General Electric

The General Electric Company, or GE, {{nyse|GE}} is a multinational technology and services company. Going into 2005, it was the world's largest corporation in terms of market cap (http://screen.yahoo.com/b?mc=100000000/&b=1&z=mc&db=stocks&vw=1). However, on the back of high oil prices, ExxonMobil has outranked GE for most of 2005. It should not be confused with The General Electric Company plc, which was renamed Marconi plc in 1999.

Jack Welch

The CEO from 1981-2001 was Jack Welch, who many regard as one of the premier business managers of his era. Nicknamed "Neutron Jack", he presided over a 28-fold increase in earnings (on a 5-fold increase in revenue) with his policy (referred to by detractors as "rank and yank") of sacking the worst performing 10% of his staff every year. In running GE's many diverse businesses he maintained a policy of only keeping those businesses which were #1 or #2 within their respective industries. In 1987, GE was the United States' second largest nuclear power company and third largest producer of nuclear weapons systems. Jack Welch introduced the use of the six sigma quality system, originally developed at Motorola, within GE.

Related Topics:
CEO - 1981 - 2001 - Jack Welch - Managers - Earnings - Revenue - Rank and yank - 1987 - Nuclear power - Nuclear weapons systems - Six sigma - Quality system - Motorola

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~