your choices on the the difference to all of you and all of us. >> don't be afraid to take on new cases, or a new job, or a new issue that really stretches your boundaries. >> spend your summer abroad on real ships rather than internships, and the specter of living in your parent's basement after graduation day is not likely to be your greatest concern. >> throughout this month, watch commencement speeches in their entirety from colleges and universities around the country by business leaders, politicians , and white house officials on c-span. >> now, the conversation with jeffrey immelt. the chairman and ceo of general electric. this was his first public appearance as deciding to move the ge headquarters to boston.

this is 40 minutes. >> it is a great pleasure to introduce today and welcome jeffrey immelt, the chairman and ceo of general electric, our newest corporate citizen. dartmouthated from with a degree in applied sciences and went to harvard to get his mba. he spent his first 19 years at ge in global leadership ts biggestof i businesses including appliances, plastics, health care. , he succeeded jack welsh as the ceo. it is been said it is easier to

succeed and inadequate ceo than an adequate one. so he had his work cut out for him. he succeeded the role four days before the 9/11 attacks. nevertheless, in the 14.5 years ge, hes been the ceo of has transformed the company by focusing on energy, health care, and transportation. aeating its core as material's company manufacturing jet engines, locomotives, gas turbines, and mri scanners. in that process he has divested nba, nbc universal, and appliances. more recently, is selling ge capital which until a few years ago was responsible for 50% of the revenue of the company.

in a word, this is jeff's company. he has commented it is no longer the consumer products company but a high-tech, future product company. he wants them to be at the intersection of physical technology and analytical software. he has embedded its products with digital intelligence and communications to make the machines run better, last longer. , in that regard -- in that regard, they created a new digital division which consolidated approximately 1200 ge software developers. this effort will involve retrieving massive amounts of data from ge machines and analyzing their data to determine things like how to improve performance, longevity, preventative maintenance. i tell you that i know of no executive in any company more

focused on big data analytics and running a business than jeffrey immelt. during his tenure, he has brou ght jobs back to the united states. ge is the second-biggest exporter of products in the country. this is innovation at its best. ge has chosen the right city to supply the resources it needs to achieve. its goals. it is not a surprise that jeff immelt has been recognized by forbes and the financial times as the best ceo in the world. i've beenoutdone, told he is about to be named best ceo in the galaxy. [laughter] it is hard to imagine in this new world of big data, software,

pen analytics what will hap to the manufacturing process and the need for better skilled workers. at the present time, ge data s how that a jet engine has less than 5% labor. a refrigerator has less than two hours of labor. the talk in the industry is, within five years, a ge plant will have but two custodians, a man and a dog. the men will be there to feed the dog, and the dog will be there to keep the man away from the equipment. [laughter] with that, i give you jeff immelt. [applause] mr. immelt: wow. exciting. that's great. i would note that you had a longer intro than i did.

theob is a lawyer, stick to law bob. let me worry about manufacturing. >> it is a pleasure and honor to be here with you. one of the questions on people's mines is where you might -- people's minds is where you might place the headquarters. maybe you can announce that today. mr. immelt: right near the seaport, by the old gillette building. two existing buildings and we will build on 2.5 acres at the seaport. we will be there this summer with temporary housing. august 22 will have a couple hundred people here. we planned to have about 200 people from corporate and about 800 people in labs. we think by the time it is said and done, there should be 4000

jobs around the ecosystem in boston. we are excited to be here. [applause] it's a good location. we will have a building right there on the channel, at the seaport. we want you to be proud of it. we are proud to be here. logo that isa ge about 20 stories high -- [laughter] that was the most important part of the deal. proudlly want you to be of us. we are proud to be here. bob: we are definitely very proud and excited. ge is famous for people management am a leadership development. it's one of the key underpinnings of the success of ge. now that you are in boston, how will you judge boston as a community and contributor to ge.

what do we have to do to be among the top 25% contributors as you look around the world. mr. immelt: first, i would say it's a two-way street. here is what we can do to for you. jobsly, the economics, the -- i say the most important thing any company can bring it's a competitive spirit. we want to win. we want to bring that competitive spirit for what we do. we want to bring that. ge is a working person's company. people get back to the community. they know what it means to give back to public high schools, to volunteer in hospitals and things like that. i think you will find us a generous neighbor and town. those are the things that we can bring to the city. the startupools and ecosystems in boston is amazing.

