An Interview with ECLP Alumnus, Chris Gibson

Chris Gibson is an ECLP alumnus currently working at GE Corporate in Fairfield, CT. He graduated from the program in 2009 after rotations in Sales Operations with Industrial Solutions, Brand Marketing & Water Product Management in Appliances, and LED Product Management in Lighting. Chris holds a Bachelor of Industrial Design from Auburn University and an MBA from Louisiana State University.

What is your current role at GE? 

Director, Strategic Marketing at GE Corporate

As Director of Strategic Marketing for GE Corporate, what are you currently focused on? 

My role focuses on driving marketing initiatives across our portfolio of businesses, specifically in the areas of value proposition and pricing. From a pricing perspective, I work with the respective business pricing leaders to identify best practices in pricing strategy, structure, and execution. My value proposition work includes leading initiatives and sharing of best practices that help create, refine, and measure the strength of our value propositions. For example, I’m currently working with numerous businesses on our Customer Metrics initiative, which concentrates on measuring and quantifying the strength of GE value propositions from the customer’s perspective. The ultimate objective is to aggregate the learning from across GE in order to move from disparate one-off research projects to a value proposition measurement capability that is applicable for products or services as well as solutions. 

What are the biggest challenges of your job?  

I would say that the biggest challenge of my role is also one of the greatest advantages: breadth. During my 7-year GE tenure I have worked in three different GE businesses not including my current role at Corporate: Appliances, Lighting, and Industrial Solutions (Energy). Attempting to learn the industry and markets in those three different businesses over a short period of time was certainly a significant challenge. In my current role, that learning curve challenge has expanded to include all of the GE businesses. Now on any given day my work could range from Capital’s pricing strategy in Australia, to Industrial Solutions’ WattStation go-to-market strategy, followed by the “One GE” Healthcare value proposition strategy in EMEA. Learning these new industries and markets on a continuous basis is certainly the largest challenge, but it is also the most rewarding in terms of the varied experiences. The exposure to different businesses and regions has also revealed that although there are nuisances to every business specific challenge, many of the issues that our businesses encounter regarding pricing and value propositions are similar.

Keeping true to our healthymagination spirit, what do you do to keep fit these days? 

To keep fit physically I like to run and exercise, although I do not run during the week as much as I would like. To stay fit mentally, I try to read a lot, laugh a lot, and not to take myself too seriously. Playing practical jokes on coworkers is always a good way to maintain a balance and keep your own stress level down – just ask Jason Cordova and Anubhav Ranjan…

What’s it like to be a year removed from ECLP? 

It feels longer than a year! I definitely miss seeing my fellow ECLP classmates every 6 months [at the ECLP Global Conference]. Fortunately I have the opportunity to participate in training for the current ECLP’s every once in a while so it keeps me plugged into what is happening with the program. I keep in touch with many of my ECLP classmates and am still convinced that we had one of the best ECLP classes in program history!

What skills or lessons did you learn as an ECLP that you particularly find valuable now that you are off-program? 

The opportunity on program to transition quickly from business-to-business, assignment-to-assignment has been invaluable in my current role. The rotational experience prepared me for the pace of welcoming frequent new and different challenges as they arise.

Looking back to the decision you made to join ECLP, why was it the right decision for you? 

As an internal hire, I joined ECLP four years after graduating from business school. I was in New Orleans as the GE Appliances Area Sales Manager for Louisiana when I joined program, first learning about the program through working with an ECLP alum, Brian McWaters. ECLP seemed like the right fit, as I was looking to learn more about the breadth of the company and expand my commercial skill set. ECLP exceeded my expectations. It allowed me to have numerous different experiences across the company in a relatively brief period of time, as well as provided a way to meet and work with some incredibly talented people.

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