 "Companies across the world look at India as a great source of talent: Raghu Krishnamoorthy")
GE has a lot of people who have been groomed in India, with good skills, communication abilities, international and managerial exposure, Raghu Krishnamoorthy tells Rajarshi Bhattacharjee
Very few multinationals claim to have their own corporate business schools as GE does. How do you leverage Crotonville to elevate knowledge, skills and capabilities across the board in GE?
The journey of Crotonville (the John F Welch Leadership Development Center at Crotonville) started in early 1950s when the then chairman realised we needed to provide an effective bridge between skills and knowledge that GE employees had already brought with them from their education and corporate backgrounds. So we had our first training in 1954 that lasted 12 weeks. From there, we have moved on to two to three weeks courses.
Crotonville has always been used to make sure that we really scale up the leadership capability in GE. For instance, we pioneered the idea of corporate education at Crotonville. But look at what we do today: We train about 45,000 employees across 162 countries. Crotonville has trained about 10,000 of them. The balance 35,000 happened in rest of the world where GE has its presence.
To drive future capabilities at Crotonville, we have access to some of the world's best thought leaders. Second, we have our own leaders teaching leaders. For instance, senior business leaders in GE have to spend a week at Crotonville - we call it 'leader in residence'.
We also bring in teams to explore. For instance, the chief executive of GE in India with his entire team of directors will come together at the Crotonville. As they go back to their sites, they seek how to apply the concepts learnt. Then they have to present to the chairman what they commit to do.
The talent management mandate of organisations needs to evolve to serve the needs of their stakeholders. How do you re-purpose the talent development agenda at GE, based on the external environment and your business needs?
Different parts of the world have different talent challenges. In the US, for instance, you have availability of mature talent and the talent challenges may be different from India. But India happens to be a net exporter of talent. GE has a lot of people who have been groomed in India, with good skills, communication abilities, international and managerial exposure. Little wonder, companies across the world looks at India as a great source of talent and put them out to the other parts of the world including the US.
On the other hand, in Africa, we don't have readymade talent. We have to work with universities, and even schools to start spotting talents and sponsoring them. We are actually not just building talents, in some cases we are creating talents.
What is the latest in executive development innovation and people processes you have designed to strengthen organisations?
One is the 'leader in residence.' It is a sabbatical of sorts, but immersed in a learning environment. We want leaders to be learners. We want the whole organisation to be a learning organisation. Another one is the 'intact team' concept, where the whole team with its leader becomes part of the learning process. You may ask, why the entire team? Say, you are an individual who is going to learn something new. When you come back to your site, you may find others don't necessarily share your view-point. If you bring the whole team in this journey, they come back reflecting the learning collectively.
The third point is where we actually take our leaders on exploration. There are some skills that are difficult to teach. I can't teach you trust. I can't teach you courage. But if I take you to 9/11 memorial, if I take you to the Normandy battlefield, you will learn about courage. Therefore one innovation is, how do you curate people's experiences.
One interesting example is, we took a bunch of our employees to a completely dark restaurant served by visually challenged persons. They had to figure out how to eat in that restaurant. The purpose is to understand how you deal with ambiguity. What does it mean for leadership when you are dealing in a strange country with strange people and how do you still make meaning out of it? So we use a variety of teaching methodologies and experiences for people to self-reflect and learn.
It is widely reported that GE makes a significant investment in corporate learning globally. Can you give us a number on that?
Globally GE invests a billion dollars every year in coaching and corporate learning. In India we have 16,000 employees. Last year, close to 6,000 employees received training. Obviously, one-third of the GE employees in India are expected to receive training this year - that's the investment.
Our attrition rate is around 7 per cent compared to the industry trend of 10 to 12 per cent. Interestingly, among all the people who came on board in GE last year, more than 170 of them are our former employees who chose to return to GE. They mention culture and learning opportunities as a reason for comeback. That's our return on investment.
GE emphasises on functional leadership at the Crotonville. Don't you think a cross-enterprise leadership approach is the need of the hour?
We employ both the approaches. When you join the company, you need to make sure that you get the necessary functional expertise. Keep in mind we are one of the most advanced technology companies in the world - jet engine, steam turbine, gas turbine - you don't want anybody who is manufacturing a jet engine not to be an expert. So in the first few years we make sure that our employees have the requisite expertise. After that we put them together from different businesses, say opening them to a programme like management development. Employees from across the world from different GE businesses come in for that course. So, for GE employees, it starts with functional leadership programmes and as they go up in the hierarchy, they get into cross-enterprise leadership programmes.