more than 50 universities, lots of alums are with ge. the historic startup culture is astounding. industries, the town does extremely well. we want to be part of this ecosystem of universities and scholarships in this sea of ideas. 20% of the s&p 500, as we sit here today, is from consumer internet companies less than 20 years old. they are in san francisco and seattle. almost all of their leaders went to mit and places like that. my thought is, there might be a chance to be a good convener here. the next generation, in 15-20

years, probably 20% of the s&p 500 will be the merger of data and physics. this is a real -- there are buzzwords, industrial internet, but it is real and it is going to happen. if boston is not the headquarters of that flow -- shame on both of us. it will mean that ge hasn't done what we think we can do, and the town hasn't done what it can do. coming atnother wave us in terms of technology and change equal to or bigger than consumer internet 20 years ago. boston needs to get more than its fair share. we are betting on our ability to be part of that as it evolves. in the boston setting, this was the genesis of a lot of big iron, which we are comfortable with, but it has to be equally good with big data.

there is no reason boston cannot be this city for the next 20 years the way silicon valley and seattle were for the last 20 years. it's our job to do that together . bob: amen. mr. immelt: our bet is that we want to win in that space. we don't want this revelation to go forward and not have ge investors and people get the most out of that. like sciences, boston can lay claim to being either the best or among the best, but there is more to come. our that is that we can be part workingand owkri -- with the universities and the best science and education schools here to make that happen in this town. bob: you are so large and so diverse, how do you work with outside partners, like startups in particular. you have excellence in certain areas and maybe amazing, innovative technology but lack a

lot of the -- mr. immelt: it is really hard. almost every big company has a ventures group. weis so hard to make sure bring our best and don't end up squashing the company inside our own bureaucracies and things like that. i would love to say ge is a perfect company, but we are not. the trick is to find the win-win. we had a couple starts at it. we hired a woman from a venture capitalist who runs our operations headquartered in california, but we have people all over the world. the trick is to do what you are doing here in boston. we don't take and we stake in a company that doesn't -- take an equity stake in a company that doesn't have -- how do you get your first order, how do you make things. the thing if you're starting a company you really need, we have to be able to deliver.

we have much more discipline about how do they fit in our own product and technical roadmap, and differentiating between when we take an investment in a company, and we think it will fit long-term with what ge is doing. sometimes it's just because we think it is a good idea and will make money. 70% of the former, 30% of the latter. the day we take a stake, your assigned to the ge team, and it's a bit -- bet to get the most out of. bob: you are super diverse. aviation, health care, a massive breadth of industries and expertise. how do you foster collaboration and what can we learn in boston to be part of that collaborative environment? mr. immelt: i would say we have what we call the ge store. it's a couple core processes we

do across the company. we want to help the team the credit health care, the aviation team to be great aviation, the power team to compete against conglomerates or single point companies, but then we drive technology, we drive globalization, we drive how we interface with customers, we drive culture across the company in a more unified way. as an investor you say, by doing that are our margin returns better than competitors. if the answer is yes, we have earned the right to say that our business model works. my countries into nbc was make better shows. it wasn't, go to the research lab or help you in china, it was, please don't make shows that stink that badly. nbc belonged someplace else. it did not belong inside ge. we are philosophical about the

things that we do best and making sure that we do it. part of our culture is the belief that markets rule. customers determine or its success. if you really believe you have to be open to any new idea or technology, we are not going to invented all in our country. we have to be a place where people want to come and work with us to develop the future. again,antage we have -- i'm here today as just a friend talking. the advantage we have at venture capital is we have seen -- we manage through cycles. some of our businesses are going through a tough cycle, but we have other businesses that make up for that. i took over after 9/11. let me tell you, it was no business on earth that was worse than the commercial aviation business. market share of jet

engines and we owned 1200 aircraft and there was no place to hide. that business stunk for three or four years. now there is a big backlog. people quite like it today. 2004, this is why you have some aircraft? because we do. we have to work through the cycle. the thing we bring, if you are venture capitalist, if two companies work or don't work, that is good. if you are a company, you are willing to spend time and work through the down cycle. that is ok. that is a strength we bring that, maybe, we both have a room in a world. venture capitalists are awesome, they do great things. but managing through cycles is something we can bring culturally that is harder for startups. >> give you a much longer time frame.

