GE: A New Way Forward?

One of the most iconic American companies, General Electric (GE) was founded in 1892 in New York state. Named among the original dozen companies on the Dow Jones index in 1896, it was the list’s most tenacious holdout, maintaining its “blue chip” stock status for over one hundred years. Throughout its history, GE survived, indeed initiated, revolutions across industries, technologies, and managerial practices.
By the time award-winning “Manager of the Century” Jack Welch retired from his position as CEO in 2001, GE’s market capitalization was over $410 billion. That peak was never surpassed, and the subsequent decline tested company leadership. Welch’s hand-picked successor CEO Jeffrey Immelt oversaw GE’s near-bankruptcy in 2008 and warranted SEC penalties for misleading investors between 2015 and 2017. Media critiqued his replacement, John Flannery, for lacking urgency as he slashed the company’s once-coveted dividend in half.
In October 2018, H. Lawrence Culp became the first outsider CEO in the company’s history after another Board intervention. With a changing landscape that had rendered Welch’s handbook outdated and recent leadership that had been heavily criticized, Larry Culp faced looming strategic challenges. Would Culp's financial, managerial, and structural transformation empower long-term value creation?