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A new leader for a new time
In 2001, Je Immelt took over as the CEO o GE. As does any
new leader, Immelt brought with him a distinct point o view
about where GE needed to go in an even more complex
and global market. He knew that operating in this century
would require leaders to be continuously ocused on growing
themselves and their businesses. In act, organic growth was
to become the primary ocus throughout the company.
At the time, GE was known more or execution and
efciency than growth. And Immelt knew that promoting
growth to GEs more than 300,000 employees would
take more than an edict or a company-wide email rom
the chairmans ofce. He knew that inusing growth
throughout the company would require a undamental
shit in corporate culture.
Cultivating a culture of growth
To sow the seeds o growth in the company, Immelt
began to remake the companys vocabulary. He refned
the ocus o GEs annual strategic planning process and
renamed it Growth Playbook. In order to make growth
the ocus o every GE employee in every GE business, in
every part o the world Immelt knew the company would
need to revisit its leadership values. In act, because GEviews
all o its employees as leaders, it was likely that
the company was going to need an entirely new set o
values growth values against which every aspect o
the companys perormance would be measured.
Because this new set o values would serve as the
oundation o leadership and perormance throughout GE,
it was critically important that they be comprehensive in
scope and exact in defnition. There was an existing set o
values at GE, but they were not ocused on those aspects
o leadership that would drive growth in todays world. So,
in 2003, Immelt assembled an executive team to revisitthe core
values o the company.
The frst step o this process involved an intensive set
o interviews and ocus groups about GE. In this GE
Success Factors Project, senior leaders rom every
business and unctional area o the company were
asked about their leadership approach. They were asked
what worked, what didnt, and what had helped make
them successul. And most importantly, they were asked,
What will it take or GE to be successul in the uture?
The Growth Values: How GE aligned its culture with its growth
strategy
The results were collected and reviewed, put into
the context o GEs growth strategy, boiled down,
and inally edited by Immelt himsel, in 2005, into
ive compact Growth Values which serve as GEs
expectations or all employees: External Focus,
Clear Thinker, Imagination & Courage, Inclusiveness,
and Expertise.
Satisfed with these Growth Values, GE teams began
integrating them into every aspect o GEs operations. Every
course at Crotonville GEs world-renowned leadership
institute was aligned with the Growth Values. And
perhaps most importantly, the values were embedded in
the perormance-management system that determinesrewards and
incentives across the company. GE was
already a perormance-driven culture, but this new aspect
o including the Growth Values in perormance reviews
ensured that compensation would be based not just on
what an employee did, but how they did it.
We wanted to make sure the Growth Values are not
just posted on a wall or sent around in a company-
wide email, but actually woven into the culture, says
Janice Semper, Manager, Executive Development at
GE. This was done very thoughtully, systematically,
and deliberately.
Adjusting to global trends
For the next three years, GEs Growth Values deined
and drove the companys new culture o growth.
Then, in 2009, the global economic recession and
other world trends led us to reevaluate the Growth
Values to ensure they were still aligned with what was
happening in the world, and with the challenges our
leaders were acing.
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Je [Immelt] asked the very bold question in early 2009 o whether
these were still the right values, the right behaviors,
given that the world had undamentally changed, says Semper.
Considering everything we had done to embed these
values throughout the company, it was a courageous question to
ask.
This time, GE looked outside the company or perspective, and set
about gathering opinions on todays leadership
requirements in particular. A ew dozen o the companys most
senior executives were sent around the world to
meet with leaders rom more than 100 organizations, including
large multinationals, small start-ups in emergingmarkets,
universities, military institutions anywhere leadership is taught
and practiced. The process o
uninchingly reevaluating leadership in the new context o the
global environment lasted more than a year and
engaged leaders throughout the company. And the outcome was that
the fve Growth Values were still relevant,
but we contemporized the defnitions o each one to more
accurately reect the global environment.
The return on investment on the Growth Values cannot be measured
in a traditional sense. In act, GE believes so
strongly in cultivating its culture that eorts like these are
not required to justiy a return on investment. However,
the alignment that the Growth Values have enabled between the
companys overarching strategy, its leadership,
and the culture o the company is impossible to deny. The Growth
Values drive behavior throughout the company.
And they continue to guide not only what we do, but how we do
it.
External Focus Clear Thinker
Imagination& Courage Inclusiveness Expertise
Is in tune with customers
and environment, connects
with stakeholders, and is
educated on global issues
Embraces and adapts to
uncertainty, connects
strategy to purpose and
inspires, uses knowledge
and instinct decisively,
and hits commitments
Generates innovative
ideas, takes risks and
learns from success and
failure, and challenges
bureaucracy
Welcomes ideas, listens
and is humble, collaborates
with respect to individuals
and cultures, and drives
engagement
Has domain expertise,
continuously develops
self and others, and
leverages technology
GE Growth Values
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