Met Life Insurance

• MetLife, Inc. is a leading provider of

insurance and other financial
services 
• MetLife insurance is a global
insurance leader
• MetLife insurance serves over 70
million customers world wide.
• MetLife has a strong presence in
America, Europe and Asia Pacific

 Cross - functional
approach / system
Consist of:

1.Cross-functional planning
2.Cross-functional team
3.Cross-functional communication
 Cross - functional
planning
• Cross-functional planning is a process
for planning and monitoring brand
relationships that involves all
departments that directly or
indirectly “touch” the customer.
•
• CSP helps increase consistency in all
brand messages and ensures that
the big creative idea is integrated
in all messages.
The objective of Cross -
functional planning is :
• To get all the employees who are
involved in marketing
communication program ” in the
same boat and rowing in the same
direction”
 What is a Cross -
functional Team
 A group of people with different functional
expertise working towards a common goal.

Characteristics of a cross functional team

 Includes employees from all levels of an organization and from

different
departments
 Consists of representatives from business functions and system
end-users.

it may include different kinds of people

–leader- aims to get the best out of everyone
–expert- provides specialist advice
–Ambassador- make friends easily
–innovator- provides source of vision, ingenuity and
creativity
–conformer- helpful ,reliable co-operation

 Competitive advantages of a cross
functional team
 Speed-
They are appropriately empowered to get things done faster
specially product development and customer service.
 Complexity-
Improves an organization’s ability to solve complex problems
because they bring together people with different skill sets,
experience and perception.
 Creativity-
New product and service, breakthrough, comes from clash of
ideas, not from interaction among people with similar ideas.
 Customer focus-
Cross functional teams focus all of the organization’s efforts on
satisfying a specific internal or external customer or group of
customers
 Organizational learning-
Team members pick up technical and professional skills more
easily, gain important knowledge about other areas of the
organization and learn how to work with people with different
skills and cultural behaviors.
 Single point of contact-
 Question No1.

Q1 . What was the reason for

Metlife company problems?
 Q1 . What was the reason for
Met Lifes company problems?

Answer:
The main reason behind
Met Lifes problems, was
due to not practicing
the
“Cross-functional
Approach” that
consisted of cross-
functional planning,
cross-functional
teamwork and cross-
functional
communication. 
Problems that arise due to non
practice of “ Cross - functional
planning approach ”:
 Over promising than
that could’nt be
delivered

 Use of questionable
sales practices

 No proper information
flow within the Decision
Making Units

 The sales operations

were not being
 Cont…..
• Metlife faced lawsuits & legal
problems from 40 states that
totaled up a fine of $20 million.
• Metlife had to refund $75 million
• Decreased sales by 25%
• Reduced credit ratings of the
Sale
s
reve
nue company
•
%
%
%
Sales
 General Electrical
Background
 The General Electric Company is an
American multinational corporation incorporated
in the State of New York.
 GE was founded in 1892 by Thomas Edison
 The Company operates through five segments:
-Energy Infrastructure
-Technology Infrastructure
-NBC Universal (NBCU)
-Capital Finance
-Consumer & Industrial
Conti…
• In 2010, Forbes ranked GE as the world's
second largest company


• General electrical has continuously shaped

our world with groundbreaking innovations
for over 130 years such as light bulbs to
fuel cell technology, to cleaner, more
efficient jet engines etc.


• General electrical always moving towards a

unique goal under an unique theme-
 “Why predict the future when you can create

it?”.
•
 Innovative Management
Approaches Used by General
Electric

vCross Functional Integration

vFlexible Organizational Structure
 Cross Functional
Integration
• General Electric created a forum dubbed “Pit”


• Employees gather in every two weeks to spot

problems and argue for solutions
•

• All employees are given a chance to participate in

the decision making process
•

• Delegate required amount of authority to the

correct person to investigate the work and to
come up with recommendations


• Success behind this approach is open and

interactive communication
•
 Flexible Organizational
Structure
• General Electric organized a flexible, natural team
dubbed “Work-Out”


• Team meet frequently to discuss how to improve

processes


• Communicate the future direction of the company to

all levels of the organization in order to facilitate
goal congruence
•
• Secret behind the success of this strategy is also
effective and right flow of communication
 Question No2.

Q1 . What can you learn from GE ’ s

approach to management that
applies to a marketing
communication program?
Advantages and effects of the GE
approaches that applies to a
marketing communication program

• Introduction of their own forum “Pit”

• The concept “Pit” is somewhat similar to
quality circle concept
• Continuous communication among the
employees and cross functional units
(strengthens the internal marketing)
• This is a collective approach where every
employee participate in the discussion
•
Conti…
• Employees will feel themselves
important because they themselves
generate solutions


• “Work Out” increase the flexibility in

– Communication
– Decision making
–

• Recommendations are given by the

managers without a significant
time delay

 In addition:
ADVANTAGE OF CROSS - FUNCTIONAL PLANNING
AND MANAGEMENT OF GE WHICH IS KNOWN AS A

BASIC PRINCIPLE OF IMC :

• Critical processes that affect customer

relationships involve more than one
department.
• Cross-functional planning involves many
departments and functions.
• Benefit of the cross-functional IMC team is to:
• Ensure consistency in all brand messages.
• Make sure the big creative idea is integrated in
all messages.
• Coordinate the timing and scheduling of the
various MC programs.
• Help employees become less myopic.
 Recommendations to improve Met Lifes Marketing
Communication Program.
1 . Adapt to cross - functional planning and team approaches -
Traditional organization

Cross-functional planning


silos & teams

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