Winning

By: Jack Welch, Suzy Welch

Narrated by: Jack Welch

Length: 11 hrs and 23 mins

Publisher's summary

Jack Welch knows how to win. During his 40-year career at General Electric, he led the company to year-after-year success around the globe, in multiple markets, against brutal competition. His honest, be-the-best style of management became the gold standard in business, with his relentless focus on people, teamwork, and profits.

Welch's optimistic, no excuses, get-it-done mind-set is riveting. Packed with personal anecdotes and written in Jack's distinctive no-b.s. voice, Winning is a great read and a great business book. It offers deep insights, original thinking, and nuts-and-bolts advice that are bound to change the way people think about work.

Want to learn more about Jack Welch and Winning? Download this free interview.

©2005 Jack Welch (P)2005 HarperCollins Publishers, Inc.

Critic reviews

"It's difficult to think of anyone in business who wouldn't benefit from reading this savvy, engaging cubicle-to-boardroom guide to success." (Publishers Weekly)

Good old boys book.

The book is alright. Definitely more of the old school mentality. Kind of a good old boys kind of book.

Great book lots of insights

Must-read for anyone in business management no matter what management level you are. It's a great read for anyone who is not in management also to understand why management thinks the way that they do.

I Win

Where does Winning rank among all the audiobooks you’ve listened to so far?

In my TOP 5 Books

What other book might you compare Winning to and why?

21 Refutable Laws of Leadership by John C Maxwell. Why? Winning presents a clear, concise and encouraging view from the man who not only wrote the book, he believes and he lives it.

Which character – as performed by Jack Welch – was your favorite?

No favorite character

Was there a moment in the book that particularly moved you?

Mr. Welch's passion throughout the book moved me.

Any additional comments?

WINNING is a win-win book for every business leader worldwide. I appreciate and embrace the advise offered and I am thankful to the writer's for his ability to articulate with undeniable clarity and candor. For many years, I found myself in several of the situations he mentioned. It was hard for me to be open due to fear of being sliced down for my ideas; and, when I did offer my ideas, those ideas became someone else who went on to great success. I then had to make clear choices to reassessed and take immediate action to get myself moving again. I loved Mr. Welch's personal story and I could relate to the areas of his story of making some bad business choices and hiring bad people. After reviewing their resumes, I thought those people looked to be the best; they turned out to be draining and offered little results. When I first began reading Winning, I felt I was operating in the 70% margin. I finished listening to Winning on yesterday and my life and business are on the move, in a good direction with a whole new passion for winning, thank God. One final favorite statement made by the writer was the statement: 'to be a leader you must be able to energize people...' OMG! I cannot agree! And though this statement has been around for years, hearing it said again encouraged me greatly.

I loved the book Winning and plan to listen to it again hopefully before end of year. Why? Just because its a great book with great insight.

p.s. My desire, I would sure like to meet the man that has gone on to energize millions. If you can make that happen, I'd be more than grateful. Yesssss!

Not as WOW as I expected

My expectations were set way too high, based on what my friend told me, and I therefore ended up slightly disappointed. Seems more like a pat on his own back rather than a lesson. and I cetainly didn't agree with his ideas on putting family second to work life. Some good points were made, but I believe they're mostly outdated in this new world.

Leadership is helping others get better!

Great book, real-life stories of great success! Interesting take on the roll of HR dept. and director.. Winning!

AMAZING

This is one of the best books I've had the pleasure to read in the last 20 years. Its insights on business, management, and leadership should be avidly communicated to anyone who's looking to grow in a company and in life. Anyone who wants to know what it takes to win should read this book.

Superb book! It was worth reading

Superb book! It was worth reading for any Executive that wants to be successful in their field

many valuable lessons to learn

at beginning i didn't like it since jack himself was the narrator, but after 15 minutes I got used to his accent and started to enjoy his performance. I am glad its read by himself, its like jack Welch is personally talking to you.

regarding the book itself, I can say one thing... reading this book is a must, simple yet great ideas and lessons

Very good start, but began to get LONG

If you could sum up Winning in three words, what would they be?

Organized, informative, Boring-at-parts/long

What was the most interesting aspect of this story? The least interesting?

Jack Welch is full of energy, and fun to listen to (even when I disagree with him on some things... such as his rather extreme adherence to rigid rules and political ideology.

Jack's Alltime-Best

Jack has outdone himself. His first book was great; repleat with stories of his experiences at GE. This new book surpasses it, and all the other business "self-improvement" books in print. This book does not merely give "window dressing" with a littiny of "war stories". It is a virtual "Bible" of strategies, tips, and lessons on how to deal with the most difficust business crises, problems, and stressful circumstances. It looks at these problems not only from management or company admin; but also from the eyes and views of the individual employees as well. He takes you through hiring, finding the right job, handling the difficult boss; handling difficulties of mergers and acquisitions, both from the acquiree's and aquireror's perspectives. He addresses the problems of how businesses enter into new product or service areas, both by start up, or by acquisition. He teaches the do's and don'ts of both. He talks candidly about "six sigma" the uses and non-uses of the program; why it works, why it doesen't. He talks about the difficult decisions to "fire", when to "cut bait" with a poor performing employee (and how to do it gracefully). He also addresses real business situation problems form the employee's standpoint-- how to deal with demotion, non-promotion, or outright termination. It is clearly the best business book around, it will be an all time classic in the business world. And, to top things off, Jack reads this in his own voice, with his unique brand of enthusiasm, energy, positive attitude, magic, "PMA" whatever you want to call it. Impressive.