SME 710 – Service Strategy and Design
Case Study 1: GE’s Growth Strategy – The Immelt Initiative

Name: Ping Lei Student ID: 10320346

Please prepare an analysis of this case. Your write-up should be 4 to 7 pages. Questions that should be addressed are:

1. How difficult was the task facing Immelt assuming the CEO role in 2001? What imperatives where there to change? What incentives to maintain the past?

2. What do you think of the broad objectives Immelt has set for GE? Can a giant global
Conglomerate hope to outperform the overall market growth? Can size and diversity be made an asset rather than a liability?

3. What is your evaluation of the growth strategy (a strategy for a …show more content…

2. Internationalization – GE’s major opportunities for organic growth would be in its overseas operations-particularly in China, India and Europe.
3. Services Acceleration – Take more of the back room resources and put them in the front room-more sales people, more engineers, and more product designers.
3. Commercial Excellence – Shifting focus from GE’s internal processes to external customer requirements.
5. Growth Strategy – Build new businesses based on high-growth and high-margin areas that will provide “unstoppable” opportunities and expand GE’s base.

- Ongoing Operations of Strategy

• Immelt identified cash flow as GE’s number one financial focus. He used tools like Six Sigma to realign the business around this objective. It was through improved cash flow that Immelt would continue to invest in the business.
• Immelt hoped to adjust organizational structure of GE from the cold, results-oriented focus of Jack Welch, to a more open and less hard-edged architecture. He believed that the major changes that he would initiate at GE would be a result of the changing environment that GE faced and the shifting priorities that it faced.

- Rebalancing the Business Portfolio

• Immelt believed that GE needed to reposition itself to maximize growth opportunities and to achieve growth targets