Management guru Jack Welch fuming as successors dismantle house he built

By Alec Hogg

Although 82 years old and long-since retired, an aura still surrounds former General Electric CEO, the legendary management guru Jack Welch. Son of a train conductor, between 1981 and 2001 Welch was the chairman and CEO of what he grew into America's largest industrial corporation, growing its value 4,000%.

A chemical engineer by training, Welch's ideas inspired a generation of managers across all business disciplines. But clearly not successor Jeff Immelt – who was finally pushed out last year by irate investors – nor incumbent John Flannery, who now reckons completely breaking up GE is the only way to save it.

Another poor set of GE quarterlies on Friday was dominated by a sharp reverse in the power division. As a result, the share price dropped 4.4%. It's a familiar story. In the 17 years since Welch stepped down, GE stock has lost three quarters of its value.

Welch has not spoken publicly about the travails at his old company but is privately seething. One friend told Fox News: "Jack is so mad he doesn't want to go on television to discuss what happened to GE because he won't be able to control his temper." Were he alive, Nelson Mandela may have felt the same about successors dismantling his beloved Rainbow Nation.