The Bottom 10 Percent

末位百分之十
 

In Welch’s final year as CEO he came under fire for GE’s policy regarding the “bottom 10 percent” of its workforce. Each year, GE grades all of its employees, and the bottom 10 percent is summarily fired. The press asked how Welch, the defender of people and ideas, could just wipe out the bottom 10 percent of its workers?  Isn’t that a heartless act that flies in the face of everything he stood for? Many had a difficult time reconciling Welch, the champion of learning, with Welch, the pragmatic coach who wanted only the best employees on his team. In response, the GE chief invoked a sports metaphor (remember, sports are everything).Any professional team drops the 10 percent who aren’t cutting it, he proclaimed.He also explained it this way: “I think the cruelest thing you can do to somebody is give them the head fake…nice appraisals…that’s called false kindness. A removal should never be a surprise.”

在擔任首席執行官的最后一年中，韋爾奇因在通用電氣公司實施 “末位百分之十”員工淘汰制而遭到攻訐。通用電氣公司每一年都對所有員工評級打分，名次排在最末百分之十的員工一總被裁掉。媒體質問說，作為人才和創意捍衛者的韋爾奇怎么能夠把員工中的末位百分之十簡單地抹掉了事呢？這種無情的舉動難道不是與他所主張的一切事情完全對立么？許多人都覺得難以將倡導學習的韋爾奇與那個只想要最好的員工加入團隊的實用主義教練韋爾奇調和起來。這位通用電氣公司老總在答復時借用了一種體育比喻（別忘了 “體育即一切”），他宣稱說，任何職業團隊都會放棄掉末位百分之十的選手，這些人不能取得成功。他還這樣解釋道：“我想你能對別人做的最殘忍的事，是給他們做個頭部假動作……給他們好評……那叫偽善。裁員絕不應當是意外的事。”

 

THE SIGNIFICANCE OF WELCH’S 10 PERCENT RULE

韋爾奇“百分之十”規則的重大意義
 

It was likely not lost on Welch that, in his final months in office, after chalking up all those accolades (such as the “ultimate manager”), he was being haunted with the same brand of criticism that plagued him in his first years as chairman. During the hardware phase, during downsizing and delayering, he was also condemned for being a heartless leader. But Welch had an answer for his critics. The GE chairman has always thought of sports as an apt metaphor for business and had little difficulty making the same sort of difficult decisions that coaches make every day.Welch always wanted “A” players on his team and thought it perfectly acceptable to have all of GE live up to a certain standard of performance.

韋爾奇在獲得了那么多的贊譽后（比如稱他是“終極管理人”），卻在任期的最后幾個月中遭到與他擔任董事會主席最初幾年里困擾他的同樣批評，對這一點他應該不會感到困惑。在硬件變革階段中，以及在裁員和精簡層級期間，人們也譴責他是沒有心肝的領導。但韋爾奇從容應對他的批評者。他總把體育運動當成是經營管理的貼切比喻，而且也不怕做出教練們日常所做的那種艱難抉擇。韋爾奇總是想要“王牌”選手組成的團隊，而且覺得讓通用電氣公司全體上下遵守一定的績效標準是完全可以接受的事。