Beth Comstock |
Years
ago, when Beth Comstock was a single mother working at NBC,
she didn’t hang a picture of her daughter in her office
because she didn’t want anyone to think she had any
obligation more pressing than her job. “My children
are so much a part of me that I was denying myself,”
says the 42-year-old corporate VP-chief marketing officer
of GE.
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Comstock is GE’s face to the world and representative of
its new post-Jack-Welch culture. “My job is to connect with
people,” she says. Reporting to GE chairman-CEO Jeffrey Immelt
(who also started out in marketing), Comstock, as corporate VP-communications,
oversees integrated communications. And as its marketing mainstay
she oversees a new corporate commercial leadership that is revitalizing
GE’s marketing and sales efforts.
Comstock has also managed to change the corporate culture some,
since becoming a GE officer in 1998. Photos of her husband of 15
years, an online marketer, and two daughters, an 18-year old freshman
at the University of San Francisco and 12-year-old middle-schooler
adorn her office. “People appreciate seeing other aspects
of your life,” she says. Now GE holds staffers accountable
for keeping women engaged “and when female engineers return
from maternity or motherhood leave we make them heroes to remind
everyone that they too can do this. I love it when GE guys say they’re
not moving, that their kids have to finish high school where they
are,” she adds.
 Comstock
has also changed GE’s image, leading the launch of its new
corporate ad campaign. “Imagination at work,” replaced
the long running “We bring good things to life.” The
ads promote GE Aircraft Engines and GE Medical Systems among other
lesser-known industries such as energy, automotive, aviation, retail
and transportation. (There are 11, each with its own marketing team,
and all of which she leads.) “Two years of research convinced
us we didn’t want to be known for just appliances and lighting,”
said Comstock.
That range of industries reporting to her hints at the scope and
variety of her job—and the fact that no day is typical. “I
fasten my seatbelt every morning, and take off on a wild ride,”
she says. Often that’s quite literal: Comstock travels four
to five times a month, (including three to four trips each year
to Europe and two to Asia where China is a key market for GE) visiting
various GE customers, marketing agencies, teams and business locations
around the world. Partly she’s there as a sponge: soaking
up best practices in one business to apply them to another and learning
new ideas. She also connects teams for specific projects, brainstorms
new ideas with teams, and immerses herself in research, writing
and trend studying to make sure GE stays on top of market developments.
Most mornings she awakes at 5 AM and thinks about working out. Perhaps
twice a week she follows through. When she’s home she is out
the door by 6:30AM heading to either her nearby Fairfield county
office or Manhattan.
Comstock grew up in Winchester, Virginia, the daughter of a dentist
turned art historian, and elementary school teacher. “My dad’s
post retirement passion convinced me you can have a second act,”
she says. Comstock started out at the College of William and Mary
in Virginia with plans for medical school or to be a science journalist,
and graduated from there with a degree in biology.
Early in her career she was on camera covering the Virginia State
Legislature for a Richmond-based news service. “But I wasn’t
as good as I’d hoped to be,” she admits. That led to
the executive suite and a succession of communications positions
at CBS Entertainment, Turner Broadcasting and ultimately NBC.
When Comstock was 27, divorced and with a three-year old daughter
(helped by parents who lived nearby), NBC moved her from its Washington
bureau where she was doing publicity, to corporate headquarters
in New York. She knew no one here.
She set about making their acquaintance. In 1993 she was named
VP of NBC News communications—(and the face that told the
world that Richard Jewell, the security guard who was the focus
of the investigation into the Olympic bombing before he was cleared
by the government, reached a settlement from NBC) and in 1996, SVP.
“There have been so many transitions in my work life I feel
like I’ve jumped on and off a lazy Susan,” she says.
Constantly being under the microscope at NBC News toughened her
for the demands of GE—including Jack Welch’s five-year-long
scrutinized succession drama. So did her boss, NBC’s CEO Bob
Wright. At the network where she oversaw licensing and merchandising,
Wright turned down her proposal to launch an NBC merchandising store
twice, forcing her to return each time with better “kick ass”
plans, and testing her passion and commitment to the project.
Passion is an understated tool because it drives hard work, says
Comstock. “I am passionate about learning and so I push myself
to seek out new opportunities and take risks.”
Sometimes that means making mistakes. In Comstock’s case
it has meant trying too hard to make something perfect, or going
at something alone so as not to burden other people. “But
that’s lonely and I’ve learned that people want to be
part of things.” Happily she has also learned not to be so
hard on herself when she fails, “to draw on humor, lessons
learned and then keep moving.”
Comstock savors ”the endless opportunity to learn and be
challenged and grow into new areas” that GE affords, along
with the company’s development, training and education programs.
She also loves the global dimension of the job, and being able to
work with a variety of international people and places. But while
the depth and breadth of GE is exciting, it can also be exhausting.
“I miss finding time to be thoughtful and reflective,”
she says. You have to lead the job and not let it carry you. It’s
a battle, but you have to force yourself to take time to focus.
It’s the only way to be effective.”
Comstock is proud of her family but admits that if she weren’t
working “I’d be crazy. My kids don’t know how
lucky they are not to have a stay-at-home mom.”
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