GE’s Former Lawyer Recalls his Worst Day

Ben Heineman’s book, High Performance with High Integrity, is a sort of memo to CEOs on how to run a major company. He would know; Heineman was GE’s general counsel for years. A few weeks ago, he sat down with Big Think to talk about what it was like advising the CEOs of America’s largest company.

He walks us through his worst day on the job—when the Israeli press leaked an internal scandal—and how he handled getting the message out to the employees and the public. When you’re working for any major company, it isn’t just about making sure that your business practices are legal. What about ethical? Heineman describes an ethical battle that GE faced, and how he helped them handle it. A senior fellow at Harvard Law School, he also weighs in on what he foresees the future of the legal profession being. Will we see a disappearance of the billable hour?