ardent advocate of decentralization, demanding the creation of complex bureaucratic systems. The years of his reign were outstanding - it was then that the so-called. Goal Management is a concept coined by a young scientist, Peter Drucker, who worked closely with the company at the time. Cordiner founded GE Plastic and the aircraft engine division. He also founded the company's training center in Crotonville. Cordiner emphasized marketing and came up with a new corporate slogan: "Our most important product is progress." His book New Frontiers for Professional Managers (1956) summed up his management philosophy.

• Fred Borch. Borch introduced the concept of strategic planning to GE and softened things up a bit after Cordiner. Jack Welch spoke favorably of his time: “Thousands of buds bloomed thanks to Borch. He introduced the company to modular construction and show business, nurtured GE Credit from the very beginning, opened our offices in Europe and allowed Aircraft Engine and Plastic Alone to start developing independently. After his dismissal, it became clear that General Electric once again laid the foundation for several businesses with a great future. Borch ran GE from 1964 to 1972.

• Reg Jones. A British native, Jones joined GE in 1939. In 1967 he became chief financial officer and president in 1973. Jones developed GE's business in high technology markets such as jet engines and nuclear reactors, and improved financial systems. He was named “Most Powerful CEO” in 1979 and “President of the Year” in 1980. A former GE director later commented: “When Jones was in office, GE was financially strong, but it was a boring, uninteresting company. Our organization was in decline and they didn't understand it." Jones was succeeded by Jack Welch.

Stage 1: "Neutron Jack"

The easy way was not for Jack Welch. There was no planned progress in his plans. He wanted to make himself known, and not just take a comfortable chair. GE was subjected to one or the other shake-up. And that was - don't forget - exactly what his predecessor, Reg Jones, set out to accomplish. “When President Reginald Jones and the GE board of directors elected Jack Welch, they deliberately unleashed a reformist preacher whose managerial perspective was very different from the analytical, administrative approach that GE was focusing on at the time,” wrote Al Vicere and Robert Fulmer in their book „Leadership by Design“. "Welch brought a new concept of purpose to the company that helped GE strike a balance between innovative creativity and adaptive management."

In the 1980s Welch brought a spirit of dynamism to GE and throughout corporate America. GE's business has been completely overhauled. Some projects were discarded, hundreds of new ones were in demand. In 1984, Fortune named Welch "America's toughest boss." GE workers had to meet Welch's stringent requirements. In effect, GE has been downsizing. Nearly 200,000 employees left the company. More than six billion dollars were saved.

At the time, Welch was nicknamed "Neutron Jack" by the media. He, like a neutron bomb, destroyed people, leaving buildings intact. No wonder he wasn't popular at GE or anywhere else in the corporate world. For a while, it seemed that Welch could be ranked with Al Dunlap as public enemy number one. GE had a dark feeling about what was happening. Welch coldly replied that it was just part of the job. Not the best, but necessary. “I don't start with moral issues. I create them! he said to Richard Pascal with his typical persuasive sincerity. - A leader who tries to lead a large organization on his own course, against the wishes of his followers, has a very difficult time. I didn't have to do this before. I've always had the luxury of building a business and still being everyone's favorite. But it has become clear that we will have to change our positions and focus on the kind of business that can survive on a global scale.”

Stage 2: Warm up

The first stage of GE's existence under Jack Welch was not an easy entry into the new business realities. Perhaps Welch was too cruel. But it's undeniable that by the end of the eighties, GE had become a much more dynamic organization. There was not the slightest complacency left - the company was ready for change. In retrospect, perhaps Welch's decision to become like a neutron bomb was the greatest decision in the company's history. Dramatic, but relatively quick changes turned out to be better than slow and systematic ones. "Beware of planning - take the leap" - that's Welch's advice. No half measures. Is this the same approach that Tom Peters extolled, as usual, full of enthusiasm: “Will Welch do it? I bet yes. Whether he's cutting ties (Neutron Jack of the early 80s) or professing devolution (Work-Out of the early 90s)... this guy doesn't accept half measures. Meet Jack Welch: Honorary Member of the Crazy Club. Hooray!"

