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Jack: Straight from the Gut Kindle Edition

4.4 4.4 out of 5 stars 1,039 ratings

The most widely respected CEO in America looks back on his brilliant career at General Electric and reveals his personal business philosophy and unique managerial style.
Nearly 20 years ago, former General Electric CEO Reg Jones walked into Jack Welch's office and wrapped him in a bear hug. "Congratulations, Mr. Chairman," said Reg. It was a defining moment for American business. So begins the story of a self-made man and a self-described rebel who thrived in one of the most volatile and economically robust eras in U.S. history, while managing to maintain a unique leadership style. In what is the most anticipated book on business management for our time, Jack Welch surveys the landscape of his career running one of the world's largest and most successful corporations.
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Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

It's hard to think of a CEO that commands as much respect as Jack Welch. Under his leadership, General Electric reinvented itself several times over by integrating new and innovative practices into its many lines of business. In Jack: Straight from the Gut, Welch, with the help of Business Week journalist John Byrne, recounts his career and the style of management that helped to make GE one of the most successful companies of the last century. Beginning with Welch's childhood in Salem, Massachusetts, the book quickly progresses from his first job in GE's plastics division to his ambitious rise up the GE corporate ladder, which culminated in 1981. What comes across most in this autobiography is Welch's passion for business as well as his remarkable directness and intolerance of what he calls "superficial congeniality"--a dislike that would help earn him the nickname "Neutron Jack." In spite of its 496 pages, Jack: Straight from the Gut is a quick read that any student or manager would do well to consider. Highly recommended. --Harry C. Edwards

From Publishers Weekly

It doesn't matter whether you love or hate Jack Welch. Who can resist hearing the man tell his story? This abridged version of his recently published autobiography, featuring Welch himself, is quite entertaining. With his slightly raspy Boston accent, Welch discusses his childhood and his career. When he proclaims something, he gives examples to illustrate his point. For instance, he says his mother was the strongest influence on his life. He then recalls the time he threw a hockey stick across the ice in disgust after losing a game, and his mother stormed into the locker room as some teammates were changing to exclaim loudly, "If you don't know how to lose, you'll never know how to win." When discussing his long career at GE, Welch is equally detailed. While some listeners unfamiliar with the corporation may find some of the discussions tedious, most will be captivated by what appears to be Welch's brutal honesty. He talks about having to lobby for promotions because he didn't "fit the GE mold," and he's open about making some poor business decisions. He's not as forthright as it appears, though. He talks about his beloved wife, Carolyn, who provided a stable home while Welch was rising in GE's ranks, but barely mentions their divorce. Still, this audiobook will be interesting listening for anyone who has followed Neutron Jack's career. Simultaneous release with Warner Books hardcover.

Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

Product details

  • ASIN ‏ : ‎ B001GUXJQK
  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ Business Plus; 1st edition (October 2, 2018)
  • Publication date ‏ : ‎ October 2, 2018
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • File size ‏ : ‎ 10.4 MB
  • Text-to-Speech ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • Screen Reader ‏ : ‎ Supported
  • Enhanced typesetting ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • X-Ray ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • Word Wise ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • Print length ‏ : ‎ 623 pages
  • Customer Reviews:
    4.4 4.4 out of 5 stars 1,039 ratings

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Customer reviews

4.4 out of 5 stars
1,039 global ratings

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Customers say

Customers find the book easy to read and engaging. They appreciate the useful insights into business leadership and making tough decisions. The content is described as enlightening and inspiring, with lively situations around acquisitions and mergers. Readers mention that the book helps them become better managers by teaching them about performance. The narrator is described as relatable and the narrative is easy to follow.

AI-generated from the text of customer reviews

39 customers mention "Readability"39 positive0 negative

Customers find the book engaging and a pleasure to read. They say it's an excellent business book and the best they've ever read.

