Getting Settled In ... Six Years Later

On a hot summer day in 2004, I stepped foot into the 201 Merritt 7 building in Norwalk joining the GE Capital team as a marketing analyst. Business was booming then – the mood was great and people fluttered the hallways with cheery dispositions. I awoke every morning feeling excited and challenged. However, I quickly realized that I needed to get to know people – the experts, great teachers, and employees who really enjoyed working here.

Over the years I’ve met and worked with so many people across many different functions, from marketing and sales to operations and IT. I established connections at all levels of the organization. Meeting colleagues informally, raising my hand to help out and attending various networking events allowed me to demonstrate credibility and build my personal brand.

Six years later I found myself ready for a new challenge so I joined ECLP to broaden my expertise in marketing and gain exposure to sales, risk and capital markets.

For my first rotation, I’m working in sales with the Media, Communications & Entertainment business within the Sponsor Finance platform. On my first day, I spent a little more than an hour with my assignment leader and we shared our backgrounds and talked about the rotation. One thing I promised I would do – for myself and for him – is to outline my goals and objectives (G&Os) so that I can refer back to what I said I would do and compare it with what I accomplished.

I’m learning how to do things that are quite foreign to me, like creating an underwriting cash flow model to better understand how much debt GE is willing to finance – whether a company is looking to make an acquisition, refinance their existing loan or various other reasons. I’m at the core of what GE Capital does … pretty cool, right? 

I won’t stop asking questions, being curious and scheduling meetings with whoever is free to meet with me. I believe that you can move up in an organization as large as GE if you have a positive attitude and a willingness to learn. I can honestly say that after six years with the company, in many aspects, I feel just as new as I did when I joined in 2004.

Posted by Callie