Jack Welch Quotes - Page 3

Simple messages travel faster, simpler designs reach the market faster and the elimination of clutter allows faster decision making.

Don't lose youself on the way to the top.

HR should be every company's killer app. What could possibly be more important than who gets hired?

Some think that it is cruel or brutal to remove the bottom 10 percent of our people. It isn't. It's just the opposite. What I think is brutal and "false kindness" is keeping people around who aren't going to grow and prosper. There's no cruelty like waiting and telling people late into their careers that they don't belong - just when the options are limited and they're putting their children through college or paying off big mortgages.

Take time to get to know people. Understand where they are coming from, what is important to them. Make sure they are with you.

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.

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

No vision is worth the paper it's printed on unless it is communicated constantly and reinforced with rewards.

Trust is enormously powerful in a corporation. People won't do their best unless they believe they'll be treated fairly. The only way I know how to create that kind of trust is by laying out your values and then walking the talk. You've got to do what you say you'll do, consistently, over time.

If you pick the right people and give them the opportunity to spread their wings and put compensation as a carrier behind it you almost don't have to manage them.

Strategy is simply resource allocation. When you strip away all the noise, that's what it comes down to. Strategy means making clear cut choices about how to compete. You cannot be everything to everybody, no matter what the size of your business or how deep its pockets.

You are not a leader to win a popularity contest-you are a leader to lead.

Our behavior is driven by a fundamental core belief: the desire, and the ability, of an organization to continuously learn from any source, anywhere; and to rapidly convert this learning into action is its ultimate competitive advantage.

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 hang around with good people, you play a lot of golf, and you have a pretty good life. That's what success is all about. It's getting people you like, who want to take the hill with you, who want to win, who have the passion. This is not rocket science.

Giving people self-confidence is by far the most important thing that I can do. Because then they will act.

If we get the right people in the right job we've won the game.

Strategy means making clear-cut choices about how to compete.

No one can guarantee you a job other than satisfied customers. That's the only thing that works. Nothing creates work other than products and services you provide that create satisfied customers.

Insecure managers create complexity. Frightened, nervous managers use thick convoluted planning books and busy slides filled with everything they’ve known since childhood……. They worry that if they’re simple, people will think they’re simple minded. In reality, of course, it’s just the reverse. Clear, tough minded people are the most simple.

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

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

Above all, good leaders are open. They go up, down, and around their organization to reach people. They don't stick to the established channels. They're informal. They're straight with people. They make a religion out of being accessible. They never get bored telling their story.

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.

I've learned that mistakes can often be as good a teacher as success.