Ge- Introduction and Corporate Strategies over the Years free essay sample

Brief history of General Electrics. In the year 1876 Thomas Alva Edison started laboratory in New Jersey that dealt with electrical devices. By 1890 Edison establish a company called Edison General Electric Company. It was at the same time that a competitor established themselves in the market. Thomason-Houston Company started to dominate the market. Soon both the companies found it difficult to rely solely on their patents and technologies. Hence in 1892 both the companies merged and called the company General Electrics. Through the years General Electrics has seen 10 leaders and yet managed to grow and make a name for its self in the world. The first GE Appliances electric fans were produced at the Ft. Wayne electric works in 1890s, while a full line of heating and cooking devices were developed in 1907. GE Aircraft Engines began in 1917 when the U. S. government began its search for a company to develop the first airplane engine booster for the fledgling U. We will write a custom essay sample on Ge- Introduction and Corporate Strategies over the Years or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page S. aviation industry. Thomas Edisons experiments with plastic filaments for light bulbs in 1893 led to the first GE Plastics department, created in 1930. The journey of General Electrics has had many ups and lows but even till today have managed to maintain their reputation in the market due to the factor such as * Leadership, * Adaptability, * Talent, * Influence and * Networks. These five points have been the key ingredients for the success of General Electrics. One of the earliest projects of the new lab was to defend the companys primary asset — incandescent lighting — through innovation. In 1908, GE scientist William Coolidge invented the ductile tungsten filament that made the GE incandescent lamp significantly more durable than the original design. The invention secured GEs technological leadership in the market and epitomized the role of the GE research lab — bringing innovation to the marketplace. GEs leaders through the years have built a diverse portfolio of leading businesses; a stream of powerful company-wide initiatives that drives growth and reduces cost; financial strength and Controllership that allow it to capitalize on opportunities through numerous cycles; and a set of common values that allows it to face any environment with confidence. General ElectrGE was formed by the 1892 merger of Edison General Electric of Schenectady, New York and Thomson-Houston Electric Company of Lynn, In 1896, General Electric was one of the original 12 companies listed on the newly formed Dow Jones Industrial Average and still remains after 115 years, the only one remaining on the Dow (though it has not continuously been in the DOW index). public company:23 Ton diesel electric locomotive made at the General Electric Corp. lant in Schenectady, New YorkIn 1911 the National Electric Lamp Association (NELA) was absorbed into General Electrics existing lighting business. GE then established its lighting division headquarters at Nela Park in East Cleveland, Ohio. Nela Park is still the headquarters for GEs lighting business. In 1935, GE was one of the top 30 companies traded at the London Stock Exchange. [11] computing: GE was one of the eight major computer companies through all of the 1960s GE had an extensive line of general purpose and spe cial purpose computers. Among them were the GE 200, GE 400, and GE 600 series general purpose computers, the GE 4010 Corporate affairs Classic GE neon signGE is a multinational conglomerate headquartered in Fairfield, Connecticut. Its New York main offices are located at 30 Rockefeller Plaza in Rockefeller Center, known as the GE Building for the prominent GE logo on the roof. NBCs headquarters and main studios are also located in the building. Through its RCA subsidiary, it has been associated with the Center since its construction in the 1930s. The company describes itself as composed of a number of primary business units or businesses. Each unit is itself a vast enterprise, many of which would, even as a standalone company, rank in the Fortune 500[citation needed]. The list of GE businesses varies over time as the result of acquisitions, divestitures and reorganizations. GEs tax return is the largest return filed in the United States; the 2005 return was approximately 24,000 pages when printed out, and 237 megabytes when submitted electronically. [30] The company also spends more on U. S. lobbying than any other company. [31] In 2005 GE launched its Ecomagination initiative in an attempt to position itself as a green company. GE is currently one of the biggest players in the wind power industry, and it is also developing new environment-friendly products such as hybrid locomotives, desalination and water reuse solutions, and photovoltaic cells. The company plans to build the largest solar-panel-making factory in the U. S. ,[31] and has set goals for its subsidiaries to lower their greenhouse gas emissions. 32] On May 21, 2007, GE announced it would sell its GE Plastics division to petrochemicals manufacturer SABIC for net proceeds of $11. 