Winning - Jack Welch [30]
The ability to see around corners is the ability to imagine the unimaginable.
The third characteristic is a strong penchant to surround themselves with people better and smarter than they are. Every time we had a crisisat GE, I would quickly assemble a group of the smartest, gutsiest people I could find at any level from within the company and sometimes from without, and lean on them heavily for their knowledge and advice. I would make sure everyone in the room came at the problem from a different angle, and then I would have us all wallow in the information as we worked to solve the crisis.
These sessions were almost always contentious, and the opinions that came at me strong and varied. And yet, my best decisions arose from what I learned in these debates. Disagreement surfaced meaningful questions and forced us to challenge assumptions. Everyone came out of the experience more informed and better prepared to take on the next crisis.
A good leader has the courage to put together a team of people who sometimes make him look like the dumbest person in the room! I know that sounds counterintuitive. You want your leader to be the smartest person in the room—but if he acts as if he is, he won’t get half the pushback he must get to make the best decisions.
The fourth characteristic is heavy-duty resilience. Every leader makes mistakes, every leader stumbles and falls. The question with a senior-level leader is, does she learn from her mistakes, regroup, and then get going again with renewed speed, conviction, and confidence?
The name for this trait is resilience, and it is so important that a leader must have it going into a job because if she doesn’t, a crisis time is too late to learn it. That is why, when I placed people in new leadership situations, I always looked for candidates who had one or two very tough experiences. I particularly liked the people who had had the wind knocked clear out of them but proved they could run even harder in the next race.
The global business world today is going to knock any leader off her horse more than once. She must know how to get back in the saddle again.
HIRING FAQS
Finally, let’s look at the six FAQs—frequently asked questions—I’ve received about hiring over the past several years. At the end of them, I will try (at last) to answer the insurance executive from San Diego about the one best question to ask in an interview. As I said earlier, I’ve been thinking about it for a long time now.*
1. How do you actually interview somebody for a job? My immediate answer to this question is: don’t ever rely entirely on one meeting!
No matter how pressed for time you are or how promising someone looks, make sure every candidate is interviewed by several people. Over time, you will find that there are some people in your organization who have a special gift for picking out stars and phonies. Rely on them. (Bill Conaty, my HR head, was a master at this. Whether it was with a handshake, a smile, or a way of talking about their family, job candidates were transparent to him.) And listen when a trusted colleague tells you that his or her gut is negatively responding to a candidate. That uh-oh feeling is usually a sign that the candidate is not what he seems.
At some point in the interview process, when it’s your turn, make sure you exaggerate the challenge of the open job; describe it on its worst day—hard, contentious, political, full of uncertainty. As you crank it up, see if the candidate keeps saying, “Yes, yes, yes!” If he does, you should worry that he has few other options, if any. You may even be his sole hope of employment.
Be impressed if the candidate starts peppering you back with hard questions like, “How soon do you expect the results to be achieved?” or “Do I have enough people to make this happen?” Be even more impressed if she asks you about the