6-26 Multiple Goals and Profitability21 The following are the multiple goals of the General Electric Company: 1. Profitability 2. Market position 3. Productivity 4. Product leadership 5. Personnel development 6. Employee attitudes 7. Public responsibility 8. Balance between short-range and long-range goals General Electric is a Goliath corporation with sales of about $15 billion and assets of $11 billion in 1977. It had approximately 170 responsibility centers called "departments," but that is a deceiving term. In most other companies, these departments would be called divisions. For example, some GE departments have sales of over $300 million. Each department manager's performance is evaluated annually in relation to the specified multiple goals. A special measurements group was set up in 1952 to devise ways of quantifying accomplishments in each of the areas. In this way, the evaluation of performance would become more objective as the various measures were developed and improved. 1. How would you measure performance in each of these areas? Be specific. 2. Can the other goals be encompassed as ingredients of a formal measure of profitability? In other words, can profitability per se be defined to include the other goals?