"...This has been one of the most engaging books on the subject matter, taking a relatively benign subject..." Read more

"This is Probably the best business book that I’ve ever read and I’ve read a lot of them. I would make this mandatory reading for any manager and CEO." Read more

"...As an autobiography, Jack Straight from the Gut, is a pleasure to read...." Read more

"...actually not as negative as I expected and at times I even enjoyed reading the book...." Read more

21 customers mention "Insight"18 positive3 negative

Customers find the book's insights useful and educational. They appreciate the details and mention it's a great biography for young engineers. The book offers valuable insights into GE history and leadership from Jack Welch.

"This book blurs the line between an autobiography, a corporate history book, and a management instructional; and it does it well...." Read more

"...This book is about Jack Welch and his amazing story up the ladder of corporate America. It teaches us about guts, hard work and true dedication...." Read more

"...The book is a biography from Jack Welch and thus follows the standard chronological form...." Read more

"Great insights into GE history and Welchs leadership. Highly recommend." Read more

18 customers mention "Leadership"18 positive0 negative

Customers appreciate the book's leadership insights. They say it makes them better managers, with great wisdom about business leadership and making tough decisions. The book provides interesting stories and business knowledge, and is described as pragmatic and inspirational. Readers also mention that the author has a passion for excellence and brings out the best in people.

"...DO THE RIGHT THING: even when you have to put your job at risk...." Read more

"...It teaches us about guts, hard work and true dedication. It actually reads like 'Once upon a time in America' featuring Robert de Niro...." Read more

"...The relentless focus on good people and educating them (unfortunately, mostly managers)...." Read more

"...I would have liked to work with Welch, he appears to have been a superb manager...." Read more

13 customers mention "Enlightened content"13 positive0 negative

Customers find the book's content interesting and inspiring. They say it teaches about hard work, dedication, and integrity. Readers also mention it's an interesting window into another world.

"...one of the most engaging books on the subject matter, taking a relatively benign subject..." Read more

"...Welch's A-type, straight talking personality comes through, with the help of co-author John A. Byrne, in a natural, down-to-earth writing style...." Read more

"...It teaches us about guts, hard work and true dedication. It actually reads like 'Once upon a time in America' featuring Robert de Niro...." Read more

"...Just as importantly it walks through many lively situations around acquisitions, mergers, personell issues, and so forth, whose drama keep you..." Read more

6 customers mention "Performance"6 positive0 negative

Customers find the book instructive and effective in addressing performance head-on. They appreciate its integrity, openness, and helpful approach.

"...a corporate history book, and a management instructional; and it does it well...." Read more

"...insights into business leadership, making tough decisions, and driving results while focusing on corporate values like integrity...." Read more

"...very clearly an objective person who while firm is fair and helpful to those who perform...." Read more

"...equally to running a small business- having good people, addressing performance head on, demonstrating integrity, being open to change,..." Read more

5 customers mention "Narrator"5 positive0 negative

Customers appreciate the relatable narrator and easy-to-read narrative. They find the book provides an excellent description of Jack's career at GE.

"...I liked the fact that Jack narrated the book also...." Read more

"Good book for organizational leadership! Jack is very relatable and as a student felt that I learned much from his book." Read more

"Although overall an excellent description of Jack's career at GE, the story slightly lacks objectivity by presenting mostly Jack's victories, but..." Read more

"Great book. Jack has great insights" Read more

Proud Papa Darwin
5 out of 5 stars
Proud Papa Darwin
Darwinian natural selection asserts: normal members of a species thrive in an existing environment while the abnormal are denied membership, forced to the periphery into a strange and challenging environment. The nature of this remote environment is such that the mutant thrives, becoming the new norm. In some instances, the old comfortable environment changes catastrophically in a direction that favors an outlier, an extreme variant. This relationship holds in all human endeavor. It is those who do not “fit in” who become pioneers. They are the avant garde, the pathfinders in science, art, technology, land development, and business administration. Pioneers make the best of a new niche. The niche becomes the norm and its population proliferates creating a new generation of freaks, mutants and oddballs in a new left field. When the going gets weird - the weird get going.
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Top reviews from the United States

  • Reviewed in the United States on July 30, 2013
    This book blurs the line between an autobiography, a corporate history book, and a management instructional; and it does it well. This has been one of the most engaging books on the subject matter, taking a relatively benign subject (how a hard working nobody become a CEO and superstar of an appliance and technology company), and makes it personable.

