Now that April Fool’s Day is finally done, I can report with confidence that GM CEO Fritz Henderson did, in fact, say the following [via Daniel Howes at The Detroit News]: “People ask, ‘What changes are you going to make in management, in the organization,'” he says. “None. That would be a waste of time. We don’t have time. There are mechanisms to get this done. You just have to drive them hard.” And put them away wet, I suppose. Only Danny isn’t buying it, ’cause there’s that pesky little matter of all the other GM “stakeholders.” “The constituencies Henderson needs to drive hardest have reasons to balk. United Auto Workers leaders, strong backers of the Obama administration, figure their allies will protect them. Bondholders operating in Bailout Nation figure the feds are more likely to help them (and protect labor) than force GM into bankruptcy and risk the collateral damage to the shaky economy.” And so the countdown to GM’s C11 continues, steady-as-she-goes-down style, with the company’s caretaker taking care . . . of his own.
I have my doubts that Henderson will be holding this job for much longer. He’s probably just a placeholder until the real CEO is hired. Henderson didn’t get hired, so much as Wagoner got fired (or so I hope.)
Yeesh! Take this old nag out back and shoot her! This is nothing more than a taxpayer funded jobs program with no end in sight. The tax liabilities (including the most recent “loans” given by Uncle Sam) are too large to be repaid. Period. Viability my ass!
The Titanic maintained status quo, too, until about 11:40 pm, April 14, 1912.
Seems like another Autoblog-ish word balloon moment is at hand:
Guy 2nd from left edge of photo is thinking “WTF does this a$$hat think he’s doing? He hasn’t got a clue…”
Well, not that I’m a fan of GM, but given the current less than 60 day window he has, that’s all he can do. Trying to replace management in that time and have even a hope of getting anything done at all would be impossible.
Driving all current stakeholders hard and throwing a hail Mary pass is their only shot during this window.
Whatever happens, our auto industry can’t move forward until we finish this soap opera.
I work for a Ford dealer, and I’m tired of this. As a nation, let’s get this over with…We spend a lot of time trying to predict all of the consequences, and you know what? We won’t know until it’s all done.
Personally, I hope for a BK with support for critical parts suppliers. I want to see Ford, Toyota, Honda, VW and others not get sucked into the undertow of the ship going down, and then maybe GM can regroup in the lifeboats and emerge leaner. It might take decades to re establish as any kind of a major player, but, once you cut out all the cancer, they do have things to offer to the public and future R&D.
A healthy car business (right sized) in this company will benefit from healthy competition.
“He’s probably just a placeholder until the real CEO is hired.”
Franklin Raines or Jamie Gorelick?
I truly think that if there is an award for Best Pictures With Articles, it has to go to TTAC. Time and time again, they are perfect.
LOL
This picture reminds me of those times in high school when you made fun of some other kid with your friends…then the same kid shows up and is like, “Hey! What’s up guys?!?”
bill301972 is right. With 60 days to come up with a plan, radically changing the management structure now would only get in the way. In any case, you can’t change a corporate culture in two months. You can make a start at that, but changing a company the size of GM isn’t going to happen overnight. It took Mulally about a year to steer Ford in the right direction.
cut and chop let’s get going, i think they can turn it around 1st unions get pay cut it’s the fastest way to cut cost, don’t fire trim pay and benifits, some job better than no job, then let’s cut the board, and then midlevel management lean mean car building machine, then once it is done remove all old management
Is that an old picture for this article? How do these guys manage to crack a smile? It’s insulting.