Over at Jalopnik, Patrick George has uncovered an internal Powerpoint that sets out very clear guidelines for how recalls and other quality problems should be discussed. GM’s communications team has been prone to awkward outbursts before, but this takes things to an almost Orwellian level.
GM employees are urged to avoid even mentioning the word “problem”, instead calling it an “issue” or “condition” or “matter”. There’s a longer list of bad words, including “Kevorkianesque” and “brakes like an X car”. Rather than detail the whole thing, I want to pose this question: this whole thing is presumably an exercise in media and communications management, but what does it say about a company culture when it actively discourages discussing problems in a frank and honest manner? I personally think that we’ve reached a point where this kind of heavy-handed attitude – one that expects the public to be too stupid to unquestioningly buy into the company narrative – does not work any longer. And I’m sure that GM isn’t the only firm that does this – they just happened to get caught.
I can assure you, every major corporation has similar guidelines. I went through corporate affairs training at three different Fortune 100’s – they all have very similar documentation and training on what to say, and not say to the press.
I broke those rules – ONCE – early in my career. I spent almost four hours with legal and corporate affairs when my quote got out in the press and I had my wings clipped on who I could and can’t talk to after.
The difference here – GM got caught.
You’re missing the giant, economy-sized elephant in the room. These are guidelines for internal correspondence, not for dealing with the press. This is about eliminating the sort of documentation stream created from honest discussion of issues within a company.
I think this is actually trying to make internal communications more specific. Nothing wrong in my eyes.
Damn straight. As a software tester- this is just the equivalent of asking that people provide more useful feedback that “don’t work” “can’t use”.
Have I somehow ended up on a Gawker media site?
I think it helps communicate problems more effectively by using approved phraseology. BTW, the use of standard phrasing is SOP in most airlines. When the Captain writes up a maintenance problem using emotional, cutesy, or funny hyperbole, that doesn’t tell maintenance exactly what the problem is, and only pisses off the regional chief pilot. By using company and FAA approved standardized phrasing and professional jargon, everyone speaks the same language and problems get documented and solved more timely and accurately. Writing up problems shouldn’t devolve into a one-up-man-ship contest to see who can be the most funny.
This. Throwing around negative adjectives and hyperbole does nothing to engender honest internal communication. If anything, it’s a huge turnoff.
This, exactly. It’s about providing accurate product quality feedback without putting any spin of emotion on it. “Just the facts” as it were.
Actually – the same rules apply both internal and external.
This is something I know painfully well. Trust me, having federal marshals showing up at your house to hand you subpoenas for testimony in a landmark anti-trust trial in the previous century was not a fun experience.
Having to give sworn testimony to the feds and six state attorney generals, under the watchful even of corporate executives – also not fun.
Having your name splashed on every paper and news channel in the free world on a random weekday afternoon in November, and having to call your wife to tell her don’t answer the phone and don’t answer the front door if anyone knocks, because corporate legal told me to tell you – also – not fun.
It was INTERNAL communications that got me into that mess.
I’m petty maniacal now of following the purge everything at the six month mark as most corporations recommend (to non-contract related communications).
The how to say things apply both external and internal. At a different Fortune 100 I worked at, there was specific training for everyone on how to do internal communications and what not to say and how not to write.
Again – everyone does this. Sorry I made my observations cloudy by not being 100% on point of internal versus external.
Trust me, I am sure there are companies (chemicals, pharma, medical) that have near identical documents and even more Orwellian views on what not say.
Corporate America got their eyes opened up when big tobacco had their internal world opened up for everyone to see. The rules changed after that.
This really isn’t a “GM” thing.
Again – they got caught.
For the record, the one slide in the image pissed me off to no end. Right column – third bullet. PERFECTLY describes my Saturn Relay beater – the traction control system in the GM U-bodies (and lesser extent their very very very close cousin W-bodies) was designed by Rube-Goldberg and Satan while they were on a drug fueled bender.
Bullets 2, 3, and 8 in the left column would far better describe the problem in the right column, third bullet. To point, if I have to pull out quickly due to traffic flow, I turn traction control off, as I’ve had it engage when pulling out (and no, I’m not spinning the wheels) and cut acceleration to nothing. It’s feckin’ dangerous – and very difficult to track down.
The problem with the system is the sensors run on voltage. If the voltage spikes or drops it is taken as either a loss of traction (spin) or a lock up of brakes (no spin) and engages traction control or ABS. Ahhh, but if you have a voltage issue due to say corrosion on one of those wires, you can get an intermittent spike or drop in voltage. Your vehicle interprets this event as a loss of traction or locked brakes, and behaves accordingly. Even if the ABS, TCS or both lights come on, there is no code. As far as the computer is concerned, it saved your butt – but the voltage went out of spec so it triggered the light. So a very brief loss of signal from a balky wheel sensor is not interpreted as hey, you have a wheel sensor failure.