6 billion. The transaction took place on August 31, 2007, and the company name changed to SABIC Innovative Plastics, with Brian Gladden as CEO. [33] BusinessesMain article: List of assets owned by General Electric GEs divisions include GE Capital, GE Energy, GE Technology Infrastructure, and GE Home ; Business Solutions Through th ese businesses, GE participates in a wide variety of markets including the generation, transmission and distribution of electricity (e. . nuclear, gas and solar), lighting, industrial automation, medical imaging equipment, motors, railway locomotives, aircraft jet engines, and aviation services. It co-owns NBC Universal with Comcast. Through GE Commercial Finance, GE Consumer Finance, GE Equipment Services, and GE Insurance it offers a range of financial services as well. It has a presence in over 100 countries. GE gauges to control a railway locomotive at a museum near Saskatoon, Canada[35]GE also produces General Imaging digital cameras. 36] In 2010, General Imaging released the Bridge Camera GE X5 with 14MP and 15x optical zoom. [37] In 2011, it is replaced by 16MP GE X500 with optional red color in Japan besides traditional black or white color in world wide. [38] Since over half of GEs revenue is derived from financial services, it is arguably a financial company with a manufac turing arm. It is also one of the largest lenders in countries other than the United States, such as Japan. Even though the first wave of conglomerates (such as ITT Corporation, Ling-Temco-Vought, Tenneco, etc. fell by the wayside by the mid-1980s, in the late 1990s, another wave (consisting of Westinghouse, Tyco, and others) tried and failed to emulate GEs success. It was announced on May 4, 2008 that GE would auction off its appliances business for an expected sale of $5–8 billion. [39] However, this plan fell through as a result of the recession. Corporate recognition and rankingsIn 2011, Fortune ranked GE the 6th largest firm in the U. S. ,[7] as well as the 14th most profitable. [8] Other rankings for 2011 include the following:[9] #7 company for leaders (Fortune) 5 best global brand (Interbrand) #82 green company (Newsweek) #13 most admired company (Fortune) #19 most innovative company (Fast Company). GE Guiding Principles GE challenges its spirit of innovation and dedi cation to integrity to produce benefits that extend beyond building their own business. They also aim to address the difficult challenges that affect the lives of the communities and people who are touched by their business. Their goal is to make money (strong, sustained economic performance, make it ethically and make a difference. In most (large) corporations there are several levels of management. Corporate strategy is the highest of these levels in the sense that it is the broadest applying to all parts of the firm while also incorporating the longest time horizon. It gives direction to corporate values, corporate culture, corporate goals, and corporate missions. Under this broad corporate strategy there are typically business-level competitive strategies and functional unit strategies. Corporate strategy refers to the overarching strategy of the diversified firm. Such a corporate strategy answers the questions of which businesses should we be in? and how does being in these businesses create synergy and/or add to the competitive advantage of the corporation as a whole? Business strategy refers to the aggregated strategies of single business firm or a strategic business unit (SBU) in a diversified corporation Functional strategies include marketing strategies, new product development strategies, human resource strategies, financial strategies, legal strategies, supply-chain strategies, and information technology management strategies. The emphasis is on short and medium term plans and is limited to the domain of each department’s functional responsibility. Each functional department attempts to do its part in meeting overall corporate objectives, and hence to some extent their strategies are derived from broader corporate strategies. CORPORATE STRATEGIES OVER THE YEARS STAGE ONE- LIVING BETTER ELECTRICALLY This period began in the late 1870s with the original Edison General Electric Company founded and led by thomas alva edison. This led to key investors (Henry villard and J P Morgan) taking leadership and merged the company with Thomas Houston to form the General Electric Company. Beginning with the leadership of Charles Coffin and later pushed by Swope and Young GE instituted very powerful resource systems and permitted the company to develop a strong, loyal and trained bench of professionals and leaders. This was a period where the focus was on building a strong foundation team. STAGE TWO- DIVERSIFICATION AND DECENTRALIZATION Ge moved from being a pure electrical company to a highly comple and diversified company and it instituted unique management systems and human resource programs. Post World war 2 GE transformed into a massive successful and diversified company focusing on interna development and organic growth. Ralph Cordiner in early 1950s focused on training managers who could manage any business regardless of the industry or size. He frmulated a professional management training program. He believed that both organised labor and Big government were major threats to the companys success so he instituted an aggressive and adversial anti labor and anti big government program. He hired Ronald Regan an acto rto serve as the corporatae spokesman when exposed it adversely affected the credibility of GE leading to a big scandal including a price fiing scandal leading to GE aiming all its processes at fixing what had been undone. Fred Borch took over and initiated what was called a groth council to identify growth opportunities and hence pursue nine major new growth areas. These growth areas included four product oriented ventures and five service opportunities further leading to diversification and decentralization. STAGE 3 JACK WELCH Speed, Simplicity, Self-Confidence (GE 1995). These values would reflect not only in the organisation’s systems and processes but also in GE’s products