Moving Forward
Colleagues,
Since my initial note to you last month following the murder of George Floyd, the topic of GE’s own practices and actions on inclusion and diversity has been on my mind constantly. I’ve spoken to many Black leaders inside and outside of GE during this time. A week ago, I joined our African American Forum (AAF) town hall with nearly 1,800 GE employees for a spirited hour of conversation. The questions raised by our colleagues were tough and fair, and the personal stories were deeply impactful. I am listening and continue to develop insight into how we as GE can rise to the challenge to build a world that works…for everyone. That job begins with me and my leadership team. But, ultimately, we all have a role.
Today, I am sharing actions GE is taking on what will be a long and much-needed journey toward sustainable change with real impact. You have gotten to know me in these last 20 months, and I hope you have learned that I favor action over words, and I don’t sign up for commitments we can’t fulfill. With that in mind, there are important steps we will take to move us forward. Let us recognize that there is no quick fix. We have work to do, but it’s work we can do, and I am deeply committed to seeing it through.
With all of this in mind, here are our first actions:
Accountability
To drive progress, we will harness the power of corporate, our businesses and the HR function. And in concert with our overall efforts to shift GE’s focus and resources to the business units, that is where much of the important work will take place. I am heartened by the commitment from all our business CEOs to take this on and drive accountability.
- At the Corporate level, I will name a Chief Diversity Officer to join my senior team, selected from among our senior leaders known for accountability and driving business results.
- Each GE business also will name a Chief Diversity Officer on their leadership team, mirroring the concept I described above.
- We will reinstate our CEO Diversity Council, a roundtable of all our business Chief Diversity Officers and GE-wide Affinity Network leaders, to meet with my senior team, our business CEOs and me on a quarterly basis. You can expect these meetings to have the same rigor as our operating reviews where we get to root cause on problems and embrace the “red” in order to improve.
- Business CEOs will assume active sponsorship for each of our Affinity Groups. Having business champions drives a new level of accountability as well as additional inclusivity as our CEOs gain invaluable perspectives. And while today’s actions respond to recent events and discussions with our Black colleagues and their allies in the GE community, we are committed to ensuring our efforts are also inclusive of all our under-represented groups.
- During our Monthly Op Reviews, each business CEO and their Senior HR Managers will now report on their Inclusion and Diversity KPIs so we have regular visibility and accountability as we do with all critical business metrics.
Transparency
- Many of you have asked about our diversity data. With transparency as one of our core Leadership behaviors, I’ve asked Kevin Cox to explore and come back to me with a recommendation as to how we can responsibly and transparently share our diversity data. Other companies are taking this step, and I view it as important for GE. I don’t think our metrics will surprise – or satisfy – anyone, but they will indicate the progress we have yet to make.
Talent Development
- We will direct and empower the business HR heads to create a strong and effective mentoring, development and sponsorship program for rising diverse talent. I have found mentorship to be invaluable and want to consider how we do this in a thoughtful and sustainable way. I also plan to invest more of my own time in mentoring our next generation of leaders. I love to teach and share my experiences and doing this with a diverse set of leaders is a priority.
Community
- As I’ve written before, my wife and I are strong believers in education. It’s an important family value of ours, and we believe the single most important driver of economic inclusion. Creating educational opportunity is a focal point for much of our personal philanthropy, including the funding of the GE Chairman scholarships.
With this in mind, I’ve asked the GE Foundation to explore ways we can build on this, starting with an initial $1MM contribution to fund economic inclusion with a primary focus on education and retraining. This action is consistent with the GE Foundation’s long history of supporting education and workforce diversity programs. I’ve asked Russell Stokes to work with Linda Boff and the Foundation to crystallize where this future investment will have the greatest impact.
I believe that the issues we are facing must be addressed at their root cause to ensure we create sustainable change that brings equity and justice to not only our Black communities but all other diverse communities.
Our Values
At GE, we believe in the value of your unique identity, background, and experiences. We know that by embracing diverse teams and perspectives we are better equipped to innovate, to solve big problems, and to deliver for our customers.
We are committed to fostering a culture of respect. And that means we hold our employees and our leaders to the highest standards. Each of us is an ambassador for GE, and how we conduct ourselves both at and outside of work should be done respectfully. GE has no tolerance for racist words, actions or attitudes.
In closing, I want to thank the many employees who have shared their personal stories and experiences with me. I have been deeply touched. I hold these close and they underscore that we have a great deal of work to do as a company and as a country. And as I said during the AAF town hall last week, Black lives matter…absolutely.
These are the actions we are announcing today and upon which we will build and grow. As I said when I wrote to you about these issues last month, our first Leadership behavior is “Act with Humility.” Humility begins by admitting none of us have all the answers. I encourage us all to listen intently to the needs and perspectives of others and work together to make meaningful progress.
I invite your thoughts and deeply appreciate your support.
Rolling stock Engineer || Testing & Commissioning || Maintenance planning Team || Troubleshooting || Service Engineer ||
4 年With Fully respect, I have only one question, why GE selling his company. GE should improve his business strategies And why we are all forgot note of our founder #ADDITION If you think you can do it, just try and try untill you got success.????????
