General Electric Company’s (GE) mission statement and vision statement bring the business to the frontline of industrial progress. The company’s corporate mission statement shows the purpose of the strategies that the business employs. General Electric’s corporate mission states business aims as a major influencer of industrial development. On the other hand, the corporate vision statement reflects the future aims of the business. In GE’s case, the corporate vision indicates leadership as a digital industrial company. GE’s strategic goals consider leadership in the aerospace industry. General Electric ensures that its mission statement and vision statement are always relevant to current industry situations and market dynamics to maintain its position as one of the largest companies in the world.
General Electric’s corporate mission statement is used to develop strategies for all operations throughout the organization. Through such strategies, GE’s mission statement provides a general approach for addressing business needs in the aviation/aerospace market. These strategies influence General Electric’s operations management approaches. On the other hand, GE’s corporate vision statement directs the organization toward desired future business targets.
General Electric’s Mission Statement
General Electric’s mission statement is “We rise to the challenge of building a world that works.” According to GE, this corporate mission is the same as its business purpose. The following are the main components of General Electric’s mission statement:
- Rising to the challenge
- Building a world that works
The first component of the mission statement shows General Electric’s philosophy of developing its business and capabilities to address challenges. Thus, GE’s purpose extends beyond its current operations, such as in the aerospace industry. Developing capabilities to rise to the challenge, as this corporate mission states, requires innovation and continuous improvement integrated into the implementation of General Electric’s generic competitive strategy and intensive growth strategies. In the second component, the corporate mission statement shows that GE’s goals include providing solutions that contribute to global development and improvement. In terms of these solutions, the mission gives an idea about the types and characteristics of products included in General Electric’s marketing mix (4Ps). The components of the mission statement broadly illustrate the nature of GE’s business purpose and its strategic goals.
General Electric’s Vision Statement
General Electric’s vision statement is “To become the world’s premier digital industrial company, transforming industry with software-defined machines and solutions that are connected, responsive and predictive.” This corporate vision directs GE’s strategies toward industry leadership. The following are the main components of General Electric’s vision statement:
- Becoming the world’s premier digital industrial company
- Industry transformation
- Software-defined machines and solutions that are connected, responsive, and predictive
The first component of the vision statement shows that General Electric aims to be the global leader as the premier digital industrial company. To achieve this leadership, the company needs to stay ahead of competitors, like Rolls-Royce and 3M. This component of the corporate vision statement highlights the importance of strategies for the competitive challenges shown in the Five Forces analysis of General Electric Company. On the other hand, the second component of the corporate vision focuses on industry transformation. This factor indicates GE’s role as an influential firm, such as in the aerospace industry. The third component provides details of the outputs of GE’s business organization. To satisfy the goals and objectives of this vision statement, strategies need to utilize the competitive advantages shown in the SWOT analysis of General Electric Company to exploit business opportunities in the global market.
Assessment & Recommendations – General Electric’s Mission & Vision
General Electric’s mission statement is concise and brief but satisfies only some of the conventions in writing an ideal mission statement. An ideal corporate mission statement should indicate what the company does, while providing general ideas about how the business should reach its vision. GE’s corporate mission provides a general idea about the nature of the business and its purpose. Even though it represents current business operations, General Electric’s mission statement lacks information about organizational activities and how the company plans to achieve the industry leadership goal of the corporate vision statement. In this regard, it is recommended that General Electric Company add more information into its corporate mission statement to show the company’s activities for satisfying its vision statement, to effectively guide business strategies.
General Electric’s vision statement has components that satisfy the standards for writing the ideal vision statement. The ideal corporate vision provides an abstract description of a future business condition that suits the company. GE’s corporate vision statement satisfies these ideal conventions because it is specific enough to describe the company’s products, and abstract enough to encompass the entire organization and its operations as a digital industrial company. Thus, General Electric Company has a satisfactory vision statement.
References
- General Electric Company – About Us.
- General Electric Company – Form 10-K.
- Lüthy, A. (2023). From the Mission Statement to Value-Oriented Corporate Management. In Value-Oriented Leadership in Theory and Practice: Concepts-Study Results-Practical Insights (pp. 79-93). Berlin, Heidelberg: Springer Berlin Heidelberg.
- Reid, S. E., & Crawford, C. B. (2022). Crafting the Vision Statement. In Entrepreneurial Vision: A Guide for Charting and Implementing the Visioning Process (pp. 263-276). Cham: Springer International Publishing.