love times i think about business, you can grow the pie, ,ncrease the size of the market or you can fight over market share within the existing market. how do you think about the value of creation? i see the being awesome opportunities across the globe, a lot of people not a part of the global economy that we can integrate more. how do we integrate more people into the economy, into the system and create more value? >> i would make to general comments. the first one, a slow growth world. you're going to live in a world where the u.s. is ok, the rest of the world is more or less minuteed by central bank gliding currency. -- manipulating currency.

there has essentially been the reform in the world so the central bankers have taken the place of what governments have done. you have decent growth is not robust growth. you haveal-bank -- central-bank difficulty everywhere else. china is in transition. and populism. four things going on that at up to slow growth and volatility. if you are waiting for the next tailwind, you will be stuck for a wild. there is no -- while. it is not that things are terrible like a was in 2008. view just up the general of tailwinds, economic cycles. sometimes i go to an investor and i say what you think about the economic cycle. i say what cycle. we are at negative interest rates in your. native interest rates in japan. currencies are fluctuating plus or -7%.

is everythingay today is about productivity. everything is about speed and productivity. anything we can do to bring more productivity to our customers and our suppliers is great. thoughtsay as a general , our focus is on adding more value through visual analytics with our customers and critic more value with our supply chain. we are basically not focused on making the company broader, we are making the company deeper. that is the way we do generating -- view generating growth. you're going to have to do more op x models. there are lots of ways to grow. made with people who don't have electricity, you have to bring financing solutions at the same time you're bringing products. , createtry productivity

solutions, you can be deeper, that is how we grow. company.0 billion we like to grow the company 5% organically. a 130 onot bad with dollar base. that is good. >> i want to open up for questions. in the meantime, boston is a big sports town. you a fan of any teams? [laughter] >> i met robert at this luncheon in 2002. at that time we owned nbc. nbc had just punched out all the nfl contracts. nbc, back in the nfl. i said, hey bob, we are number one right now. too expensive, we can't afford the nfl. two years later, we went from

number one to number four. and i was begging robert to get us back into the nfl. [laughter] i was begging to get back into the nfl. i'm a bit pictures been. i love the patriots. i was go to school in new hampshire in 1975 when bernie cargill hit the big home run. i'm not in love with the red sox. >> it has gotten better. big bob kraft fan and i'm a big patriots been. -- fan. i figure this long enough that i'm a student of culture and leadership. see a culture -- you culture when you see the patriots and leadership. know robert chance and i growth in cincinnati to their better -- so they are

better than the bengals. i have those two things going for me. >> in your intro, he were talking other culture of winning, i thought immediately of the patriots and robert. the would to add to governor in milwaukee. day, we allf the believe in transparency. there has been a lot written about how ge what about his ,rocess, what i would say is we're going to get back to the community. to take my word for this. we're going to get back -- for any dollar you think was invested here, there are a lot of places we could have gone, you will get back a thousand fold. take my word for it. just trust me for it. [applause]

you will get back a thousand fold. the fact that you have a republican governor and a democratic mayor that actually could work together and actually had a bigger vision for what this meant is unique. both of them think craft because of it. [laughter] that is actually quite a positive. we are 140 years old. a new york city company that moved to connecticut. this is a long-term investment for us. his you are investing in infrastructure of universities and the feeling of how people want to run their day-to-day life. those are positives. that stuff you can't quantify. it is much more important than anything else. >> i think we have the most enlightened government in the country.

>> that is not saying a lot right now. [laughter] fair enough. >> that is a pretty low bar. >> better than not being the most enlightened. at least we had that. but the governor and america worker closely. great community to work with. you will be very welcome and happy here. you made the right decision and i think massachusetts is going through a renaissance. . period. it is the best place to be in the world. we are super happy to have you. yet, butite number one we can be number one. >> let's open it up for questions. around?cs being passed >> i am joanne simonsen, we support 7000 people with his

abilities in massachusetts. i have a hypothetical question. suppose my husband worked for g for 29 years eight months and 13 days, and he invested 99% of his 01k stock, i was not that is a good strategy. -- want to note that is a good strategy. >> if you want consistent growth and good living, i would say today's diversification is a good thing. conglomerates go in and out of favor. i think they're coming back in favor just because the world is so volatile. executing on the pivot from capital has been important for investors. consistency, capital allocation,

whatever growth is out there, we are going to get. ticket tong to get a growth the most exciting technology in the next decade or so. husband -- tighter husband i put 100% of every 401(k) in ge stock. i will never sell or share. everything i have, other than boston real estate, is in bost . >> other questions from the crowd? quiet crowd today. one appear. -- one up here. here it comes. >> hi, i'm diane.