Senior Engineer Transient Analysis at GE-Hitachi Nuclear Energy International, LLC
4 年Yesterday, I listened to Martin Luther King Jr. read his Letter from a Birmingham Jail on https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ATPSht6318o I was deeply moved by his remarks and especially this passage. "I have been gravely disappointed with the white moderate. I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negroes’ great stumbling block in the stride toward freedom is not the White Citizen’s “Counciler” or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate who is more devoted to “order” than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice; who constantly says “I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I can’t agree with your methods of direct action”; who paternalistically feels that he can set the timetable for another man’s freedom; who lives by the myth of time and who constantly advises the Negro to wait until a “more convenient season.”" I am inspired by your comment that we will drive progress and harness the power of corporate GE. Now is the time to act to correct racial injustice, not another "more convenient season". Thanks for you leadership Larry as a citizen of the US, a shareholder, and employee.
With all due respect, I do not see the above as a solution. In fact, it falls under what I call the broad category of pablum – Soothing, but essentially useless.?As a Master Black Belt during my GE days, I offer, for your consideration, a possible solution, to the immediate problem of police brutality and then one that goes beyond. Here goes: For police brutality - A)?????Every police precinct in this country shall immediately review all arrest logs and their accompanying body and/or patrol car camera videos.?If, on any of those videos, a police officer is shown using excessive or inappropriate force against a suspect of ANY color, fire them immediately and prosecute them.?Each precinct shall also review its disciplinary records and immediately remove from duty any officer cited and/or disciplined for brutality against citizens. B)?????Remove immediately, any Police Chief or precinct leader that cannot produce patrol or body camera footage of police action associated with arrest log activity, or that has failed to remove an officer disciplined for brutality. Granted, not every camera is going to function properly 100% of the time, and local laws vary, but in 30+ states, possibly more, laws and policies exist for body and patrol car camera use.?In the remaining states, this should be made law immediately, which brings me to my next point. C)?????Any Mayor, Congressperson, Senator, at the state or local level, who does not establish laws and allocate funding to enable the above should also be “Removed” immediately. Every Mayor or town leader should also include a specific agenda item at city or town council meetings that requires the Police Chief to report his actions relating to body/patrol car camera review.?By “Remove” in this instance, I mean voted out of office at the first opportunity. This brings up my next point. The Fourth Estate. D)?????We have a free press in this country for a very significant reason.?To keep tabs on our elected and appointed officials.?Anyone who carries a pen, camera, microphone, and a press pass should make it his or her business to report regularly on the above.?Simple compliance metrics could be posted in the first paragraph of any news publication or website police blotter/crime watch section.?Failed compliance activities by local police leadership could also be reported, and finally, any politician who fails to create laws or allocated funding could also be called out, especially around election days, when their jobs are on the line. How do we ensure that the press does their job????It’s us.?You and me. E)?????Instead of kneeling, standing shoulder to shoulder in crowds spreading viruses, holding up signs, and promising to love each other, each of us should hold our local media outlets accountable for carrying the statistics and reporting that tell us, the taxpayers and citizens, that the above is happening as required so that we may hold our elected and appointed officials and servants accountable for consistently and transparently implementing the above actions.?If our politicians don’t step up, “Remove” them at the polls.?If the Fourth Estate doesn’t mind the politicians, “Fire” them by canceling your subscription and finding one that does.?A little social media shaming might help as well. This is simple, measurable, and actionable.?The legislation and orders to implement and report on this would fit easily on a single page. Note also, the layers of accountability, each building on the last, ending with us, the citizen. We’re all in this together. Now we have a way to act like it.?Granted, it might take some time to implement fully, but initial actions could happen quickly. Fully implemented, actions like the above would create laws, policies, and procedures that would create true transparency, and very quickly weed out the bad actors.?If, as leaders at GE, you are serious about solving this situation, you will use your political clout in the communities where GE employs its workers. You have the voice to urge our civic leaders to consider this layered approach to accountability for police action. What was it Louis Brandeis said???Sunshine is the best disinfectant??This is what sunshine looks like. Maybe GE can bring a little light to the situation! Now onto the broader situation of helping black, hispanic, or any other community that is underserved/developed/privileged or any other word that can be used to describe an area blighted by the exodus of work to low cost pole countries, especially China. Three words: Bring. It. Back. Instead of adding to the bureaucracy, that would sit around, talk endlessy, and get nothing done, pluck your best and brightest manufacturing and engineering folks, and bring manufacturing of GE products BACK to US soil and put the plants in these communities. Use the awesome creative abilities of the many fine and capable professionals at GE to set up the plants. Work with local and federal governments to upgrade the processes, and invest in the equipment and processes that would make the products competitive with low cost pole labor. If that requires automation, so be it. Imagine for a second not only bringing jobs back these communities, but true high technology, high skilled jobs these communities so sorely need. For once, let's take clear ACTION and DO SOMETHING, rather than just hire a bunch of high priced political types to preen and virtue signal and plan more of the same. This is what we've always done. The two solutions I have outlined above are tangible, actionable, and measurable. Break the mold, Larry. Do it differently. And win!!! Bob Lobley Retired GE Employee since 2015.