Think your organisation is too big, bureaucratic and over-regulated to apply lean startup? Think again. General Electric, with its $493B in assets and 200,000 employees worldwide, is doing exactly that.

1. COLLECTIVE CAMPUS
How General Electric (GE)
Saved 80% in
Development Costs

2. IF GE CAN, SO CAN YOU
General Electric, with its $493B in assets and
200,000 employees worldwide, adopted the Lean
Startup mindset to keep up with the rapid pace of
change disrupting every industry.

3. APPLYING LEAN STARTUP
Eric Ries, author of the Lean Startup, approached GE with a simple question,
after introducing a group of stakeholders to the philosophy that was rooted in
software development.
“Is this something you can use to make things like turbines and jet engines, as
well?” The resounding response was “yes”.

4. A CULTURE FOR INNOVATION
GE quickly realised that applying Lean Startup
would require a cultural shift in the organisation.
GE promptly created its Fastworks program -
geared towards the successful adoption and use of
lean startup philosophy across GE.
Step one? Get senior leaders, “the top 5,000”,
trained and educated in lean startup.

5. GET SENIOR MANAGER BUY-IN
The benefits that grassroots employees could
bring by way of testing projects and gathering
validated learnings translated to ‘money in the
bank.’ This provided the impact and evidence
needed to obtain ongoing support from senior
stakeholders.

6. WHAT ABOUT NON TECH COMPANIES?
“This absolutely works outside of technology and
software and GE is a great proof point for that”,
having applied the philosophy in areas such as
transportation, energy and finance.

7. IT’S NOT JUST ABOUT TRAINING PEOPLE
“You need to think more broadly about your organisation and the ability to make sure that behaviours and
culture can support the application of a lean startup approach,” says Janice Semper, Human Resources Partner.

8. QUESTIONS TO ASK
Will lean startup behaviours be permissible and
rewarded? Does performance management support
lean startup? What are your expectations of your leaders
in supporting lean startup? What competencies do you
need to develop?
A holistic approach is required to successfully implement
lean startup.

9. EVERYTHING MUST BE ALIGNED WITHI THIS WAY OF WORKING
At GE, limiting characteristics that embody the values of its people are failure not being an option, an addiction
to being right and a lack of customer-centricity and empathy when developing new products. Why engage
customers when you have all the answers right?

10. THE BELIEF SYSTEM
New beliefs underpin new behaviours and these new
behaviours are critical to the success of lean startup in
a large organisation.
• Empower and inspire each other
• Customers determine our success
• Stay lean to go fast
• Learn and adapt to win
• Deliver results in an uncertain world

11. RESULTS IN TRANSPORT
Using lean startup, GE developed and commercialised a new engine based on regulatory changes brought on
by the EPA. It got to market 2 years before its competition not only resulting in significant cost savings, but
bettering the EPA’s requirements.

12. RESULTS IN ENERGY
GE developed a gas turbine which enabled it to deliver the most efficient, low cost energy solution it could to
customers and it decreased development costs by 60% by doing so!

13. RESULTS IN INDUSTRIAL BUSINESS
• Reduced time of NPI by two thirds
• Reduced time to customer validation by 80%
Not only were there massive cost savings but this freed up funds to reinvest into new ventures. This
enabled GE to explore a higher number of new innovations and products, cheaper and quicker.

14. POSITIVE IMPACT ON EMPLOYEE MORALE
Customer churn can cost organisations more than $50,000 per person.
Implementing lean startup means that employees are engaged on projects
that are delivered quicker and actually realise benefits. This is light years
away from traditional, waterfall based ‘transformational’ projects.

15. FUNDING PROCESS
The Fastworks process has been embedded into
operations: employees with an idea add it to a
growth board and seek seed funding to validate
their idea. If validated, additional funding is
available. If invalidated, then things simply stop
(stopping anything at GE is also something that was
counter-cultural before lean startup reared its head).

16. REGULATORY ENVIRONMENTS
Leaders from regulated organisations often say
that “it’s impossible for us to implement lean
startup - it’s too risky, we’re so regulated.” The fact
is that lean startup is a de-risker.
“Using lean startup allows us to mitigate risk
before putting things to market - it is a risk
mitigant that applies across our healthcare,
transportation, finance businesses (and so on)”.
By testing quickly, we are taking lots of small bets
rather than few large ones and only going to the
regulator with products that we know our
customers have an appetite for.

17. DISRUPT YOURSELF BEFORE SOMEONE ELSE DOES
“Look at the level of disruption that’s happening in our industry. It’s unprecedented and it’s happening today. If
we don’t change we run the risk of becoming obsolete in less than a decade.” This is the reality that’s
communicated to influencers at GE to inspire their jumping on board the good ship lean startup.

18. FUNDAMENTAL LEARNINGS
GE has learned that startups are extremely purpose driven and have a strong connection to the company. They
have also discovered that dedicated co-located teams achieve amazing things
The underlying message is clear - if an organisation the size of GE can implement lean startup, then chances are
that your organisation can too.

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