i'm here in the corner. if the governor of connecticut asked for an interview, what would you say when someone leaves in a situation that connecticut has just gone through. what are some think they did right or wrong? it is a loss for them. >> i'm not to say anything bad about connecticut. it was a great place to live. we have a lot of friends there. -- being able public servant today is a hard job. i think for all of us, it is about the future. it is about who is willing to nowt for 5-10 years from versus protecting the past. that is true for companies and for government. on 100%e going to dwell

of backward looking, it is a hard world. toyou are willing to lean in those technologies, changes, collaborations, and that is what companies have to do today and that is what government have to do today. it does not matter if you are in connecticut or massachusetts or texas or ohio, if you are looking backwards, you're going to lose. i can't say anything bad about the people, because i think they work hard. therly, we liked communities we lived in. this move for ge is all about the next 40 years. what it was the company to look like, how we want the company to be challenged, i want people that are town at this report. i want them to walk out of their office every day and be terrified. i want them to be paranoid about the world that they are in, about how we are moving fast

enough, what can we do better, swiss market than we are and i want to be in a sea of ideas so that paranoia reigns supreme. [laughter] seeook out the window and deer running across -- i don't care about that stuff. 29-year-old student at m.i.t. to say all your technologies are wrong and lose. and then you will spread the word. that is what we want and are looking forward to. i don't want to say anything bad. >> that is great. >> jim roosevelt. we have a presidential campaign which, at one point was entertaining and now has become terrifying perhaps, each party have aa populist --

populist, and the other calls it the middle class being left dial the role ofwhat is major corporate citizens like ge for changing that equation for the average american. >> i think it is a great question. , if you don't work productivity,on, globalization, he get fired. you get fired. if you don't work on innovation, productivity, globalization, you get fired. if you are running for public this, you you are for can't get elected. intersecting circles have moved further apart. think we need to be mindful

ignizant ofs and -- c the economic -- cognizant of the economic effect we have. i have to compete in china. i have to make our interest cost less. tothe same time, we have keep investing in training. we have to give everybody that wants to the doors it just to -- a chance to compete. -- i wasnew hampshire an early supporter of lindsey graham so i don't pick him. [laughter] i was in a town hall. and the production of associates that worked there, they probably make 60-70,000 dollars a year. it is winning. that is hard to do.

that is great. any of the five people for president, none of them know is about factors as i do. none of them know as much about factory workers as i do, none of them have invested more in the competitiveness of this country as i have, at ge has. i'm not good be lectured by these guys. -- not going to be lectured by these guys. we cannot be callous about jobs. we cannot be callous about the things we do and we need to reinvest back into those core facilities that we think can be competitive. ge has many. we're about a $20 billion exporter. we now export to all most every country in the world. on the balance of trade basis, america is winning with ge exports around world. i was last week in argentina and brazil. argentina is leaving a popular's

government back to more democratic one. it is a mess and may be a hesitant to turn it around. where populistce government has taken economic wealth and frittered it away. the people in this country think that if the answer, look at other places. i don't think business people have always done our best. we need to be accountable for the totality, but i would also say we need to be thoughtful about what we are getting ready to do in the next six months this country. i'm suzanne, the state auditor for the commonwealth, i decided as everybody else in the same because i am in boston five days a week that he will be here, the other two days i try to be at my home in the brookshire we have a lot of deer

and pears. what we don't have is a lot of jobs. legacy of ge. i not asking you about cleaning up the river, i'm asking whether yousee -- i'm not asking -- i more sympathetic to your opposition than i am from neighbors. i'm more of a realist. my question is, what about the rest of the commonwealth? we are very excited about what you are going to do here in boston, but the rest of the commonwealth is not the same boat. poverty? >> we have 5000 employees in massachusetts in general. we have good relationships with the schools like holy cross and wpi. i don't think this is the last investment that we make in

