Leave It Better Than You Found It: Altitude Award Winner Jessica Iacobucci Focuses on Teamwork

Cincinnati has a lot going for it. Built on hills overlooking the Ohio River, the city has an impressive skyline, a rich and vibrant arts and culture scene, major league sports teams, and top-quality universities. All of this helps to explain the magnetic attraction it tends to have on people who grow up there and leave, only to return years later. Jessica Iacobucci is one such proud returnee.

"I found my way out a couple of times but always made my way back to Cincinnati, GE Aerospace HQ," says Iacobucci, who's been with the company for almost 23 years, with stints in such far-flung locales as London and McAllen, Texas. Now a business operations leader on the GE9X engine program, Iacobucci and her husband always wanted to come home to have kids - they have a daughter in fourth grade and a son in sixth - so they could be around their families and have a built-in support system nearby.

That solid family foundation is not only the reason she returned to her hometown after two years in London; it's also the source code for her approach to teamwork and talent development. "I'm one of five kids, right in the middle of the pack. My dad owned his own business and worked tirelessly. My mom was the CEO of our house. She juggled all of us kids and our sports, and also worked," says Iacobucci. "A family of super hard workers with entrepreneurial spirit? That absolutely shaped who I am."

"Small Improvements Add Up!"

Iacobucci's career trajectory at GE Aerospace can be summed up with something else she learned from her big family: "If you have a goal and a passion for something, you go for it." Iacobucci says she's continuously benefited from mentors investing in her and giving her opportunities to step into leadership roles herself - and she has never shied away from taking those steps. While on the Services Agreements Operations team, Iacobucci wholeheartedly embraced FLIGHT DECK, GE Aerospace's proprietary lean operating model, and helped infuse it into the work of a global team.

"The beauty of FLIGHT DECK is it may seem intimidating at first, but it's not that complicated. It's really just about how you work, but with a level of rigor and process," she says. "Everybody has to be contributing to continuous improvement, the ideas have to come from everywhere, and everybody has a stake in the game to get to a desired future state. And it just works."

Iacobucci's straightforward approach, as well as her passion and commitment to building and leading strong teams, has seen the fundamental lean goals of less waste and more efficiency realized in some profile-raising ways. For instance, she harnessed the power of FLIGHT DECK to rebalance and improve the workload for GE Aerospace's Commercial Engines and Services business.

Over three years, she tackled the services contract margin review process, ensuring agreement profitability performance was understood and appropriately reflected in the business financials. Iacobucci's efforts helped to improve lead time by more than 30 percent and increase first-time yield - the percentage of outputs that meet quality standards without needing rework on the first pass through a process - to 95 percent. How? Her team completed more than 20 kaizens and used daily management and problem solving to reduce both lead time and process time.

"Kaizen, which means 'change for the better,' is a philosophy of continuous improvement," she says. "It's OK to start small. Small improvements add up!"

Embracing the Spirit of "What's Next?"

With a sustained record of results, Iacobucci earned recognition as a "Developer of World-Class Talent" at the inaugural GE Aerospace Altitude Awards. Established in 2025, the awards honor those who drive meaningful results through FLIGHT DECK while exemplifying the company's key behaviors: respect for people, continuous improvement, and customer-driven. It was fitting recognition for a world-class coach known for empowering others and always having an eye trained on collaboration and accountability.

Reflecting on the award, Iacobucci goes right back to the power of people working well together. "The first word that came to my mind," she says, "was humbled. I was really just representing the team up there. What I always say is leave the place better than you found it, and the secret sauce at GE Aerospace is how we collaborate and build upon ideas to make things better. A team is exponentially stronger than one individual. And we were able to take a moment to celebrate and acknowledge that this is helping all of us. And then it was, 'OK, great! What's next?'"

For Iacobucci and her new team, what's next is supporting the roll out of the GE9X engine. It's an exciting time, with their days spent working through the challenges of a next-gen engine program and collaborating with the sales team to secure engine and services orders. For Iacobucci and her family, it's continuing to commit to each other and the city they love. "I want to give back more to my community, especially my alma mater, the University of Cincinnati," she says. "A scholarship there, and the opportunity for several co-op experiences while in college, is what led me to GE Aerospace in the first place."

"I'm incredibly grateful for the continued family support. I know my parents were proud when I got this award and were excitedly asking for pictures and updates throughout the night," she says. "I ended up sitting next to GE Aerospace Chairman and CEO Larry Culp at dinner and had a chat with him. It was a 'pinch-myself' experience."

She pauses for a moment. "It's that feeling you get when you know you're doing good work," she adds. "And that, to me, is enough."