What Welch's Belief in His People Led to
The last post on Welch we talked about his near spiritual belief in the promise that he believed resided in his people. Not only did it result in great leadership across the company, like we talked about, but it permeated everywhere.
This also made Welch believe that the creativity of his people would produce incredible efficiencies in the company as well. He was right.
He said concerning this that "The idea flow from the human spirit is absolutely unlimited,'' Welch declares. ''All you have to do is tap into that well. I don't like to use the word efficiency. It's creativity. It's a belief that every person counts."
But Welch simply wasn't a believer that dreamed of stuff, he was a believer that always took action. The ultimate expression of his belief in his people launched the largest quality initive in a corporation that have ever been undertaken: Ge's Six Sigma program.
This isn't the post to get into what all of that meant, the point is that there is a huge difference between saying you believe something, and truly believing in something. The difference is always revealed in the actions that are taken. You can always measure things that are said to be believed in by that simple measuring stick.
Welch said he believed in his people, and he did. He showed it by implementing one of the most ambitious programs in corporate history upon them; he put his beliefs into practice. Belief in your people must always lead to something actionable, or it isn't truly belief, it's just a nice feeling, or an illusion.
Six Sigma was implemented not only because it was shown to bring tremendous results, it was implemented because Welch also believed his people could pull it off. They didn't disappoint his faith in them.
Other Jack Welch Resources:
Jack Welch's advice to MIT Sloan students
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