goes without saying that no company, small or large, can win over the long run without energized employees who believe in the mission and understand how to achieve it.

Innovation is not a big breakthrough invention every time. Innovation is a constant thing. But if you don't have an innovative company [team], coming to work everyday to find a better way, you don't have a company[team]. You're getting ready to die on the vine. You're always looking for the next innovation, the next niche, the next product improvement, the next service improvement. But always trying to get better.

You talk about seeing around corners as an element of success. That's what differentiates the good leader. Not many people have it. Not many people can predict that corner. That would be a characteristic of great leaders.

We know where most of the creativity, the innovation, the stuff that drives productivity lies-in the minds of those closest to the work. It's been there in front of our noses all along while we've been running around chasing robots and reading books on how to become Japanese-or at least manage like them.

So every time you think about your work-life balance issue, remember what your boss is thinking about - and that's winning. Your needs may get heard - and even successfully resolved - but not if the boss's needs aren't met as well.

The most important quality of leadership is intellectual honesty. The reality principle - the ability to see the world as it really is, not as you wish it were.

Again, your challenge is not just to improve. It is to break the service paradigm in your industry or market so that customers aren't just satisfied, they're so shocked that they tell strangers on the street how good you are.

What Sam Walton did was to go into one of the most mature industries of all and find a way to make it grow, grow, grow, double-digit, month after month, year after year. He did it by innovation, customer focus, and above all, speed.

We know where most of the creativity, the innovation, the stuff that drives productivity lies - in the minds of those closest to the work.

We have built a company with a business mix and operating system that will allow us to deliver record results in any foreseeable economic climate, ... We have just completed a very successful management transition and I've never been more confident about the company's future.

You can't believe how hard it is for people to be simple, how much they fear being simple. They worry that if they're simple, people will think they're simpleminded. In reality, of course, it's just the reverse. Clear, tough-minded people are the most simple.

Approach every meeting with a purposeful, high-energy, ready-to-make-a-contribution attitude, and watch how fast leadership’s perception of you follows your behavior.

GE's businesses turned in a terrific first quarter. Our products and services are being well received in unusually robust global markets.

The essence of competitiveness is liberated when we make people believe that what they think and do is important - and then get out of their way while they do it.

Nothing is worse than the person in their 40s who says, 'I'm not going to learn this.' 'I don't carry an iPad.' That will label you and put you right in the corner. Some people do it as a badge of honor. I've seen them myself, they walk around bragging [about not knowing much about technology].

Globalization has changed us into a company that searches the world, not just to sell or to source, but to find intellectual capital - the world's best talents and greatest ideas.

Make winners out of every business in your company. Don't carry losers.

Culture drives great results.

Lack of candor blocks smart ideas, fast action, and good people contributing all the stuff they've got. It's a killer.

Cash is king. Get every drop of cash you can get and hold onto it.

The main social responsibility for a company is to win.

An overburdened, overstretched executive is the best executive, because he or she doesn't have the time to meddle, to deal in trivia, to bother people.

A good leader remains focused. Controlling your destination is better than being controlled by it

Every employee, not just the senior people, should know how a company is doing.

Public hangings are teaching moments. Every company has to do it. A teaching moment is worth a thousand CEO speeches. CEOs can talk and blab each day about culture, but the employees all know who the jerks are. They could name the jerks for you. It's just cultural. People just don't want to do it.

I am often asked if leaders are born or made. The answer, of course, is both. Some characteristics, like IQ and energy, seem to come with the package. On the other hand, you learn some leadership skills, like self-confidence, at your mother's knee, and at school, in academics and sports. And you learn others at work-trying something, getting it wrong and learning from it, or getting it right and gaining the self-confidence to do it again, only better.

The record results for the third quarter once again demonstrate the ability of GE's diverse mix of leading global businesses to deliver top-line growth, increased margins and strong cash generation.

If you don't have a competitive advantage, don't compete.

No company, small or large, can win over the long run without energized employees who believe in the mission and understand how to achieve it.

I might not be the brightest bulb in the chandelier, but I'm pretty good at getting most of the other bulbs to light up.

Some people have better ideas than others; some are smarter or more experienced or more creative. But everyone should be heard and respected.

If the rate of change on the outside exceeds the rate of change on the inside, the end is near.

Genuine leadership comes from the quality of your vision and your ability to spark others to extraordinary performance.

Wright is a visionary with a great strategic mind, and he's a strong business leader with outstanding people skills, ... He's a terrific guy and will be a key force in guiding the company's future growth.

A company has only so much money and managerial time. Winning leaders invest where the payback is the highest. They cut their losses everywhere else.

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.