and services through their simple and highly functional designs. * Sustained attack on bureaucracy. * sought to instil a culture of openness, confidence, leadership and creative thinking at every level of the organisation. Nuetron jack was his nickname for ruthlessly eliminated several layers of management and shed a large number of jobs Welch declared that the organisation’s true core competency rests in the ‘global recruiting and nurturing of the world’s best people and the cultivation in them of an insatiable desire to learn, to stretch, and to do things better’ (GE 2000). GE’s performance evaluation system was famous for * its ‘rigour and ruthlessness’ (Grant 2008, p. 308) * Welch clearly recognised that GE’s best asset was its human capital. WHAT IS WORK OUT? * A quick, simple concept aimed at getting unproductive work out of the process of decision making and decision implementation by harnessing the intellegence of the workers closest to the problem. In the middle of 1988 Jack Welch and Jim Baughman, head of the management-development center at Crotonville, New York, visited the various GE plants concerned about poor quality and low productivity in the major appliancs business. They met groups of frontline workers, usually without their managers and vice versa. Everwhere he heard the same thing which was workers had ideas but no authority to act on it and managers had the authority but no time to evaluate or approve the ideas of workers. GEs clogged organizational arteries posed a threat and hence Welch decided to remake one of the most successful companies in the world by demanding that each business unit has to either first or second in the world. If not the manager had to fix, sell or close the unit. To get rid of bureaurcracy he removed organizationall layers including the corporate strategy planning staff and decisions were ade by the people themselves an by Welch himself. The feedback from the drastic downsizing and absence of bureaucracy initially led to constant pressure as there was now too much work and too few people as the strategy, structure and cost base of GE had changed but not the way day to day work gets done. Besides that mrale was low too. Tired of the complaining Jim Baughman and Welch decided to convert an idea called work out into action with 30 management thinkers. The behavior of 13 business leaders and heads of the corporate staff groups had to be changed to change the underlying management culture of GE and hence Work Out was not only about reducing work but also changing the management culture simultaneously. The management team recruited leadership development and change management experts to help out who weere handpicked in a way that the senior business leaders of GE would consider them credible enough to work productively with them. The management teams goal was to appoint one lead consultant for each GE business as well as one for major corporate staff units. The idea converted to action and management leaders were roped in to sprea the virus to 13 business units at the time and by 1989 speed, simplicity and self confidence was the product of Work Out. BOUNDARYLESS ORGANISATION Information from multiple parts of the enterprise at our fingertips, all integrated to suit our specific needs, instantly available, across geographies, time zones and organizational structures. In order to achieve that and to enable the information age to realize its full potential, we need to allow for what The Open Group calls â€Å"Boundaryless Information Flow†- a continuous securestream of information seamlessly flowing within and among enterprises, across permeable boundaries. Welch believed that the key to translating diversity into a competitive advantage was the ‘frictionless transfer of best practices and learning within the organisation, and the close partnership relations with its suppliers’ (Grant 2008, p. 10). The Boundaryless Organisation initiative aimed to blur GE’s internal and external boundaries through information sharing, crossbusiness learning and the integration of key suppliers into GE’s end-to-end processes. It facilitated the flow of information and assisted learning across the organisation by providing a safe forum for the open expression of opinion. This would have helped staff overcome their competitive motives and assisted knowledge transfer. The blurring of boundaries had another important strategic purpose, namely, the unlocking of synergies from GE’s diversified portfolio of businesses and achieving substantial economies of scope by sharing knowledge, resources and capabilities common to different businesses. The organisation captured some of the benefits of its diverse knowledge base. GLOBALISATION Globalisation was aimed at exploiting international economies of scale across GE’s business portfolio and taking advantage of global opportunities as they arose. During the 1997 Asian financial crisis GE invested acquired distressed assets in the region in order to leverage off an eventual upturn. This approach had paid off for GE in the past during the US and European recessions in the 1980’s and the Mexican crisis in the mid 1990’s, allowing the company to accumulate quality assets at discount prices. The Globalisation initiative allowed the organisation to exploit global economies of scale and helped GE capitalise on learning opportunities across geographical locations. To the extent that knowledge from one GE business or location could be readily applied to another there was always a potential for synergy gains from the organisation’s global diversification. DIGITISATION This initiative was introduced in 1999 with the launch of Welch’s destroy-your-business. com