The Management System of General Electric Company

At the end of 1960s, General Electric Company met with fierce competition from Westinghouse Electric Company in the market, and the company's finance kept swinging on the deficit. The top leaders of the company adopted a new strategic measure in the enterprise management system in 197 1, that is, set up a "strategic organization" in the division. This "strategic organization" is an independent organization department, which can selectively manage some products independently within the division, so that the division can allocate and use human and material resources flexibly and effectively, and make strict and predictable strategic planning for various products, sales, equipment and organizations. This "strategic organization" can be equated with a group; It can also be equivalent to the level of the company, such as medical system, device components and chemical metallurgy; Others are equivalent to the level of the department, such as tungsten carbide tools and engineering plastics. The leadership of General Electric Company attaches great importance to the establishment of "strategic organization", which is considered as a "very meaningful step" and an "important way" for the company's development. 197 1 year, the company set a record in terms of sales and profits. Judging from the rapid development of the company from the 1960s to the mid-1970s, this measure did play a lot of roles. From 1966 to 1 1 in 1976, GE's sales doubled from $765,438+77 million to156.97 million; The net profit increased from $339 million to $93 1 ten thousand. In the same period, the total fixed assets increased from $2.757 billion to $6.955 billion.

In 20 15, Jeff Immelt, the current CEO of General Electric Company, announced the establishment of "GE Digitization Department", which integrated all digitization functions in the company into one department and better integrated software and analysis technology into industrial products. GE expects that the company will get $6 billion in software and analysis this year, and plans to become one of the top global 10 software companies in 2020. Similarly, the American General Electric Company attaches great importance to scientific research and has a long history. From the second year after the company was founded, the young German mathematician steinmetz engaged in scientific research and set up a laboratory at 1900. According to 1970 American Industry Association, the company has 207 research departments, including a research and development center and 206 product research departments. * * * There are more than 7200 scientific researchers/KLOC-0, accounting for 4% of the company's total employees.

1973 general electric company * * * has 3 1 000 professionals with technical degrees, more than half of whom are engaged in research and development. From 65438 to 0972, the company's total expenditure on scientific research exceeded 800 million US dollars, of which 300 million US dollars was borne by the company, and 500 million US dollars was mainly used for R&D contracted with the US government.

The research work of General Electric Company is divided into two aspects: basic theory and applied research. Its research and development center is engaged in these two aspects, focusing on basic theoretical research, serving the whole company, and conducting joint research on some topics in various industries. The predecessor of this R&D center is the laboratory established by the company in 1900, and it is also the first industrial laboratory engaged in basic research in the United States. Its founders are Whitener, a young chemist from MIT and two technicians from General Electric Company. The early research work of the laboratory mainly focused on the basic research of light bulb, X-ray tube, thyratron and related chemistry and metallurgy. During the two world wars, this research laboratory studied the communication and radar equipment used in the war. At the end of World War II, the number of researchers in the research laboratory expanded to more than 600. 1968, this research laboratory was officially named as the research and development center. To 1973 * *, staff 17000 people, including 325 doctors in physics. The deputy general manager of the company concurrently serves as the director of the R&D center. This R&D center consists of two research departments: Materials Science and Engineering Department (divided into four research rooms) and Physical Science and Engineering Department (divided into five research rooms). In addition, there are three administrative departments, namely

(1) Research and Application Department, which consists of four departments: external liaison, planning analysis, personnel research and intelligence research, and is responsible for rapidly popularizing the research results to all production departments of the company and establishing extensive technical contacts outside GE;

(2) Research Management Department, responsible for the management of experimental factories and service stations, leading the accounting department, equipment department and welfare department;

(3) Legal Advisory Department, composed of 1 1 person, is responsible for the legal affairs of patent review, invention evaluation and patent application. In addition, the company's 206 product research departments are generally located near the product factory, with researchers ranging from dozens to hundreds, mainly in applied research. /kloc-in 0/900, General Electric established the first R&D center in the garage.

GE has four first-class laboratories in the world, which are located in Una, Niska, new york, USA (1900 opened), Bangalore, India (opened in September 2000), Shanghai, China (10 opened in 2003) and Munich, Germany (opened in June 2004).

The General Electric R&D Center has produced two Nobel Prize winners. They are Irving Langmuir, winner of the 1932 Nobel Prize in Chemistry, and Ivar Giaever, winner of the 1973 Nobel Prize in Physics.