    The language isn't formal, academic, or even moderated. If you're offended by the occasional use of foul language, you'll be offended on a few occasions, Jack tells it how it is. He recounts his climb through the ranks of General Electric, and how he managed to create the vision that led to GE's success.

    The book is an autobiography, and there's not a lot of dissenting view points. While Jack does mention that some of his decisions were unpopular, and how some of his actions were flops, the analysis of why these ventures failed are always introspective. That doesn't allow for a complete picture of GE's history during Jack's tenure with the company, but for those of us who aren't working for (or competing against) them, it suffices.

    More importantly, it's enjoyable. There are a few nuggets of wisdom (giving 'stretch' promotions at the beginning of a career, the No 1 / No 2 philosophy, encourage big swings and never punish a big miss) contained within the book, but it's not a management philosophy text book.

    You aren't likely to find any profound quotes or revalations contained in these pages; and if you can manage that expectation, then this book is a fantastic read.
    13 people found this helpful
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  • Reviewed in the United States on January 16, 2024
    This is Probably the best business book that I’ve ever read and I’ve read a lot of them. I would make this mandatory reading for any manager and CEO.
    One person found this helpful
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  • Reviewed in the United States on March 22, 2008
    Jack Welch's life has been about excellence, winning....and having fun. His autobiography, "Jack: Straight From the Gut", tells how he rose from small town roots to become CEO of General Electric, arguably the greatest corporation in America and the world at the end of the 20th Century. During his life's journey, Welch accomplished more than most ever dream of. He earned a Ph.D. in chemical engineering by the age of 25. During his 20 year tenure as head of GE, company revenues soared from $27 billion in 1981 to $130 billion in 2001. GE's annual growth rate averaged 18.9 percent during this period, and its stock rose a staggering 3,098 percent.

    Without any formal management training, Welch worked his way up from "process development specialist" in 1960 to CEO of GE in 1981. His management secret? Welch attributes his success in life and business to living the lessons his mother drilled into him during his youth. She taught him early that he had better face the facts of any tough situation if he was to succeed: "Don't kid yourself. It is the way it is." she would tell him repeatedly. "Grace Welch taught me the value of competition, just as she taught me the pleasure of winning and the need to take defeat in stride,"... "If I have any leadership style, a way of getting the best out of people, I owe it to her," Welch writes.

    And getting the best out of people, himself included, is what Jack Welch did best. He was such a great manager largely because he focused on bringing out the best in his employees, making GE into a "people factory". He knew that a business cannot afford to be soft-hearted when it comes to grading and rewarding, or punishing, employees based upon their performance. He knew that the value of a business is primarily the talents, skills, and knowledge of its people. Under Jack Welch, GE changed from bureaucracy to meritocracy - focused on grading its people, rewarding the best, encouraging the middle, and getting rid of the rest. As he writes: "Performance management has been part of everyone's life from the first grade. It starts in grade school with advanced placement. Differentiation applies to football teams, cheerleading squads, and honor societies....There's differentiation for all of us in our first 20 years. Why should it stop in the workplace, where most of our waking hours are spent?"

    Welch characterized the traits that made him successful and that he sought in others as "The Four E's": 1. Energy of personality, 2. the Enthusiasm to communicate that energy to others, 3. the Edge to make tough decisions, and 4. the Execution to see those decisions implemented. The Four E's were connected by the "Big P: Passion". Welch's integrity to this vision of employee excellence is seen repeatedly in the book when he promotes unrecognized and unrewarded employees because he saw the four E's and big P in them, where others did not. Most of these individuals went on to become successful upper managers at GE and even CEO's of other large corporations.

    Whether being blasted in the media as "Neutron Jack" for laying off thousands of employees while building a state-of-the-art management training center, or executing the buyout of other companies, such as RCA with its NBC network, or implementing a system to share best practices among GE companies world-wide (a concept he termed "boundaryless"), Welch dove into each project with seemingly inexhaustible passion and zeal. He brought the same dedication to implementing each company-wide program he initiated: Globalization, Growing Services, Six Sigma, and E-business. Welch loves what he created at GE. The company definitely became his baby - and he was the heart and soul of GE during his time as CEO.

