TODAY

Yangon, Myanmar, March 27, 2014 – General Electric (GE) hosted its first Myanmar Executive Leadership Program (MELP) for 20 senior leaders from the public and private sectors, including delegates from Myanmar’s Ministry of Electric Power, Ministry of Energy, Ministry of Health and Ministry of Transportation – Myanma Airways.

Held at GE Crotonville, GE’s global leadership institute and the world’s first major corporate university, the intensive program focused on the development of leadership skills integral to advancing business, government policy, compliance and regulatory practices.

The program was organised as part of GE’s Corporate Citizenship efforts, and supports broader capacity and capability training in Myanmar. Most of the sessions, held in late February, took place at the GE Crotonville main campus in New York; other sessions included visits to the United States Military Academy at West Point, GE’s Global Research Center in Niskayuna, the Gas Steam Turbine Manufacturing Plant in Schenectady, and a tour of the New York Stock Exchange – including GE’s trading post at the NYSE.

Working closely with subject matter experts from across the GE portfolio, the participants engaged in a wide range of topics including business and technology overviews covering the aviation, healthcare, and oil & gas industries, as well as the GE leadership philosophy, talent management strategies, and compliance best practices.  The Myanmar leaders also met with GE Chairman and CEO Jeff Immelt for an open discussion that was among the highlights of the program.

“It was a pleasure to have been involved in the first Myanmar Executive Leadership Program which provided me with deep insights about GE’s best practices in leadership and innovation across its various operations all around the world. I have also taken away a number of eye-opening experiences and inspiration from the site visits conducted during the program,” said H.E. U Aung Than Oo, Deputy Minister, Ministry of Electric Power,

H.E. U Myint Zaw, Deputy Minister, Ministry of Energy, added, “Having the opportunity to participate in the Myanmar Executive Leadership Program at Crotonville presented many learnings which I hope to share with my teams in the Ministry of Energy. It was also especially beneficial to engage with experts from GE on a variety of topics around leadership.”

“The Myanmar Executive Leadership Program represents GE’s continued commitment to contribute its expertise, technology and solutions to help both government and local private sector companies solve the tough challenges faced in Myanmar. We hope to be able to inspire, connect and develop Myanmar’s leaders of today and tomorrow as part of our aim to help Myanmar make progress in its social and economic reform agenda and boost its global competitiveness”, said Stuart Dean, CEO of General Electric, ASEAN.

GE is continuing to expand its customer leadership education and value co-creation initiatives, providing more Crotonville experiences to more customers worldwide. GE hosted two Global Customer Summits in 2013, attracting senior leaders from 60 countries, including two business leaders from Myanmar; GE plans to host a total of 50 Myanmar leaders at future Global Customer Summit sessions.        In January this year, the GE Foundation also sponsored a senior management program with a “Train the Trainers” conceptfor Myanmar’s government officials, developed by the Lee Kuan Yew School (LKYS) of Public Policy. More than 44 senior government officials attended the program in Nay Pyi Taw, which was organised with the theme of “Infrastructure Development and Competitiveness in Myanmar”. The aim of the program was to help accelerate infrastructure development in Myanmar by training senior government officials on key practical aspects while drawing lessons from ASEAN and South Asian countries.