LORD OF THE LEADERS
* Prior to heading executive development at GE, Raghu Krishnamoorthy served as vice-president of human resources at GE Aviation, a subsidiary of General Electric. He joined GE in 1994 as human resources leader of GE Capital (India) and was involved in setting up GECIS (later Genpact)
* Krishnamoorthy has more than 19 years of human resources experience at GE, including several global and operational leadership roles
* He holds a management degree from the Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad and was a Fulbright scholar at the University of Minnesota
Very few multinationals claim to have their own corporate business schools as GE does. How do you leverage Crotonville to elevate knowledge, skills and capabilities across the board in GE?
The journey of Crotonville (the John F Welch Leadership Development Center at Crotonville) started in early 1950s when the then chairman realised we needed to provide an effective bridge between skills and knowledge that GE employees had already brought with them from their education and corporate backgrounds. So we had our first training in 1954 that lasted 12 weeks. From there, we have moved on to two to three weeks courses.
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To drive future capabilities at Crotonville, we have access to some of the world's best thought leaders. Second, we have our own leaders teaching leaders. For instance, senior business leaders in GE have to spend a week at Crotonville - we call it 'leader in residence'.
We also bring in teams to explore. For instance, the chief executive of GE in India with his entire team of directors will come together at the Crotonville. As they go back to their sites, they seek how to apply the concepts learnt. Then they have to present to the chairman what they commit to do.
The talent management mandate of organisations needs to evolve to serve the needs of their stakeholders. How do you re-purpose the talent development agenda at GE, based on the external environment and your business needs?
Different parts of the world have different talent challenges. In the US, for instance, you have availability of mature talent and the talent challenges may be different from India. But India happens to be a net exporter of talent. GE has a lot of people who have been groomed in India, with good skills, communication abilities, international and managerial exposure. Little wonder, companies across the world looks at India as a great source of talent and put them out to the other parts of the world including the US.
On the other hand, in Africa, we don't have readymade talent. We have to work with universities, and even schools to start spotting talents and sponsoring them. We are actually not just building talents, in some cases we are creating talents.
What is the latest in executive development innovation and people processes you have designed to strengthen organisations?
One is the 'leader in residence.' It is a sabbatical of sorts, but immersed in a learning environment. We want leaders to be learners. We want the whole organisation to be a learning organisation. Another one is the 'intact team' concept, where the whole team with its leader becomes part of the learning process. You may ask, why the entire team? Say, you are an individual who is going to learn something new. When you come back to your site, you may find others don't necessarily share your view-point. If you bring the whole team in this journey, they come back reflecting the learning collectively.
The third point is where we actually take our leaders on exploration. There are some skills that are difficult to teach. I can't teach you trust. I can't teach you courage. But if I take you to 9/11 memorial, if I take you to the Normandy battlefield, you will learn about courage. Therefore one innovation is, how do you curate people's experiences.
One interesting example is, we took a bunch of our employees to a completely dark restaurant served by visually challenged persons. They had to figure out how to eat in that restaurant. The purpose is to understand how you deal with ambiguity. What does it mean for leadership when you are dealing in a strange country with strange people and how do you still make meaning out of it? So we use a variety of teaching methodologies and experiences for people to self-reflect and learn.
It is widely reported that GE makes a significant investment in corporate learning globally. Can you give us a number on that?
Globally GE invests a billion dollars every year in coaching and corporate learning. In India we have 16,000 employees. Last year, close to 6,000 employees received training. Obviously, one-third of the GE employees in India are expected to receive training this year - that's the investment.
Our attrition rate is around 7 per cent compared to the industry trend of 10 to 12 per cent. Interestingly, among all the people who came on board in GE last year, more than 170 of them are our former employees who chose to return to GE. They mention culture and learning opportunities as a reason for comeback. That's our return on investment.
GE emphasises on functional leadership at the Crotonville. Don't you think a cross-enterprise leadership approach is the need of the hour?
We employ both the approaches. When you join the company, you need to make sure that you get the necessary functional expertise. Keep in mind we are one of the most advanced technology companies in the world - jet engine, steam turbine, gas turbine - you don't want anybody who is manufacturing a jet engine not to be an expert. So in the first few years we make sure that our employees have the requisite expertise. After that we put them together from different businesses, say opening them to a programme like management development. Employees from across the world from different GE businesses come in for that course. So, for GE employees, it starts with functional leadership programmes and as they go up in the hierarchy, they get into cross-enterprise leadership programmes.
LORD OF THE LEADERS
* Prior to heading executive development at GE, Raghu Krishnamoorthy served as vice-president of human resources at GE Aviation, a subsidiary of General Electric. He joined GE in 1994 as human resources leader of GE Capital (India) and was involved in setting up GECIS (later Genpact)
* Krishnamoorthy has more than 19 years of human resources experience at GE, including several global and operational leadership roles
* He holds a management degree from the Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad and was a Fulbright scholar at the University of Minnesota