    As an autobiography, Jack Straight from the Gut, is a pleasure to read. Welch's A-type, straight talking personality comes through, with the help of co-author John A. Byrne, in a natural, down-to-earth writing style. Jack Welch's rise from small town Irish immigrant roots to chairman of General Electric is one of the most engaging and inspiring business tales you will ever read. Welch is a late Twentieth Century version of Andrew Carnegie: rising to fame and fortune from a humble background. His life is a confirmation of the American virtues of free enterprise system, with its focus on the values of hard work, integrity, ambition and excellence. Jack Welch is a real life Ayn Rand business hero. Like Howard Roark or John Galt, he struggled across his career, and despite numerous set-backs, he ultimately rose up to create a life of great achievements. Welch sought excellence in himself and those around him. As a result, he drove GE, its thousands of employees, and the American economy to unprecedented levels of productivity and prosperity.
    2 people found this helpful
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  • Reviewed in the United States on December 28, 2003
    Just a few notes from "Jack straight from the Gut" book which is primarily focused on Jack Welch's 30 years with General Electric.
    PhD IN CHEMISTRY: earned this from University of Illinois before starting his career in business which ended up being primarily focused on working for and managing General Electric.
    This allowed him to really understand many of GE's products when needed during his 41 year tenure.
    DO THE RIGHT THING: even when you have to put your job at risk. Doesn't make sense to do the wrong thing just so as to not "rock the boat"
    CONTINUOUS IMPROVEMENT OF THE WORKFORCE; one way to do this is to fire the bottom 10% of employees on a yearly basis. This earned him the nickname of "Neutron Jack" even though he always tried these workers other positions within the
    company and not with competitors.
    QUINTUPLE HEART BYPASS: was performed just a few years ago after suffering angina pains for about 15 years.
    AVID GOLFER: all of his life with a very low handicap.
    EMBRACED QUALITY: throughout the company with a 6 Sigma program.
    CONTINUALLY DEVELOP WORKERS to maintain productivity. Hired outside talent as needed.
    MEASURE ALL BUSINESS UNITS using ROI calculations in addition to revenue and profits.
    BUY OR SELL BUSINESS UNITS: in order to grow a business or cut losses as needed
    GE PURCHASES: over $50B worth of goods and services on a yearly basis
    OVERHEAD EXPENSES: reduced by 30% or $10B by fully implementing
    digital control of all processes including the use of the Internet.
    EMPLOYMENT: over 300,000 workers worldwide.
    MARRIED 3 TIMES: currently living in Boston with a young wife and her 4 children.
    FUTURE PREDICTIONS: China represents the biggest competitor which will drive most non performing companies out of business.
    5 people found this helpful
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Top reviews from other countries

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  • Martin
    3.0 out of 5 stars Bad glue
    Reviewed in Mexico on July 6, 2023
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    Martin
    3.0 out of 5 stars
    Bad glue

    Reviewed in Mexico on July 6, 2023

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  • Brune
    5.0 out of 5 stars Parfait
    Reviewed in France on July 29, 2023
    Envoi rapide et soigné.
  • butterfly
    5.0 out of 5 stars Good condition of the book received
    Reviewed in Canada on January 2, 2021
    Very good condition for this book.
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    butterfly
    5.0 out of 5 stars
    Good condition of the book received

    Reviewed in Canada on January 2, 2021
    Very good condition for this book.
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  • gokula krishnan
    5.0 out of 5 stars Good read
    Reviewed in India on June 6, 2021
    Open hearted and Transparent look through Jack’s heart. Recommended by my Mentor and I believe will recommend the same to anyone in future asking for Biographies to be read.
    Found a lot of similarities between him and me.
  • Luís Coladel
    5.0 out of 5 stars Entregou aquilo que descreveu.
    Reviewed in Brazil on May 6, 2020
    Ágil no login, na busca, no processo de compra e na entrega, bem como a relação entre a descrição anexa ao produto e o que foi entregue, integralmente cumprido.

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