Go to dealer, ABS and TCS lights on – no code – no history. Everything fine. GM tech then tells you come back when it’s really broken.
After a few years (and I use this as my beater vehicle so I kind of don’t care) you just give up.
So don’t take this as a defense of GM – it is more of a back handed compliment – but in truth – EVERY company does this – internal and external (and think about the pharma companies that have caught over and over again cooking test results to get FDA approval and candy coating their research reports)
@CJ
Have you ever been deposed in a lawsuit for a company? I have. If you ever have, you would understand this document.
No, but I’ve created hundreds of pages of project documentation for two industries. Wouldn’t the potential harm of documented problems be minimized by resolving said problems before delivery?
Way to miss the point–as usual.
See no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil.
Thanks for the laugh. If your experience being deposed granted any insights, you’ve yet to share them.
Breach of contract lawsuits while working for IBM. On both sides of the legal actions.
Emails and presentations were involved in the discovery process and I, along with others, were questioned on the meaning of specific statements within said documents from several years before.
‘What did you mean on [insert date] when you wrote that the [insert item] was at risk of not meeting the terms of the contract’
Not uncommon for IBM GBS employees to have their email communications saved for many years without the ability to delete when working on certain projects. IBM liked (likes?) to sue. They also got sued. The most common situation was with suits and countersuits flowing back and forth.
My job was tracking and closing open issues. Answering said questions would have been within my job description. It never came to that because we resolved every issue. GM should try it out. My 2001 rate of $130 an hour actually makes sense in light of their current liability. Maybe they should give me a call, provided that I wouldn’t have to drive one of their cars.
Cool story bro. Care to name an employer or industry?
And, you were the ‘guy’ 13 years ago making 270k a year? Or was that the billing rate?
Awesome, all problem routed to you and you solved them all by creating hundreds of pages of documents?
Cool man. Sounds cool. You’re the best. Why isn’t the world hiring you and why are you asking your boss to lease a different vehicle for you? In fact, why aren’t you the baddest man in the world?
You sound like an angry, bitter, little man. Don’t let the world get you down. It was a billing rate, although 2,000 hours a year would have been a fantasy. 50 hours a week would have felt like a vacation, so I took the money and ran long ago. My clients were mostly investment banks. I started as a tech writer and finished as a project manager. Since changing coasts, I’ve been doing something unrelated. The rewards are different, but if I had any more fun it would likely kill me. You should probably find something that doesn’t make you so miserable too.
I’m not little or angry. Nor am I miserable. Thanks for your concern. Not calling Derek out here, but I’ve actually met him too.
I’m pretty sure he can confirm I’m not little or angry. I’ll leave it to myself to confirm I’m not miserable. He can confirm my IBM employment in the past if needed but I never shared my legal cases with him as I consider Derek a bit of a friend–even if I criticize him here from time to time.
I’m no Tresmonos (would love to meet the guy)–but I did get slightly buzzed while meeting Derek at a bar near his place in Toronto. It was after Bertel left and I got pissed that Jack wouldn’t approve Derek picking up the alcohol tab (kidding Jack)
This thread started (if you scroll up) with you stating:
‘This is about eliminating the sort of documentation stream created from honest discussion of issues within a company’
I then, along with many others here, stated some facts like:
‘Have you ever been deposed in a lawsuit for a company? I have. If you ever have, you would understand this document’
You brought up money here..not me. You asked for details on my experiences. I only asked back. Sorry to hit a hot spot with you CJ. Sorry you can’t name a company you worked for like I did.
That’s still no different than any other large company. Figuring out the risk-balance of a particular kind of paper trail is Job 1 for corporate legal.
If yuou don’t like it, don’t work for a big company, and consider voting for politicians like Ralph Nader.
Small business is a different deal – I’ve worked for small business, university / state government, and a Fortune 500 company. State government and the big company have more in common with each other than either has in common with small business. Small business feels like the living embodiement of American values, and it really is in a lot of ways.
Systems Analyst for local government. E-Mail retained even after deletion via some sort of proxy or other — just remember that anything you state can and will show up in the paper, so write accordingly, and you’ll be fine.
(That said, some of the stuff that people send via their work account that REALLY should be sent via personal account is stunning!)
“(That said, some of the stuff that people send via their work account that REALLY should be sent via personal account is stunning!)
