Shadowing Practice: Jack Welch: My Greatest Leadership Learnings From a Life in Business - Learn English Speaking with Video
Loading...
1
Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome Mr. Jack Welsh.
2
Welcome to Copenhagen.
3
Mr. Welsh, I think you prefer Jack.
4
Jack, please.
5
Yeah, less formal.
6
Today's headline is winning strategy.
7
And therefore, I'd like to begin by asking, why do relatively few of us really win big?
8
Well, I think, well, first of all, I'm not sure that I agree with that, but I never think of strategy as one thing.
9
I think strategy, execution, and people all go together.
10
And if you don't get the people right, the strategy doesn't matter.
11
And if you don't get the people right, you won't get the execution.
12
So you're dead.
13
So from my standpoint, strategy is sort of a purest thing.
14
It's more academic.
15
Execution and getting it done is what it's all about.
16
But without question, that whole idea of winning and driving home,
17
what you're going to do and what you're not going to do is, Volvo decided before Allif that they weren't going to be in cars.
18
and they're focused now on buses and trucks and excavators, they can excel in that.
19
And they were in a bad game in cars, but it takes a courageous management to get out of the car business.
20
Takes a lot of guts.
21
That's a huge decision.
22
And the fact that that company did it 15, 10, 15 years ago is a tribute to the system.
23
And GE hired you in 1960, and you got a boss who, let's say, was a bit against you.
24
How did that affect your will to win?
25
Well, I came there as a freshman engineer, the lowest one in the totem pole, and I was going along quite well,
26
and I came in for my first annual review, and I was making $10,000, and he didn't dislike me.
27
He just thought I was sort of a thorn in his side, But I got a raise.
28
I got a $1,000 raise, which was a 10% raise.
29
And I was quite pleased with that raise
30
until I went back to my bullpen where there were six engineers who were in there together.
31
And I happened to, because of my mother's injection of self-confidence, think I thought I was a better engineer.
32
So I'm back and I sat down, and we all talked about what we got this year.
33
And every one of us got a $1,000 raise.
34
So I quit within two weeks.
35
And I moved my family to Chicago, about a thousand miles away, and I was at the going away party that my boss was having for me, actually.
36
He was quite pleased to have a going away party for me.
37
And I was at the party,
38
and his boss from New York flew up to this small town we worked in and convinced me to stay,
39
got me away from this boss, gave me a much bigger raise, and I stayed, and it changed my life forever.
40
And I learned something from it.
41
I have a big lesson.
42
Differentiation.
43
Now, I'm not sure this is popular here.
44
But I'm going to say it anyway.
45
Differentiation is absolutely the key to building great teams.
46
As I said in the beginning, this game that we're going to talk about tonight, this is all about building great teams.
47
The idea that Jack Welch could design a jet engine,
48
build a plow pen, write a comedy for television.
49
All these things is silly.
50
It's just not doable.
51
The only thing you can do is, in many ways, be a good orchestra conductor where you hire great people, keep raising the standards, keep getting better people,
52
and forcing yourself to learn from them.
53
The idea that you have all the answers is a joke.
54
You'll be as good as the team you get.
55
I'd like to focus on what happened from 1981 to 2001.
56
Because soon you were making headlines when you became CEO.
57
At that time GE had a very large range of businesses.
58
And you introduced a controversial strategy.
59
You touched upon it yourself before.
60
You called it, I think, something like, Number one, fix, sell or close it.
61
We're not carrying losers anymore, quote, Jack Welch.
62
How did you come up with that strategy?
63
Well, Peter Drucker, I've got to give him credit for this idea.
64
And it's a thought you all ought to think about.
65
Peter Drucker had a zillion great thoughts, but this was one of them.
66
If you weren't already in this business, would you enter it now?
67
And if the answer is no, what are you going to do about it?
68
And from that came fix, close, or sell.
69
So what we did was we put all the businesses that we were number one or number two in, and there were a number of them.
70
There were 16 of them.
71
But we prided ourselves on having 71 businesses.
72
So we put all the other businesses outside of the circles.
73
We had a services circle, a technology service business, and a manufacturing segment.
74
Three circles and then outside the circle were some 63 businesses.
75
The people outside the circles were madder than hell.
76
Whether we're in a leper colony, what's wrong with us, et cetera.
77
We had had some businesses that we were carrying as losers for decades, but that's who we were.
78
We were in those businesses.
79
They no longer made sense.
80
We were making television sets in a town called Syracuse, New York, a plant there.
81
And our manufacturing cost was 25% more than the Japanese were selling television sets in Syracuse, New York.
82
That didn't take a strategic whiz to get the hell out of it.
83
And that's the type of thing we went through with all these businesses.
84
Now, many times when we sold businesses to other companies, everybody won.
85
If you, in fact, don't have your people knowing exactly where they stand, what they're doing well, what they have to do to improve, and where their future's going.
86
The idea of calling people in, guess what happens when this happens?
87
You have to call people then like I did in the early 80s and say to them, I'm sorry, Mary, you have to go.
88
And Mary says to you, why me?
89
And you have to say to them, you're the worst person that we have here.
90
And she says to you, but I've been here 31 years.
91
Why didn't anybody ever tell me?
92
That's the sin of management.
93
That's what we, and people say, I'm too kind to give an honest appraisal.
94
Kind, that's cowardly.
95
We have 26 of the Fortune 200 CEOs worked for me.
96
The head of Boeing, the head of Honeywell, these huge companies, are my friends.
97
But we didn't have a place for them at the end.
98
And that's what you, but they knew, they knew the game.
99
Transparency, all I've talked about today.
100
You can't be too transparent with your people.
101
They must know where they stand.
102
But if you should ask the CEOs to learn from that lesson, what would that be?