program where line managers were encouraged to visualise how their business might be ‘crushed by the dotcom juggernaut’. Digitisation allowed further improvements in internal process and the discovery of profitable new market opportunities. The Digitisation initiative led to the widespread discovery of new opportunities not only in the improvement of internal knowledge management but also in customer service. Further, in combination with the breaking down of GE’s hierarchy, SIG SIGMA Six Sigma. The methodology, developed by Motorola, was implemented by GE on an unprecedented scale throughout the whole organisation. It is a comprehensive quantitative system for defining, measuring, analysing, improving and controlling every aspect of corporate processes. Among the claimed benefits of the system is its focus on achieving measurable financial results from any project to which it is applied. GE’s target was reducing defects to 3. 4 per million therefore aiming at flawless products and no room for mistakes. With the deployment of Six Sigma Welch clearly demonstrated his awareness of the importance of creating value for customers and its strategic role for GE. He was quoted as saying, ‘We want to make our quality so special, so valuable to our customers, so important to their success, that our products become their only real value choice’ (Bock, W. 001). This reflects Welch’s desire to lock in GE’s customers into perpetual dependence, making it more difficult for them to switch. Key Concepts of Six Sigma * Critical to Quality:Attributes most important to the customer * Defect: Failing to deliver what the customer wants * Process Capability:What your process can deliver * Variation: What the customer sees and feels * Stable Operations:Ensuring consistent, predictable processes to improve what the customer sees and feels * Design for Six Sigma:Designing to meet customer needs and process capability STAGE 4 Jeff Immelt 1. Focus on consumers and the need to use the process to satisfy customers and drive the growth of the company and diverge in to going big for GE i. e Diversification 2. Generating new idea and developing the capabilities to make them a reality-Innovation 3. Great technology. The main aim being the need to have best products, conten,t and services 4. Commercial excellence for developing world class sales and marketing talent 5. Globalization aims at creating opportunities everywhere and expanding in developing global markets 6. Growth leaders who can inspire and develop people who know how to help customers grow and help GE grow GE Production Strategies 1. Big moats Strategy When it comes to castles, â€Å"big moats† are tougher and more costly to build — but they’re also much better at keeping people out. With manufacturing, big investments that bring to market advanced technologies can have the same effect — keeping the competition from ever getting close. As  The New York Times  underscores in its in-depth story, ‘G. E. Goes With What It Knows: Making Stuff,’ a â€Å"big moat† manufacturing strategy is precisely what GE is successfully pursuing right now. It centers on â€Å"heavyweight products that take patience and piles of cash to develop, weigh tons and last for years — next-generation jet engines, power turbines, locomotives, nuclear plants, water-treatment systems, medical-imaging equipment, solar panels and windmills. The costs and complexities of such businesses†¦ make it hard for just any company to compete. † Essentially, these are markets, that have â€Å"big moats,’† GE Chairman and CEO Jeff Immelt told the paper. â€Å"They’re tough to get in. † But the pay-off is that big-moat businesses can also be quite lucrative. â€Å"Mr. Immelt points to G. E. ’s jet-engine business as an example, saying that it has higher profit margins and returns on capital than the leading banks. ‘It doesn’t happen every quarter or every year,’ he says. ‘But over a 10- or 20-year time period, the businesses that are hard to do had the best returns. So the arithmetic works over time. ’† 2. High – end technology based manufacturing. That focus on â€Å"technology-based manufacturing† is also turning into jobs, with the  Times  noting that more than 4,000 have been created by GE over the last 18 months, including â€Å"new factory jobs in Kentucky, Ohio, New York, Alabama and Mississippi, for making products including energy-thrifty washers and dryers, fluorescent light bulbs, sodium batteries, environmental coatings and jet engines. And the company is opening a research center in Michigan for advanced manufacturing technologies. † As Immelt explained, the key is focusing on what he calls â€Å"large-scale entrepreneurship† by â€Å"identifying long-term market shifts — ‘what’s next,’ he says — and then marshaling the company’s research, manufacturing and marketing resources to capitalize on the opportunity. â€Å"It’s about using the scale of G. E. , the majesty of the company, to drive growth and change,† he says. 3. Innovation When work first began on the LEAP (Leading Edge Aviation Propulsion) engine in 2005, the objective was clear: to create a high-bypass turbofan jet engine that dramatically increases the fuel efficiency of the narrow-body planes we fly. The  year was 2005. Today, the news is official: Just ahead of next week’s 49th International  Paris Air Show, Carrier Virgin America has officially launched the LEAP engine by ordering it for 30 of its  new Airbus A320neo planes. Virgin also announced that  the existing CFM56-5B  engine will power the 30 currently-flying A320s in its fleet. The combined order totals $1. 4 billion. By achieving 15 percent more fuel efficiency gains over existing tech, the A320neo and LEAP engine will save Virgin America $1. 