 [Larger view] | Winning
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 Maybe I'm just too cynical, but... | |
| My first impression was that this was just another feel good, motivational book. But once I got into the book I quickly found out that I was right.
I hate to give any book a bad review, but I have read so many of these motivational books and they are all the same. this one was no different. They leave you motivated for a little while but leave you with very litte practical knowledge. However, I can't completely recommend against this book as it may be of great benefit to many people. I'm probably just a little too jaded for Winning. | |
 A Tough-Minded Career Guide for Corporate Life | |
| How do corporate managers really think? When they make a move, what's really going on? This book has the answers. Like the lyrics of The Apprentice opening song, this book reminds us not to take anything personally. It's just business.
The first part of Winning describes Welch's philosophy of leadership. Reward the top performers, he says. Take care of the middle and then boot the bottom. Cruel? No, he argues. People should know where they stand. I believe Welch is right -- as long as you appreciate his perspective. He's speaking as a manager and corporations view people as resources. Except for some qualities which he believes can be trained, the company's job is to choose and keep only people who really contribute to the mission. As a career consultant and coach, I often talk to people whom Welch would categorize as misfits. Some were disrupters at more than one company -- who eventually found a home in a unique position or started their own businesses. Some recognized they were misplaced in a particular company or industry. Welch doesn't deal with "what happens after ," and that's really not the organization's job. Rather I would encourage everyone to take the feedback as a guide and move to a career that's more rewarding. Hire your own career guide who will be your own resource and advocate. Surprisingly, the best part of Winning is the second half, dealing with individual career management. Often people who achieve great career success cannot explain what happened. Not Welch. I like his criteria for choosing a position, especially the importance of "credentialing." Will this job help you move to the next? I've been using a more general term, "marketability." And I like his discussion of matching your sensibilities -- i.e., personality and culture -- to the job's. These elements often drive people to new careers, more than the work itself. He acknowledges that heading down the wrong path can block off opportunities to reach a satisfying career. Too many self-help authors opt for empty words of cheer, along the lines of, "You can be whatever you want." Welch reminds us that business, like a lot of life, can be tough. And I applaud his realistic question: Are you taking this job for yourself or to satisfying someone else's agenda? Sometimes you do have to subordinate to family or other needs -- but be upfront and don't complain. Just do what you need. Other guidance on getting ahead -- how to be a team player and how to manage a bad boss -- avoid the usual platitudes. Decide on your long-term objective, he says, and make an informed decision. Welch's advice applies, of course, only to well-managed, reasonably sane companies. If you find yourself frustrated with his advice, you probably belong outside the corporate arena. Individual industries have unique customs and informal rules. Some companies have hidden agendas of their own. People can be set up to fail. But most of the time, you won't go wrong with Welch's advice, even if you've landed in a mess. And if you keep landing in one messy situation after another, it's time to ask what's really going on. | |
| One-on-one with Jack Welch | |
| Pretend that you have written a letter to Jack Welch, asking him to share what he has learned throughout his career thus far, especially what he has learned about "winning" in the business world. To your surprise and delight, he responds...inviting you to spend a long weekend with him on Nantucket, during which you will have his undivided attention. He anticipates almost all of your questions and has carefully prepared to answer them, fully and honestly. What we have in this volume is probably what Welch would share with you if given the opportunity.
How best to describe Winning? It is not an autobiography. It offers memoirs but only to the extent Welch draws upon his life and career to establish a context within which to pose a question, offer an example, make a key point, etc. Unlike so many other business books allegedly written by celebrity CEOs (but which were in fact primarily crafted by ghostwriters), this book is a refreshing exception. There is no doubt in my mind that Welch wrote it. Of course, along the way, he would have been a fool not to have obtained feedback from his wife, Suzy, given her own distinguished career. She is widely renowned for her talents, both as an editor and as a business thinker in her own right. But this is definitely Welch's book. Much of what Winning offers is, of course, relevant to business but its greater value, for me, is derived from the personal relationship which Welch immediately establishes and then sustains with his reader. Oh sure, he shares generously of what he learned during a 40-year association with G.E. Those reminiscences are both informative and entertaining. However, as Welch points out, he learned almost as much about business after he retired as CEO as he did when he worked there. Since then, "I have been asked literally thousands of questions. But most of them come down to this: [begin italics] What does it take to win?" [end italics] His thoughtful and eloquent response to that question gives form and direction to this book. To his credit, Welch never hesitates to acknowledge his poor decisions, his deficiencies as a corporate leader and manager, and his disappointments during what has been an otherwise extraordinarily successful business career. What also comes through loud and clear are his obsession with achieving superior performance (especially his own), his delight in taking on formidable challenges, his passion for "winning," whatever the competition may be, and his appreciation of each new day as well as the new opportunities which it offers. Also obvious is that he possesses what Hemingway once described as a "built-in, shock-proof crap detector." What a privilege and pleasure it would be to spend that hypothetical long weekend with Welch. Presumably those who have done so would agree that reading this book gives at least some indication of what would be revealed during a series of one-on-one conversations with him. I disagree with Warren Buffett's claim that "No other management book will ever be needed." (Will all due respect to his friend, perhaps Welch also does.) However, I think Winning offers a wealth of sound, practical, at times unorthodox advice about leadership and management. For executives who aspire to be "winners," this is a must read. I also highly recommend the unabridged audio set (11 hours on 9 CDs) during which Welch reads from this book. The set includes a lively as well as informative interview of him by Jane Friedman, president and CEO of HarperCollins. |
