Be Where The Growth Is

Recently, the ECLPs in Brazil had a great opportunity for a round table with Beth Comstock, our CMO and Aparna Ramaswani, our global HR leader. It was an hour and a half of quality time spent only with seven ECLP alumni and seven current ECLPs from the classes of 2011 and 2012.

Beth and Aparna were in Brazil to attend the Marketing Council, which was organized by our corporate marketing manager, Marcos Leal. In addition, Beth and Aparna both had busy schedules meeting with commercial leaders from all over Brazil.

During our discussion, Beth mentioned the importance of being close to the customers. She stressed that we need to understand the way our solutions help our customers make money. Most importantly, she emphasized that we need to make sure our customers are satisfied and happy with GE.

“If you keep your focus on the customer, everything else (i.e. GE’s strategy and value proposition) comes together.” Beth said. She also mentioned our new suite of Digital tools and how they will be an increasingly important part of our customer offering. These tools will help us to gather crucial data, allowing us more insight into our customer’s needs and how to meet them.

Beth also expressed her target to make marketing at GE more integrated to the individual business it supports, so that marketers use the same language as individuals from all of the other functions. In her opinion, “implementers” are the key to making this a reality.

Recently, in an article for Harvard Business Review, “Unleashing the Power of Marketing,” Beth described “implementers” as leaders who “build coalitions and persuade others, using functional expertise, insights, and teamwork rather than authority. They have to mobilize people and, quite simply, get things done. Marketers are too often painted as ideas people who don’t stick around to see their ideas implemented or as wonks who prescribe heavy doses of theory. So if they want credibility, they have to deliver results.”

You can learn more about the article here and read the full version here.

Beth also mentioned how instrumental ECLPs are to the achievement of her goals for marketing at GE, saying “You (ECLP’s) have to lead the change.”

Aparna commented on her efforts to build a strong pipeline of talent in various strategic regions around the globe, with an emphasis on emerging countries such as Brazil, India and China. She mentioned how important it is to hire more ECLPs in these regions.

Throughout our time together, both Beth and Aparna stressed that this is not only a great time to be at GE, but also a great time to be in Brazil. GE’s strategy is to go where the growth is and invest in our country, so I could not agree more that I am in the right place at the right time.

Posted by Luis

Comments

[Michelle]

One thing rings true for anything though, If you keep your focus on the customer, everything else comes together AUTOMATICALLY afterwards, this is something that many people do not realise right away