9 million in annual fuel costs per plane while also offering double digit reductions in greenhouse gas NOx emissions. Both the LEAP and the CFM56 are made by  CFM International, a joint venture between GE Aviation and French engine manufacturer Snecma. The new airplanes will begin delivery in 2016. Henson said GE has a three step process to help the company reach the 8% annual growth targets set by CEO Jeffrey Immelt. The three steps are: 1. Identify the trends shaping the business landscape. Every year the company surveys whats happening in the world around it. This information then shapes how it will proceed with its growth and innovation efforts. This year, the company identified the rise of emerging markets, infrastructure growth (in large part enabled by the emerging markets), large demographic shifts, and environmental awareness in consumers. . Apply business goals that are unachievable if the units stay focused on the current business environment. This step related to a point Govindarajan made earlierthat business focus can be drawn into three segments: 1) managing the core business 2) moving into adjacent markets and 3) creating entirely new businesses. 3. Lay out the challenges, the trends, the targets, and have a discussion with key team members. The company convenes leaders from each of its units and surveys the above information and crafts the plans it will need to meet the goals. These innovation projects are then reviewed by the chairman once a month, which raises the profile of these efforts throughout the company and reinforces the importance of innovation. Asked by an audience member where the innovation process gets messy, Govindarajan said It gets messy when you go to execute on breakthrough ideas. Thats where the challenges lie. To meet the challenges of executing on innovative ideas, Govindarajan suggests companies employ three key tenets: 1. Forget  the rules that govern the core business. 2. Borrow  the key components of the core business that will give the new business competitive advantage. 3. Learn  how the breakthrough business should run- spend a little, learn a lot through testing your assumptions. Ultimately, said Govindarajan, building a breakthrough business is less a technology challenge than it is an organizational challenge. - Empowering Your CPG Business Strategies How Do You Accelerate Operating Strategies? Through our long history we’ve continually enhanced our solutions to deliver value where you need it. Whether you’re engineering more flexible assets to keep pace with product innovation, or driving structured continuous improvement programs to drive down inventories and manage costs, our solutions fit with your goals. Operational ExcellenceTo achieve both plant and supply-chain level efficiencies, a solid foundation of reliability and predictability is needed. Tap into our experience and see how our solutions have helped our customers secure and build on their progress along a consistent set of improvement milestones: * Process/Production Visibility – Using HMI and control systems to empower operators and maintenance with line-side metrics nd machine data * Overall Equipment Effectiveness (OEE) – Using the Proficy suite to integrate data assets along production routes, and adding dimensions of analysis for a more complete understanding of factors affecting throughput * Process Reliability – Incorporating rich quality information to extend loss analysis an d prevention, and to maximize material usage * Standardized Work Processes – Ensuring consistent work processes with structured task execution, event management and line-side supporting information * Enterprise Operational Excellence – Extending analytics across the production network; integrating performance and event data to enterprise systems for improved planning and execution| | | http://www. ge-ip. com/industries/consumer-packaged-goods/cpg_customer_strategies Profitable and Product-Safe Supply Chain As Consumer Packaged Goods companies increasingly face the need to manage multiple new SKUs while ensuring high product quality, our Proficy software suite delivers maximum flexibility and operational reliability—critical to addressing changing consumer demands in today’s competitive marketplace. Providing the right IT architecture and helping you leverage valuable, hidden manufacturing data, Proficy seamlessly integrates key production information with in your existing infrastructure, from the plant floor and across your enterprise. It enables increased manufacturing visibility to help you make better decisions that drive results: * Increased productivity and efficiency * Reduced costs * Improved quality and safety * Better regulatory compliance Manufacturing Sustainability With increasing costs for utilities and permits, resource conservation is as much about the bottom line as it is about stewardship. Yet in the pursuit of a lower impact business, the quality of your product cannot be compromised. Our portfolio of solutions delivers the information needed to understand how to manage these competing needs – enabling you to mix continuous improvement strategies with capital expenditures for a balanced outcome. Advanced Automation – Ensuring precise control of delicate processes, so energy, water and other key inputs are consumed appropriately * Open ; Layered – Visualization, data collection and reporting/analytical tools designed to integrate with diverse assets and other systems – u nlocking the information in your processes * Comprehensive Analysis – Manage utility or chemical inputs in the same framework as standard materials – correlating all machine, ingredient and process information