In his inimitable way, Jack Welch would often shoot directives at his executives designed to drive down the costs of doing business.  One such directive was so dichotomous that it kept senior GE executives awake at night: In an effort to reduce the costs of raw materials, Welch instructed his Global Sourcing to substantially increase its purchases of raw materials from developing countries.  The challenge to the executives was to do this without compromising GE's brutal focus on quality and speed.  With difficulties in communication and standards of quality and efficiency, Global Sourcing found that the price-saving was not justifying the indirect costs of doing business with developing countries.  They called in SBE.

GE's Global Sourcing acquired SBE's proprietary methodology to build trust and improve communication across global cultures.  SBE conducted workshops at the Head Office and at a conference with GE Global Sourcing business leaders from around the Pacific Rim.  The executives learned new ways of negotiating, contracting, communicating, and setting standards and objectives across global cultural boundaries. Areas of fractured trust between the operations in various countries were identified and repaired.  The result was considerable cost-saving and efficiency gains in GE's Global Sourcing.