My Story @ GE
The decade I spent with General Electric, Egypt
Introduction
From where do I start?
A call from Turkey landed on my cell phone, the caller was a senior IT leader in Turkey’s GE office “Murat Akturk” who viewed a modest resume online - Ali Ezz’s CV - and the call turned out to be an interview.
Following this call, another interview was held at GE Office in new Cairo, Egypt, led by “Al Ibrahim”, a Sr IT Manager in Egypt’s office. December 2013, I accepted the offer and decided to take this step forward, start a new job at this multi national company.
GE Healthcare (2014-2017)
I was onboarded with GE Healthcare business, as their Local IT Engineer, and took handover from the previous IT Specialist “Mohamed Afifi“. GEHC staff were friendly and open from day 1. It took me around 3 months to digest all the major tasks in HC’s IT environment that will then form my core responsibilities. My scope spanned 4 areas starting with IT support, asset management, mobility operations and managing the printing function. The IT scope was not limited to those areas, further projects were demanded by the business such as an e-fax solution, printer upgrade & saving plan for the mobility monthly invoice.
HC staff were engaging with me on Day 1, IT support related tasks as usual, and the workload was accumulating due to the increase in number of employees. When I joined GE HC, there were 150 employees and during my 4-year tenure - by end of 2017 HC staff were 220 total. I managed, succeeded at managing the work pressure and the Healthcare business GM “Tamer Said“ was satisfied with my service. At the time, Computacenter were managing the IT services for GE businesses globally, including Egypt. HC Egypt had their own Local IT, and they were the exception. Every time Computacenter tried to add Healthcare Egypt to their account and meet with HC leader, they were given “No“ as an answer. This was justified by the success of their local IT Engineers (Moh Afifi, Mahmoud Mostafa & Myself).
Outside of work, a lifestyle that turned to a hobby, contributed to my success at GE, it was cycling. I was known among the staff with my passion for cycling, road cycling. I started cycling 2 months prior to GE uploading my activities to Strave. I purchased the first road bike after receiving my third salary. Luckily, I managed to create a new lifestyle, fixed a weekly schedule - Friday Ride - and utilized this hobby to the best I could to get rid of the negative energy we accumulate at work. A hobby or a sport is a must for every employee working at any given corporate or company to reserve their body and mental health.
During 2017, several businesses were reshaping at GE. I left Healthcare and joined a new business as part of an organizational change. Healthcare staff - to me - are a second family and friendship that will last forever.
GE Corporate (2018-2021)
By Q1’2018 - with the global departure of Computacenter - a new IT organisation was underway, being formed under GE Digital business, then finally landed under GE Corporate. The new sub regional IT leader for North Africa was announced, Fadel Belaskri, MDP (IT Manager) announced was “Nouhar Mansour“, and Egypt team reported to the new IT Leader. I was introduced to a great talented group of IT professionals, and from there I formed a partnership - with Mohamed Maghawry - that would turn out to be the pivotal point GE Egypt’s IT operations, providing premium services to all GE Businesses, 1500 employees.
I’ve relocated along with HC business from Boomerang building to Summit44 where GE united under one roof. Nouhar Mansour, Moh Maghawry & Myself, were based on the ground floor in Summit44, while the 2 talented IT engineers (Amr Nour & Peter Alber) were based on the 4th floor to support 3rd and 4th floor users. That was the formation during 2018.
Mohamed Meghawry held the position Senior EUS engineer focusing on premium support, along with Peter Alber & Amr Nour assigned as MyTech agents, based in the MyTech Lounge. By May 2018, we were operational as one team. We controlled and maintained the IT infrastructure in GE North Africa, broke records in META region and held top position in terms of IT performance, depot/PC supply chain, MyTech Lounge, mobility targets and NPS scores. Egypt & North Africa team were dominant and achieved all set targets, KPI’s across META region, and globally!
December 2018, I joined GE Staff, and became a GE employee after almost 5 years spent as a contingent worker with Healthcare. In January 2019, I was assigned - by Fadel Belaskri and Bipu Cherian - to lead the IT asset management for North Africa, in addition to mobility operations. Amgad Kosbar, a former Alstom employee rejoined Nouhar’s team in January 2019. As days went by, the work load was increasing and we’ve been pumping into new experiences, getting exposed to other GE businesses and teams (Gas Power, HC, Fieldcore, Oil & Gas, transportation, Aviation, Grid Solutions/Alstom Power, Digital, Global Operations, Corporate). Together, we’ve finalized projects, overcome challenges, escalations, raised the bar in our region in terms of KPI’s and scores that lead to recognitions received by the region’s CIO. By 2019, Peter Alber left the team seeking a new opportunity, and Moustafa Ramadan joined the team.
