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Jack Welch, who transformed General Electric Co. into a highly profitable multinational conglomerate and parlayed his legendary business acumen into a retirement career as a corporate leadership guru, has died. He was 84.

His death was confirmed Monday by GE. The cause of death was renal failure, his wife Suzy told The New York Times.

Welch became one of the nation’s most well-known and highly regarded corporate leaders during his two decades as GE’s chairman and chief executive, from 1981 to 2001. He personified the so-called “cult of the CEO” during the late-1990s boom, when GE’s soaring stock price made it the most valuable company in the world.

Born Nov. 19, 1935, as the only child of an Irish working-class family in Salem, Mass., Welch graduated from the University of Massachusetts-Amherst in 1957 with a bachelor’s degree in chemical engineering. He later obtained master’s and doctoral degrees in chemical engineering from the University of Illinois, finishing in 1960.

Welch joined GE that year as a junior engineer in Pittsfield, Mass.

He rose through the ranks, and built GE’s plastics business into one of the company’s fastest growing business units. He became a senior vice president in 1977, and vice chairman in 1979.

Welch’s results-driven management approach and hands-on style were credited with helping GE turn a financial corner, although some of the success came at the expense of thousands of employees who lost their jobs in Welch’s relentless efforts to cut costs and rid GE of unprofitable businesses.

Welch also divested GE of billions of dollars in businesses that didn’t live up to his mantra that they be No. 1 or 2 in their markets. The early moves dismantled GE’s bureaucracy and eliminated many layers of reporting relationships.

Business success and outspokenness brought him wide fame.

In 1999, Fortune magazine named Welch as its “Manager of the Century.”

For his first book, “Jack: Straight From the Gut,” Welch received a $7.1 million advance. Although released on the very morning of the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks, the book became a best-seller, and led to frequent speaking engagements where he took his candor on stage.

“From the day I joined GE to the day I was named CEO, 20 years later, my bosses cautioned me about my candor,” Welch wrote in ‘Straight from the Gut.’ “I was labeled abrasive and consistently warned my candor would soon get in the way of my career … and I’m telling you that it was candor that helped make it work.”

Welch moved to Boston after his career at GE, living in a townhouse in the city’s Beacon Hill section.

In his later years, Welch also devoted more time to passions such as baseball — specifically, the Boston Red Sox. But Welch never strayed far from GE.

“When I last saw him, what I remember most vividly was when he asked me, ‘So how exactly are you running the company?’ Jack was still in it – committed to GE’s success. And to have Jack Welch ask me how I am running GE is pretty humbling,” said GE’s current CEO, Larry Culp.

Welch is survived by his third wife, Suzy Welch, and four children from his first marriage.