This week has been a fruitful week, as we hosted five major events at our LDC.

• Chiefs & Leaders met to establish clarity and alignment on our purpose, roles, culture, strategy, and key objectives.

• Service Directors & Managers met to establish 2020 execution readiness, topics including role clarity, accountability, and our vision for the pinnacle job.

• Multiple levels of leadership met for root cause analysis (Topset) training and leadership skills refresher.

• Superintendents from multiple business lines met for Sales 101 training.

• GE Steam Power’s Nuclear business met with our Steam Nuclear team (from the GM to many Superintendents) to prepare the forecast for the next five quarters.

As I reflect on the week, I am mindful of a quote our Dan Reinhardt is fond of and often encourages us to remember.

“Never tell people how to do things. Tell them what to do and they will surprise you with their ingenuity.” – General Patton

We had a “divide and conquer” approach to the week. All came prepared to tackle the week and get many key goals accomplished while building relationships. Leadership was transparent about the outcomes we needed – the “What” – and various levels of the organization were empowered to make decisions – the “How”. I am confident we set ourselves up to successfully run the plays we need to run this spring.

More than strategy, I am confident we built trust this week. As the Chief & Leadership teams were looking beyond the here and now, another group of leadership – Directors, Managers, and Superintendents – were preparing us for the near term execution. As a result, our teams did a great job of defining the “How” and taking ownership and accountability for the “What”. This is a big step for us, because we have more and more of our team confident to step up, stand at the table, and proudly represent our APM.

This week was a large investment in leadership. Like any investment, we expect a return. I am confident we will see the returns this spring in our execution excellence. What I am equally excited about is the returns we will see beyond the spring that are the dividends of trust.

—Jake