Jack Welch’s Mixed Legacy
JACK WELCH DIED ON MARCH 1 at the age of 84. He was one of the most successful men of the 20th century—a working class Irish kid who, through enormous talent and hard work, rose to be one of the most acclaimed businessmen of all time.
An entire generation of managers and business leaders studied his every move, pushed his books up the bestseller lists, quoted and emulated him. He succeeded at everything he touched, except perhaps the one thing he cared most about—his legacy.
Very few have worked harder to shape what future lest anyone forget that’s what he did. He lent his name to a business school at Sacred Heart University and later founded the very successful Jack Welch Management Institute to teach his approach to leadership. He taught at MIT. He even married a journalist covering him, Suzy Wetlaufer. After carefully and very publicly selecting Jeff Immelt as his successor, he later blamed him for the company’s troubles. Welch used those from his inner circle to make sure that he himself got full credit for GE’s success.