against consumption for deep insight into improvement opportunities HR STRATEGIES GENERAL ELECTRIC HR STRATEGYGE employs over 13,000 people in India. †¢Rewards and BenefitsGE strives to provide competitive employee benefits packages in the various regions and industries. Their wide range of employee services, retirement, health and other benefit plans are designed to help eligible employees make the best decisions for themselves. Through HEALTHAHEAD, GE has further committed to improve the health of their employees and their families by creating a culture of health which will deliver on-site and on-line programs, education, tools and services. †¢Leadership and LearningGE believes in developing the talent of new employees with programs designed to give in-depth experience and build skills that are crucial to their long-term success. They invest more than $1 billion annually in training and education offerings. †¢The GE Women’s Network is a voluntary organization to support the professional development of women at GE. Development is focused on leadership, advancement and career-broadening opportunities through a variety of tools, including information, education, leadership interaction and networking with other women to share and learn best practices †¢The â€Å"SPIRIT ; THE LETTER†are two of the ways that GE keeps open channels of communication and makes clear their policies and expectations of employees. †¢GE policies and initiatives also include day care centers, mother’s resting rooms in offices, safer transportation and son. †¢RESTARTis a program that focuses on hiring women scientists and engineers who have taken a career break and wish to get back to work. †¢Recently, in 2011, GE introduced â€Å"GE India Innovation Award† to honour those employees who exemplify the concept of ‘imagination at work’. Dipak Bharali who invented an accessory in conjunction with the Jacquard hand loom became the first winner of this award. Marketing strategies 1. Investing and tapping the internal market within the reach of the company. To promote this strategy, GE invests in their employees by providing good working environment and providing necessary tools required to perform various tasks in the organization. By being highly valued and appropriately compensated, the employees at GE are usually the first customers to purchase and promote any product rolled in the market. Another important consideration in this strategy is the involvement of employees in developing a quality approach the work they do in the company. Every employee has the responsibility of promoting production of quality products within the business. 2. EXTERNAL ENVIRONMENT In seeking the external market, the company considers several factors such as fiscal, economic, technological developments, legal requirements and the business environment Attention is also paid to existing and potential competitors in the business within the external environment. The micro and macro environment for the company’s business are also put into consideration. The microenvironment is the combination consisting of customers, suppliers and other stakeholders in the company . GE is a huge company that treats suppliers as insiders and crucial partners in the running of the business. The customers of GE are not seen just as potential people willing to spend their money in the business but the company has put efforts of integrating the company’s view and the view of the customers. Customer service is very core in GE and all multinationals dealing under GE is supposed to adopt this view. Three components are cited as crucial with regard to quality afforded to customers. These include the employees, the process and the customers themselves Another strategy implemented by GE is relationship marketing among its major consumers. This strategy basically aims at retaining existing customers This trategy concentrates on building long term relationship with the customers which is regarded as very vital in the running of business. This strategy is based on the business recognition that customers build relationship with people rather than products . To build thi s relationship, frequent contact with the customers is enhanced and the customers are encouraged to keep on making enquiries within the business. In its efforts to build strong relationship with the customers, GE has established a modern state of the art answer centre, which is regarded as one of the best in the world where customer’s gets free personalized attention around the clock. The center has been able to create opportunity for GE to be in contact with customers for longer time and hence creating the opportunity for tapping even customers who may get dissatisfied in the course of doing business. This contact helps the customers of GE to understand the company’s commitment to them and the value they attach to their customers. This has the effect of improving and cementing the very crucial relationship that GE attempts to build. The knowledge obtained from customer’s interactions provides relevant information with regarding to sales and marketing and possibilities of new products development * Diversification strategy Another crucial strategy adopted by GE is diversification. Recently, the company diversified to offering financial services. This diversification is adopted in the company’s efforts to ensure that it can offer all services that its customers deem necessary. This attempt was initially started as a credit financing stream where customers would obtain financing for the products they wanted if they didn’t have enough money. Ways in which the company can improve its international marketing strategy The international market is