What it takes to make the turn

Tom Peters On Excellence

HUNDREDS of bosses in the past 10 years have confronted monstrous agendas for change, but only a few have executed a genuine about-face - such as Jack Welch at General Electric, Mike Walsh at Union Pacific Railroad and Tenneco and Percy Barnevik at Asea Brown Boveri. What do these three dynamos have in common?

Frighteningly smart. Most chief executives I've met are very bright, but Welch, Walsh and Barnevik are almost in a league of their own. Don't try to blow one by this gang, or try to hide bad news in a footnote.

Animal energy. Chief executives in general are an energetic lot, but these three are off the charts. Strat Sherman of Fortune magazine says Welch, whom he interviewed extensively, "just happens to have 2,000 per cent more energy than the rest of us." Ditto Walsh and Barnevik. It's exhausting just to watch these guys.

Irrational about action. Although Welch, Walsh and Barnevik are superb thinkers, they are also monumentally impatient. They simply can't countenance, or understand, procrastination. Normal barriers don't seem to exist for them and they don't expect such hurdles to slow down their underlings either. When you sign up for something, you do it - and intervening acts of God, nature and competitors are no excuse for not getting it done on time.

Distilled vision. Welch, Walsh and Barnevik are masters of "the speech." All three grasp nuance, but they have boiled their message down to a handful of critical principles - with which they will ceaselessly bore front-line employees, executives, securities analysts and the man on the street. You have no trouble figuring out where this gang is coming from.

Cut to the chase. It was clear to Welch, Walsh and Barnevik that the time for mincing half- steps was past. They took the "big bath," as the accountants call it, all at once. They figured they had one brief opportunity to mount a real revolution, and they grabbed it, compressing years of work by other chiefs' standards.

Disgust for bureaucracy. Many chiefs, while impatient and action-oriented, are quickly captured by their bureaucracies. This trio seems to be genetically averse to all forms of bureaucracy - and the wrath of the gods will be brought down on the head of anyone who allows turf issues or the procedure manual to interfere with progress.

Performance freaks. Welch, Walsh and Barnevik slashed layers of bureaucrats, liberated the independent unit managers, then held their toes close to the fire. Sure the world is ambiguous and changing fast. Nonetheless, you have been given a task to perform and given all the rope anyone could ask for - so perform. Ted Turner's version of this is: "Lead, follow - or get the hell out of the way."

Straight shooters. A union boss told me that Pat Carrigan, the first woman to manage a General Motors car plant, "ain't got a phony bone in her body." Welch, Walsh and Barnevik also have a visceral affinity for the truth. Bad news or good, they tell it to you straight. And in return they expect you to tell it to them straight. Full stop.

Tomorrow is another day. These execs think fast, decide fast - and don't rehash yesterday. David Glass of Wal-Mart said Sam Walton's main skill was his ability to leave yesterday's cock-up behind and get on with tomorrow. This ranks near the top for Welch, Walsh and Barnevik as well.

Half a loaf is no loaf. "It ain't done till it's done," could be the Welch, Walsh, Barnevik motto. We've seen lots of half-turnarounds recently - Kodak, Dupont - but halfway is no way for these three.

Driven individuals. I'm no psychologist, but "driven" does not seem excessive when describing these three bosses. They believe the impossible is possible and are determined to prove it, then re-prove it, day after day. In short, I wouldn't want to stand between them and what they want to accomplish.

Are there other skills that mark large-scale turnarounds ? Sure. Welch, Walsh and Barnevik cannot match the wacky brilliance Michael Eisner used to launch bedraggled Disney on a new trajectory. But GE, Union Pacific and ABB had to trash 100 years of old practices gone stale, and our trio was the perfect chain-saw crew.

They did more than hack. They were master rebuilders. Mass destruction must come first, and fast, at sagging corporations. But without the reconstruction, the pain is wasted.

Welch, Walsh and Barnevik are fit for the Mount Rushmore of corporate renovation. Emulating them is no small order. And these traits are not much good in halves. A half-impatient Jack Welch is pitiful to imagine, but brings to mind too many struggling chief executives.

TPG Communications