This archive brings together posts and podcast episodes featuring Larry Culp’s leadership approach at GE Aerospace, with a focus on Lean as a management system—not a set of tools. The content highlights how Culp emphasizes safety, respect for people, disciplined problem-solving, and learning from mistakes as foundations for operational excellence.
Rather than slogans or superficial transformations, these examples show how Lean leadership shows up in daily behavior: responding to bad news without blame, addressing root causes instead of finger-pointing, and creating systems where people feel safe—and expected—to speak up.
For leaders interested in real-world Lean leadership at scale, these posts offer a rare, practical case
Thanks, as always, to Ryan McCormack for this. He always shares so much good reading, listening, and viewing here! Subscribe to get these directly from Ryan via email. News, articles, books, podcasts, and videos about how to make the workplace…
I’ve already written one blog post about this excellent Bloomberg BusinessWeek article about the Lean transformation at GE Aerospace, a post that focused on CEO Larry Culp saying that “a problem-solving culture is far more effective operationally than a finger-pointing…
tl;dr: GE Aerospace CEO Larry Culp argues that problem-solving cultures outperform finger-pointing and blame, leading to better learning, performance, and accountability. Problem-Solving vs. Finger-Pointing at GE Aerospace There was a fascinating article in Bloomberg BusinessWeek about GE doing its final…
Embracing Imperfections and Learning from Mistakes: A Leadership Insight from the 2022 AME Annual Conference… In a riveting conversation between Larry Culp (at the time, CEO of GE and now CEO of GE Aerospace) and my good friend Katie Anderson…
GE Aerospace calls its Lean operating model “Flight Deck.” At the company’s 2024 Investor Day, Larry Culp described how it connects strategy, daily management, problem-solving, and leadership behaviors. What stood out to me was the emphasis on safety before quality,…
As I recently shared on LinkedIn, I really appreciated the annual shareholder letter that was published and shared by Larry Culp, who has been CEO of General Electric for just over five years now (the first-ever outsider CEO in their…
I was surprised that GEO CEO Larry Culp’s opening remarks weren’t shared in the YouTube recordings from the GE Lean Mindset event held in New York and live-streamed earlier this month. Larry Culp’s Opening Remarks on Lean at GE His…
tl;dr: In this post, Mark discusses key takeaways from the GE Lean Mindset events, particularly focusing on the diversity of backgrounds among attendees. He emphasizes how a varied set of perspectives contributes to a richer understanding and application of Lean…
Thanks as always to Ryan McCormack for this… there’s always so much good reading, listening, and viewing shared here by him! Subscribe to get these directly from Ryan via email. Insights about improvement, innovation, and leadership… Operational Excellence, Improvement, and…
Updated: The recordings from this inspiring day are now online. I’ll be sharing thoughts and reflections in future posts. I was very excited to learn about an event that was produced by GE on Wednesday, September 6th, in New York…
tl;dr: GE CEO Larry Culp emphasizes Safety, Quality, and Delivery before Cost (SQDC) as the foundation of Lean. By putting safety first and focusing on leadership behavior and daily management, GE is using Lean to improve performance without resorting to…
TL;DR: Larry Culp’s AME keynote shows that Lean leadership at GE is about how leaders think, learn, and respond to problems–not tools. Katie Anderson and Mark Graban discuss psychological safety, gemba, learning from mistakes, and building culture through daily leadership…