considerably different as compared to local and regional markets. This is because it entails the possibility of meeting different markets dominated by different cultures. To achieve success in effective international penetration, several ways can be adopted and utilized. The first strategy would be comprehensive market survey that would effectively establish the needs that potential customers of that market are . The survey should be carried out by professionals who should include as part of their team local professionals well oriented with local market. The survey would help the company establish the kind of products that it can offer to such markets. The other consideration would be to use other companies existing in the local markets as frontiers of the company in such markets either as dealers or franchises The other strategy would be recruitment and training of employees sourced from the local markets. Such employees would give the company the advantage of being conversant with local languages and the general trends of business within their local environments. Use of print and electronic media would also be very crucial in establishing international markets and this would call for establishment of liaison between major media sources and the company . Advertisement in the media should be professional and should portray the integrity and presence of the company Recommendations GE is a global company. The achievements made by the company over the last couple of decades show the firms commitment to achieving global presence in all corners of the world. Since the company has a wide capital base, it has potentials to reach a wider market than it has currently achieved It is recommended here that; * The company should invest in high level business surveys in upcoming markets to expand its market base * The company should engage local professionals in their targeted regions who would help actualize the real customer needs in such markets. * The company should adopt up to date technology to help fast track its services and product logistics in its wide markets. This calls for adequate training for employees on ways and modalities with which new technology should be used. Such technology could be in the area of communication, international money transfer, shipping and logistics and effective diplomacy necessary to maintain budding foreign relations Five Ingredients of GE’s success: Success Factor 1: Leadership * GE Leaders: Dynamic in their own way. All contributed to the institution some enormous power and rewards * Their belief in shared leadership and team approach Note: GE leaders once retire step down from all the responsibilities, allowing the successors to lead independently Success Factor 2: Adaptability * GE’s management has anticipated and responded successfully to major market shifts * It has adopted â€Å"strategic portfolio† management and decision making approach. Adapting to situations and thus cracking the most attractive opportunities which has come their way * Current leader Jeff Immelt follows the same pattern of â€Å"Systematic Change† Success Factor 3: Talent * They consider employees as a valuable resource and asset * GE’s success has been selectivity in all aspects * Their sensitive and caring nature towards their valued employees and stakeholders Success Factor 4: Influence * Influencing the stakeholders Stakeholder groups – Investors, Stockholders, management, employees, customers * GE leaders have been consistent in trying to ensure that their interests have been satisfied Success Facto r 5: Networks * GE from its inception has pursued highly conservative, discipline financial policies that have also earned the company accolades * To implement these policies they have set up an integrated set of management systems which are â€Å"Networks† * GE has always made constant efforts to build up strong networks, as it has never directly communicated with the consumers it has made additional efforts to be in the good books of the middlemen PR STRATEGY The Big Picture GEs approach to corporate citizenship and to business are driven by a common understanding of the role we can play in helping to solve the worlds toughest problems. Our goals are to make money (strong, sustained economic performance), make it ethically (rigorous compliance with financial and legal rules), and make a difference (ethical actions, beyond formal requirements, to advance GE’s reputation and long-term health). GEs corporate citizenship strategy is defined by three key pillars of energy and climate change, sustainable healthcare and community building, and underpinned by a foundation of operational excellence in the way that we do business. We highlight our citizenship performance with data points, metrics, actions and progress made in the following priority areas: * Our People * Our People: Health Safety * Compliance Governance * Public Policy * Environment * Our Suppliers * Human Rights * Our Products Services * Our Customers * Our Communities Perspectives GE invites a range of stakeholders on an ongoing basis to provide their opinions on key issues and challenges GE and other multinationals face in the area of corporate citizenship. Metrics As part of our citizenship reporting, GE sets many benchmarks to measure performance on issues that support GEs commitment to the themes that drive our business strategy. Features We have great stories to tell from our perspective as a global citizen. We’re working to be part of the solution in solving some of the worlds toughest problems. Our Priorities We identify citizenship progress by priority areas that range from the environment and human rights to our people, products and communities.