March 2020, COVID hit, and employees were instructed to work remotely from home. However, we’re were arriving to office regularly with precautions taken seriously. But due to massive layoffs, Mohamed Meghawry was off boarded in June 2020 due to organizational changes, and we’ve been hit hard by this lay off, following by Nouhar Mansour who left in summer 2021. Moustafa Ramadan was off boarded as well in December 2022. The team of five, were down to 2, myself & Amgad Kosbar.
October 2022, Mohamed Meghawry returned to GE as the mobility operation engineer and we’ve rejoined forces back, where Amgad was the IT Engineer, myself as the Depot lifecycle engineer, and Mohamed Meghawry managing the mobility scope. We were all based on the 4th floor.
2023, the year where GE spinned off its Healthcare business, and GE HC was set to operate as a standalone company. Amgad Kosbar was assigned to GE HC as their Sr Local IT, and myself remained under the Corporate business, supporting GEHC through their transition period (TSA) and other businesses providing lifecycle operation services to each. 2024.
A Small Problem
Following Nouhar’s layoff, I’ve faced internal pressure to take over the mobility operation’s scope in Egypt - officially - a request that I’ve pushed back due to several reasons:
My request for salary increase was rejected
No title change was promised, hence no appreciation .. 😥
My employee band level upgrade was rejected as well
This unfortunate conflict led to a deterioration in my relationship with my previous manager Fadel Belaskri. However, a few months later, we’ve met and managed to overcome this misunderstanding, because I’ve justified my rejection for this scope Fadel understood my point of view.
Flashback
I love & appreciate Fadel Belaskri - Through out my journey at GE, he backed me up in all major escalations, trained me, gave advices and guided me in different scenarios on how to finalize my job tasks. Most important, he recommended me to take on the Depot Operations for his region in 2019 & his trust in me was everything I needed. THANK YOU AGAIN AND AGAIN - my brother, Fadel 😍
November 2023, I’ve joined a call with Bipu Cherian, Kristoff & Nicolas where I’ve been informed about my lay off due to GE’s spin off plan, and those within the corporate business were affected - I was one of them. On 29th Feb 2024, it was my last day. After 10 years & 2 months, my chapter at GE came to an end. I intentionally did not inform anyone regarding my off boarding (the colleagues in Egypt) due to emotional reasons.
From March, I’ve started to apply online, with no luck. Due to the high unemployment rate in Egypt, it was a challenge to land a new job unless one remains patient with his submissions & applications.
GE Vernova (Oct’2024-Oct’2025)
One day, September 2024, my friend Mohamed Meghawry called me for an opportunity in GE Vernova, and he recommended me to the regional manager, David Jones. It took 1 meeting with David to put my legs back in GE. During the interview, I thanked David for giving me the chance to speak and share my basic needs, and that was after the positive feedback he received from North Africa team about my previous experience. I’ve started with Vernova in Oct 2024, after 7 months of unemployment, and received warm welcome from our beloved employees in Egypt office. It was a reunion, and I’ve returned to my daily job with the same infrastructure as I’ve left it. The same vendors we procure from, same PC imaging process, same web portals .. etc.
One year with Vernova, gained me new experience reporting to Sr IT Leader, David Jones. Its in our benefit to report and work with new managers, where each share their experience, structure and mindset with the team. I’ve worked with David on deploying Vernova’s new internet connection for Egypt’s office (a Microwave Link), and resolving the new VPN outage in office. Together, we’ve resolved 2 long pending issues for Vernova in Egypt. The rest was business as usual, weekly/biweekly and monthly regional calls. I loved David, the team and my come back at GE. It was a wonderful year.
Thank you David again!
David & Ali - We Share
David is from South Africa, I’m from Egypt. Our daughters share the same name ❤️ - Layla !
David love Bikes (Motor Bikes) - I love Bikes as well (Road Bicycles) 🙌🏻 - We share our passion for 2 Wheels
On one hand, I’ve been commuting everyday to work and carrying out the same IT services as in the past. On the other hand, I’ve began to self-assess my goals, skills and what I dislike about by current job. I resumed applying online with the intention to pursue a new opportunity outside GE, for these reasons:
There were no indications for a change on the short/long term, a future promotion or any projects that could elevate our roles in Africa region.
GE Vernova signed a global agreement with a major global IT company - Info Sys - where they will take on the asset management responsibilities. With their onboarding, my role in GE turned to be secondary, and not a primary one.
My job title was set to the default, as per the IT organization .. one day it showed as “DT Site Support Technician” - a title that does not reflect my experience.
11 years @ GE and it was time for a change - GE is family to me, and it will remain so
New Job (September 2025)
In September, I’ve received a message on Linkedin from a recruitment agency. The agency then connected me with the main client. I’ve been interviewed, and shortly was offered a job contract for the role of “Asset Management Engineer”. The offer I’ve received was from a major IT company, headquartered in India.
Basically, I was leaving a global company & moving to another global - IT oriented - company, and for this reason, I accepted.
That was my decade at GE, 2014-2025
A 🥰 lovely and successful journey
GE remains family to me
الحمد لله رب العالمين