103
If you think about the Michael Jorgen quote, what is the most important thing to have as a CEO, the lesson to learn?
104
One of the jobs you have as a manager,
105
forget CEO, one of the jobs you have as a manager is to pump every day self-confidence into your team.
106
to make them feel great, to make people like me feel like I got a full head of hair and I'm 6'10".
107
That's what you want to do.
108
You want to get into people's skin and excite them about where you're going and why you're going.
109
One of the things about change is, I'm sure all have took care of this, but when you come in as the new CEO or the new boss even,
110
Every new boss has a new direction, new change.
111
Let me give you, and they explain why we're changing, what's in it for the company to change, but they forget one thing.
112
People hate change.
113
And people want to know what's in it for me.
114
How did you make sure that your ideas was understood?
115
Well, you see, I didn't have the same job that all of her.
116
I had all these different, I really can go on mine.
117
So my job was to get broad things.
118
We want to do more services than we want products.
119
We want to have sticky businesses.
120
So my strategy was, be sure you're going for a sticky business.
121
What does a sticky business mean?
122
It means that every business, every sale you make, is a follow on sale.
123
You sell a CAT scanner or an MRI machine, and you sell a 20 year service contract.
124
We all learn from mistakes.
125
What would you say was your biggest mistake, and what did it teach you?
126
I talked about blowing up a factory.
127
Yeah, that was pretty big.
128
And I learned about how to treat people.
129
I also made really a rock of an acquisition.
130
You know, we have this boundary-less behavior.
131
We want to share ideas with everybody.
132
But we're growing so fast, and I made six big acquisitions, RCA, NBC Network, et cetera.
133
And I was swelling rather than growing.
134
And we bought an investment bank.
135
Get a peepity.
136
Now let me tell you what an investment, I hope I'm not offending any investment bankers here, But the investment banks in America, they have one basic, if you will,
137
value on that left-hand column I talked about, and it's my bonus, my bonus, my bonus.
138
Don't tell me about sharing ideas or this.
139
Culture meant nothing.
140
It was all about money.
141
So we clashed constantly.
142
We had all kinds of errors in there.
143
We had people stealing money.
144
We had all kinds of fraud.
145
We sold it, we got out alive, UBS eventually bought it all, and we got out whole.
146
But it was a dramatic mistake that taught me culture counts.
147
You can do a thousand spreadsheets on acquisitions, but if you don't get the culture right, the numbers might look good,
148
but you put it together and the cultures are like this, the deal is going to fall on its face.
149
What would be your key advice for them to remember by if they want to go out and really succeed, really win?
150
Well, you know, it's tough to pick one, but if I had to pick one, it'd be get the hell out of the office, get out and touch the people,
151
listen, listen, listen, love them to death, and touch them.
152
Get inside their skin, excite them about what they're doing, give purpose to their jobs and their lives.
153
That's what this is all about.
154
We spend most of our waking hours on these jobs.
155
Make them fun, make them exciting, and reward the hell out of those who do the job you're asking them to do.
156
Thanks a lot.
157
Ladies and gentlemen.
158
Thank you very much.
159
Thank you.
Why Practice Speaking with This Video?
Practicing your English speaking skills using real-world videos like Jack Welch's talk is an excellent way to enhance your fluency and comprehension. This video provides rich insights into leadership and strategy while showcasing effective communication skills. By engaging with the content, you not only learn essential vocabulary related to business but also gain exposure to natural conversational styles. Learning English with YouTube allows you to immerse yourself in authentic contexts, making it easier to understand nuances in language tone and delivery. Furthermore, this practice can improve your confidence when expressing your thoughts, especially in professional settings.
Grammar & Expressions in Context
In the transcript, several important grammatical structures and expressions illustrate the dynamics of effective communication:
- Conditional Structures: Welch uses conditional statements, like “if you don’t get the people right, the strategy doesn’t matter.” This conditional form is essential for expressing hypothetical situations and their consequences, a critical skill for any English learner.
- Passive Voice: Phrases such as “I was making $10,000” showcase the passive voice, drawing attention to the action rather than the subject. Understanding this structure helps learners shift the focus of their sentences when necessary.
- Direct Speech: “I quit within two weeks” is an example of direct speech, which makes conversations lively and engaging. Using direct quotes can add authenticity to your speaking by mimicking real dialogues.
- Descriptive Language: Words like “courageous” paint a vivid picture of leadership qualities. Incorporating descriptive adjectives can enhance your storytelling and persuasive abilities in English.
Common Pronunciation Traps
As you practice shadowing this video, pay close attention to the following pronunciation challenges:
- Differentiation: This multi-syllabic word can be tricky. Break it down into segments: dif-fe-ren-ti-a-tion. Practice saying it slowly at first, then gradually increase your speed.
- Courageous: This word may trip up learners because of its soft consonants and vowel sounds. It can help to emphasize the second syllable as you practice.
- Execution: This term is pivotal in the context of business and may be difficult due to its 'cution' ending. Practice saying it clearly in sentences to gain fluency.
Utilizing the shadow speaking technique with this video allows you to mimic Jack Welch's pronunciation and intonation, making your own speaking style more authentic and polished.
What is the Shadowing Technique?
Shadowing is a science-backed language learning technique originally developed for professional interpreter training and popularized by polyglot Dr. Alexander Arguelles. The method is simple but powerful: you listen to native English audio and immediately repeat it out loud — like a shadow following the speaker with just a 1–2 second delay. Unlike passive listening or grammar drills, shadowing forces your brain and mouth muscles to simultaneously process and reproduce real speech patterns. Research shows it significantly improves pronunciation accuracy, intonation, rhythm, connected speech, listening comprehension, and speaking fluency — making it one of the most effective methods for IELTS Speaking preparation and real-world English communication.