This story is part of the series Behind the Desk, where CNBC Make It staffs with successful business executives to learn everything from how they got to where they are to what gets them out of bed in the morning to in their daily routines.
Jeff Immelt admits that his 16-year career as CEO of General Electric was, at best, “controversial” after he left the famous company in 2017 drowning in debts worth the value of ruined shares. .
But instead of earning his more than $ 200 million in retirement and downtime, Immelt wrote a book. “Hot Seat: What I Learned Leading a Great American Company,” available Tuesday, details its mistakes in running GE.
“I want to think about it,” says Immelt, who now lectures at Stanford University’s Graduate School of Business. “I don’t want to hide.”
In 2001, Immelt, who had previously held executive positions at GE for 19 years, was chosen to succeed Jack Welch, one of the most famous CEOs in U.S. history. Under Welch, GE’s market value increased from $ 14 billion to more than $ 410 billion.
Immelt’s career was not so fruitful.
He took the helm on September 7, 2001, four days before 9/11. The impact of the terrorist attacks hit several GE companies, causing a 20% drop in shares, Immelt writes in “Hot Seat.” Seven years later, the 2008 financial crisis hit GE’s financial services division, GE Capital, which nearly collapsed.
During Immelt’s tenure, GE shares fell about 30%, ending the market value of more than $ 150 billion, which many analysts, investors and even fellow executives fault of Immelt’s wrong steps. The year after its release, GE was removed from the Dow Jones industrial average. In December, GE agreed to pay $ 200 million to the Securities and Exchange Commission for misleading investors and disclosure failures in its energy and insurance businesses from 2015 to 2017.
“I know there will be more criticism with the book as we relive it,” Immelt says. But “I love the company. I love the people and I feel like a different context needs to be painted around GE.”
Here, Immelt talks to CNBC Make It about its big mistakes, how it handles extreme stress, and whether money and power really make you happier.
About whether I would do it all over again with GE: “Good days are really good”
I think the answer is yes. Good days are really good and the things we have had the opportunity to do and work on, such as the globalization of the company or the launch of products or the development of people, are extremely rewarding.
And bad things stink.
What I try to explain to entrepreneurs or MBA students [who I work with] is that without a few bad days, you never appreciate the good days. I have a unique perspective of being grateful that the good days have gone through some bad ones.
It was an honor to lead, and I will always feel that way.
General Electric executives Jack Welch and Jeffrey Immelt are attending a press conference in New York City. The conference will announce that Immelt has been named president and president-elect of GE, succeeding Welch.
peterson brand | Corbis Historical | Getty Images
When dealing with extreme stress: “I would go home at 7pm and go to bed”
Go to bed at night and don’t worry about things you can’t control. Do your best. People need to learn to classify themselves according to progress and not about perfection. Perfection is impossible today.
You also have to be careful. You can’t drink too much. You can’t do things that affect your judgment.
During the financial crisis, when I wasn’t working, I went home and went to bed. Some nights that were at 2 in the morning and others at 7 in the afternoon, I would go home at 7 in the afternoon and go to bed because you never knew when you would sleep the next amount.
About his big mistakes: he should have looked at the company with a more “comprehensive” look
Very soon after 9/11, he should have had a holistic, long-term look [GE], and he did so from a precautionary point of view.
The choice I made at the time was to let GE Capital continue to grow as we fixed the industrial set of businesses. For 2007 and 2008 [and the financial crisis] appeared, this did not seem very clever. At that time there was so much momentum around GE, that it would have been a Herculean task.
But what I’m telling young leaders is that you look at your business for a very long period of time. Don’t do it every day. I think the story could have been different if I had.
Finding support: “Everyone likes you when you’re in the lead”
My family and close friends have helped me get past the last three years and the last 20 years.
Everyone likes you when you’re at the top, but you need a few people you really like when you’re at the bottom, because almost everyone gets there.
The fact that I maintained close friendships and maintained an amazing wife and daughter, that’s what helped me overcome myself.
As for the happiness of buying money: I was “so happy” as a GE plastics salesman
When he was one [GE] plastic seller in 1982, he was very happy. I was happy when I ran the medical business [GE Medical Systems from 1996 to 2000].
I think people need to be success-oriented and have a vision of themselves and what they want to do, that is meaningful to them and to others. That to me is happiness and money comes with it.
I didn’t get a chance to spend as much time with my daughter as I would like. But what makes up for it is that you have to do a lot of really tidy things. It would be insincere if I didn’t say there were benefits [to money], but I always marveled at simple things.
When I was CEO, I would go to Walmart and shop to see what our lighting products on the shelves were like. I would call [former Walmart CEO] Lee Scott o [current Walmart CEO] Doug McMillian and say, “That’s what I saw today.” I never lost sight of the fact that this is what I like most about my job.