G.E. Management Style
General Electric has some of the most unique and most effective human
resources (HR) practices of any global organization. Core to these unique
processes and their effectiveness is the value of company employees as the
most critical asset there is in the organization. While many organizations
claim this, GE makes that value a core part of their management strategies
and direction. HR is seen as integral to many of the business strategies as
a result.
One of the most powerful processes in GE is the extensive use of feedback
to both evaluate the performance of employees when working in groups, and
when working on their own. Every year there are extensive reviews of
employee performance, and those highest performing employees are placed
into management and leadership development programs, often with the intent
of replacing senior executive years in the future. GE has seen much
success with this yearly review of performance and the evaluating of which
employees will be promoted, sent to management development programs, or
given tasks that align with their specific skill sets. The ability to
match individual employees' unique strengths with the demands of a specific
business strategy is what HR spends the majority of their time working on,
based on the feedback obtained from peer-based and superior-based reviews
of performance. GE's culture passionately believes that for any business
strategy to succeed, there needs to be an accompanying specific set of
skills employees have that will make the attainment of the goals
achievable. GE sees strategy success at the intersection of a persons'
performance and innate talents on the one hand, and the demands of a
business strategy on the other. Finally, GE is a culture that thrives and
transparency, and the review of employee performance in teams is an
integral part of fulfilling that cultural value in the company.