After proving that he was able to solve the company's problems on his own, Welch moved on to the second stage: rebuilding the company for the 21st century. He took enough care of the hardware. It's time to think about software.

The central link was the concept of WorkOut - "Warm-up", launched in 1989. It is believed that it appeared after a random question from Professor Kirby Warren from Columbia University. Warren asked Welch, "Now that you've kicked so many people out of the company, aren't you going to figure out what to do next?" At that time, 100,000 people left GE. Welch liked the idea. And soon it became a reality. Welch brought in about twenty professors and consultants in order to implement the new concept. Welch called Work-Out "an ongoing, ongoing search by the entire company for the best way to do what has been done before."

Work-Out has become a communication tool that has provided GE employees with an amazing opportunity to change the way they work. “The idea was to have a three-day informal meeting with 40-100 GE employees in a wide range of roles. The boss started with a review of the state of the business and the announcement of the agenda, then he left. Employees broke into groups and, under the guidance of a leader, looked for solutions to individual problems, explains Janet Loewy in Jack Welch Speaks. “Eventually the boss came back to listen to the proposed solutions. The boss had only three options: to accept the idea immediately; reject it immediately; request more information. If the boss chose the third, he had to name the team and set a deadline for a decision.”

The training went remarkably well. It helped start the process of building trust between GE employees and management. It gave employees the opportunity to voice their concerns at work and then make a real difference. It destroyed the barriers. Devastating storms are a thing of the past. Creativity was in the air.

Stage 3: Six Sigma

Welch the Destroyer has become Welch the Power Divider. Learning has become part of GE's transformation into an open organization. The walls between the departments were shaken, the boundaries of authority shifted. In the 1980s, the layer of middle management was destroyed. Welch empowered employees GE talk to each other, work together, share information and experiences. Surprised at first by the new approach, they soon appreciated the opportunity.

“In the early nineties, after we finally defined ourselves as people with an unlimited thirst for knowledge and a duty to share, it became impossible for all of us to even tolerate - let alone hire - tyrants, despots and dictators. They just faded into yesterday,” noted the 1997 GE Annual Report.

The next stage of Welch's revolutionary changes was the introduction of a large-scale program to improve the quality of work. It started in late 1995 and was named Six Sigma. “Six Sigma spread at an uncanny pace throughout the company and influenced everything we did,” the company said in a report two years later.

Basically, Six Sigma insisted on personal responsibility for quality. While remaining a production program, it touched every person in the organization. “We are against the old quality control system because it does not take into account the human factor. Now it is the job of the manager, the leader, each employee, quality is everyone's business, ”Welch said.

Three stages of development - destruction, creation and quality control - transformed GE. The giant company remained highly profitable, but at the same time became more economical and dynamic. The numbers were telling.

Back in 1981, when Jack Welch first became president, GE's total assets were $20 billion and revenues were $27.24 billion. The profit was 1.65 billion dollars. GE's market value was $12 billion with 440,000 employees worldwide. By 1997, GE's total asset value had risen to $272.4 billion and total revenue to $79.18 billion. About 260,000 employees generated $7.3 billion in profits, and thanks to them the company had a market value of $200 billion.

GE now operates in more than 100 countries with 250 factories in 26 countries and a global workforce of 313,000. In 2000, GE had revenues of $129,853 billion with a net income of $12,735 billion. The company's shares in April 2000 was the highest in the world: 518 billion. GE ranked fifth on the new Fortune 500 list. Thirteen GE business areas would make it into the top 50 companies Fortune, if they were evaluated independently. GE was and remains a corporate giant.

GE in numbers

Labor force: 313,000 people

Revenues: $129.853 billion

Net Income: $12.735 billion

Market size (April 2000): $518.579 billion

US exports: $7.11 billion

Reporting margin: 8.6%

R&D spending: $2.2 billion

Total property value: $437 billion

GE business

• Aircraft engines: During the 1990s, GE received more than half of the world's major commercial orders for jet engines. It