President, Eaton Corp. Electrical Power Components & Systems (Retired)

Jerry Whitaker is a retired President of the Electrical Sector – Americas for the Eaton Corporation.  Eaton, is headquartered in Cleveland, Ohio, and is a global manufacturer of highly engineered products that serve industrial, vehicle, construction, commercial, aerospace and mission critical electrical markets

Whitaker joined the company in 1994 as Marketing Manager of the Assemblies and Systems division.  In 1997 he was asked to serve as the General Manager for Cutler-Hammer’s Engineering Services and Systems Division.  He was responsible for developing the business model and start-up of the division.  Under his watch, the business has grown to over $600M.

After starting the Engineering Services and Systems Business he was promoted to Vice President of Power Distribution and Control and served in that capacity for three years. He moved on to the position of President of Power Components and Systems with global responsibility for nine divisions and a specific focus to grow globally. During this time he was responsible for numerous key acquisitions and took the business from a predominantly North American business to a balanced global organization with 50% of the sales outside of the U.S. As President of Electrical Sector – Americas, Whitaker oversaw the P&L, manufacturing operations, sales, marketing, technology and product development for four operational groups comprised of twelve divisions, 17,900 associates, and $4.3B in revenues.  His group has successfully integrated eight substantial acquisitions in the last four years before his retirement and implemented the Eaton Business System, Eaton Lean and Six Sigma processes in all operations.

He previously served on the boards of the Allegheny Conference for Community Development, Tuomey Medical Center, and was the Chairman of the United Way for Sumter and Clarendon Counties.

He is currently on the Boards of; Matthews International, Sealed Air Corporation and The Milliken Company. He also served on the boards of the Carnegie Museums of Pittsburgh and Chair of the Carnegie Science Center and The Energy Innovation Center.

He was the Chairman of the Eaton – Caterpillar ISO JV and also served on boards for several Eaton subsidiaries.

Before joining Eaton, Whitaker spent 22 years with Westinghouse Electric Corp. 

Whitaker has a BS in electrical engineering from Syracuse University and an MBA –Finance from George Washington University