oncen or the commonwealth, again get up and going, there will be more things that happen here. to -- myerybody has you point to my answer is will see more of us around massachusetts than just what we invested today. i think that is going to happen. some will happen because we want to and some will happen naturally. i would expect more ge divisions to think this is a good place to be. in terms of competitiveness, we are company that believes in competitiveness, the other thees, the other the room, burden is on you. the community cap make it invest double. they have to compete with other locations. , i have beenhis the ge 34 years, i think

governor and mayor have made a difference. that has always been true here. times when itn has not been a good place to do business. part, butdo my everybody will have to compete for the future. there is no easy button. that means the berkshires. paul has a question. i do not know if he has a microphone yet. hi, paul grogan. boston foundation. ge has been very active charitably, i'm interested in your approach to turn will give in and what some of your boston priorities might be. workedorically, we've for decades on inner-city

education. onhave worked on decades inner-city schools into towns around the country. more recently, we work on community health as being a us and west for focus on employee employability. how do you help train workers to help start their own companies or become that are skilled for the 21st century. i think this is going to be, we like to do things where does more than money. people can bring their hard work on intellect, their wanting to get back as well. we try to stay in places where we bring domain, expertise. you will have hundreds of ge people that are mentoring and schools. -- in schools. you'll have people working in health clicks all around the

world. we have a think of the ge garage that we can take it to communities that have modern manufacturing tools that we allow local auto renew is to play with and you will see all about that here. again, we're going to talk more about this on april 4. we want to be part of the community. big companies are complicated. there we think about us from time to time that everybody alike. our job is to make sure the much higherike are than the things you don't like. to be a lot of things you like about having ge in town. back,llingness to give both in terms of money and, more importantly, our teams, it is good be something you will happy and satisfied with his time goes on. >> they can. -- outstanding-- thank you --

thank you. i stand. one more question. >> david maker. healthp their -- the care debate has gotten pretty contentious and distorted by the political process. ge is a major consumer and major provider. how does ge play in helping us get into a sustainable place and what do see that sustainable place being for the health care? industry -- innd the industry and we are legacy health care provider. we have had them play health care since 1947. it is kindars, we -- of, we see both sides of the equation. act was anble care it drives access.

it is too early to say how the exchanges are going to work. at least it was a try. it replaced nothing really. presidento give the credit for that but that's. i always break down health care into for big systems. consumers matter. until people have some more accountability for their own health care costs, things don't change. if you're like me and go to a country like india where everybody pays out of their pocket for health care, you see different activity there than you do here. something has to change there, we have to drive innovation around chronic disease. know, a lot of the great work you do and some of the work we do is how do you make their peace for chronic diseases --

therapies for chronic diseases more effective. it still lacks a lot of the fundamentals on how to drive quality up and take cost down. we have to change the way people, payment reform. we play different places between our business and employee health. it is good to be 20% of u.s. gdp. it is growing. everybody in this room, no matter what your businesses, will be a health care expert the next 10-20 years. this is not a problem that is going away. that is how we play. waylay in a very complete in terms of how we talk -- think about it. we play health care in a hundred 80 countries around the world. -- 180 countries around the world. >> thank you very much.

[applause] want to give you a token present. it is a watch so blind people can read time. >> thank you very much. thank you. >> thank you, that was really fun. i hope you feel welcome here. people are excited to have you around. i looking you talk and you are saying all the right things. you'll find that this was an incredibly clever. clever move. >> thank you. thank you. susan. soon. yuoou

>> very fun. he is a great guy. >> thank you. >> congress is back tomorrow and it is a busy week ahead for the

house. ember's return on monday to consider several bills including want to prevent tax fraud and identity theft. then on tuesday, debate begins on the $610 billion defense authorization bill which currently has more than 300 amendments attached to it. also on the agenda, military programs andand va emergency programs to combat the zika virus. you can watch it live here on c-span. the senate meets tomorrow at 2 p.m. eastern. followed by a debate on the nomination of policies to district judge of violent. confirmation vote at 5:30. later in the week, we will see work on military construction and funding for zika virus research. you can call the senate live on c-span two. -- follow the senate live on c-span 2. next, q and a with historian

adam discussing his book on the spanish civil war and then, british prime minister david cameron takes questions the members of the house of commons. after that, a discussion on islamic terrorism in europe. >> this week on q and a, historian adam hit shield discusses spain in our hearts. >> adam hope shield, the title of your new book is spain in our hearts. what does that title mean? >> it comes from a quotation from albert which i know by heart