Jack Welch

John Francis Welch Jr November 19 1935 March 1 2020 was an American business executive He was chairman and CEO of General Electric GE between 1981 and 2001 During his 20year tenure GEs market value grew from 14 billion to 600 billion and he has frequently been cited as one of the greatest chief executives of the twentieth century Under Welch GE acquired the RCA Corporation in 1986 and expanded aggressively into financial services through GE Capital which came to account for 40 of the companys revenue He also restructured GE around a philosophy that each of its business units must rank first or second in its market shedding those that did not meet that standard By the end of his tenure GE was the most valuable company in the world In later years Welchs practices and legacy have drawn scrutiny from historians and journalists particularly regarding his transformation of GE into a company heavily dependent on financial services GE Capital collapsed in the wake of the 2008 financial crisis and GE was eventually broken into three separate companies Additionally his emphasis on shortterm financial performance over longterm investment has been cited as having had a lasting effect on American corporate culture including at companies such as Amazon When Welch retired from GE he received a severance payment of 417 million at that time this was the largest such payment in business history In 2006 Welchs net worth was estimated at 720 million Description above from the Wikipedia article Jack Welch licensed under CCBYSA full list of contributors on Wikipedia