Tom Brennan's Reviews > Power Failure: The Rise and Fall of an American Icon

In the 90s, I used to haunt libraries like a ghost. Barnes and Noble too. I would read everything not nailed down because I love to read and because I was broke in those days. For years, I read Time, Newsweek, etc. while never purchasing a copy. In those years, I frequently came across some profile or other of General Electric and/or Jack Welch. He was the most respected CEO in America, and GE was the biggest company in America. Fast forward 25 years, and GE is a broken up shell of itself.

There's a story in there, and when I came across Cohan's book it intrigued me. I've read the stories of the downfall of MCI and Enron, amongst others, but those had fraud connections. GE, for the most part, did not. What happened?

Cohan answers the question methodically, in the best sense of the term. He walks us through the rise of GE, and the hidden land mines silently waiting beneath those glittering valuations. He is honest and fairminded in dealing with Welch and his immediate successor, Immelt. He did his homework and it shows in how he tells the story, skillfully weaving the various threads together or perhaps I should say showing us how they unraveled. Bad decisions? Some. Hubris? Of course. Failure to predict how badly some future unknown would impact them? Absolutely. Inability to respond flexibly? That too.

I find business books interesting, the historical ones, anyway. This book is interesting in the least, and even enlightening in spots. GE brought good things to life for generations, but in the end, it revealed the truth: Nothing man builds can survive long term, nothing, for everything human is faulty.