You are absolutely correct. Specially if it is sexually explicit stuff. Lots of people get nailed by sexual harassment lawsuits, which they cannot deny because there are lengthy e-mail threads.
I’d like to see what Honda’s correspondence is like as we all know what Toyota’s is like too:
” , “a staff member of the Toyota Motor Corporation Product Planning and Management Division sent a copy of an Engineering Design Instruction describing the pedal remedy that was already implemented in Europe to someone at Toyota Motor Engineering and Manufacturing North America, Inc. for the accelerator pedal of a RAV 4 manufactured in Canada. Two weeks later “a member of the TMC PPM inexplicably instructed a member of the TEMA PPM not to implement this Engineering Change Instruction. Furthermore, in November 2009, Toyota provided NHTSA with FTRs regarding sticking accelerator pedals on vehicles in the United States but not with information regarding Toyota’s extensive testing and determinations regarding the cause of the sticking accelerator pedals or an explanation of the significance of the FTRs,” the demand letter said.”
http://www.safetyresearch.net/2014/03/19/toyotas-billion-dollar-web/
Also, in today’s work environment where people communicate by e-mail, with the permanence of writing in stone and the thought that goes into a telephone conversation.
Time and again, I have run into/dealt with unfortunate e-mail communications that were essentially innocuous, but written in a way that was inflammatory when taken out of context and highlighted. My least favorite expression to deal with: “LOL!”
GM employees are urged to avoid even mentioning the word “problem”, instead calling it an “issue” or “condition” or “matter”.
This is one of my all-time pet peeves – people calling PROBLEMS “opportunities,” “challenges” and the worst of the lot, “issues.”
They are none of those things – THEY ARE PROBLEMS.
I don’t understand why it’s such a bad thing to honestly call a problem a problem.
Is it too harsh a word or something?
Or is it because if someone calls a problem a problem, it’ll sound like they’re afraid of it, or that it’s a big deal?
Corporate culture in incredibly spineless. You really have to appreciate the degree to which everyone, but especially upper management, is coddled and there are no problems and everyone’s equally at fault.
It’s also incestuous, inasmuch as these traits propagate through an entire company. What you end up with is a culture of people who are unable, much less unwilling, to stake out controversial positions.
It also makes for some hysterically funny situations when you cross cultural boundaries. This corporate wimpiness is particularly North American, though you’ll see it in Asia as well. Northern Europe, though, doesn’t have it, so it’s particularly awesome to see a Scandinavian (and not a particularly highly placed person) call an American executive’s plan “the stupidest f*cking thing I’ve ever heard” in open forum.
There’s no “I” in team, but there’s always a “U” in “f*ck-up”.
No, but there IS an “I” in “win,” and when I am king, I shall issue a royal decree designating the official spelling of the word “team” to be TIEHM, so then there WILL be an “I” in “team.”
Simple answer: Suppose this “problem” really isn’t a problem, but results in a lawsuit. The e-mails using the word “problem” will be produced to the other side in the lawsuit.
Then every author and every recipient of each of those e-mails will be interrogated, under oath, about what he/she meant when he/she wrote or read the word “problem.”
Corvair-like, that made me picture some 70 year old VP telling their corporate PR hack “Never under any circumstances mention the Corvair”
I think this is a guideline document for employees driving company cars, when they report issues. GM has a pretty extensive company car program, which feeds the employee car purchase program (tag).
This makes sense really. None of those comments are particularly helpful in diagnosing problems. As an engineer, dealing with emotional editorial for technical problems is annoying and (unfortunately) common.
I take issue with the matter of GM’s newspeak when it comes to conditions that were caused by taking the value approach to the components of car creation that may have an adverse effect on my physical person causing reduced or ceased function
Wonka: [angrily] Wrong, sir! Wrong! Under section 37B of the contract signed by him, it states quite clearly that all offers shall become null and void if – and you can read it for yourself in this photostatic copy – “I, the undersigned, shall forfeit all rights, privileges, and licenses herein and herein contained,” et cetera, et cetera… “Fax mentis, incendium gloria cultum,” et cetera, et cetera… Memo bis punitor delicatum!
Oh, well in that case never mind
Is it just me as a non-corporate type, or do others see many of these corporations as being like little versions of present-day China, where they attempt to blend modern day capitalism with a police state? In fact, is it possible that Walmart owns China?
“In fact, is it possible that Walmart owns China?”
No, but I’ve heard voices (spoken sotto voce natch!) that Walmart is actually owned by Li Keqiang.
Go figure.
Big businesses can have as much money/influence as a medium-sized nation, if that’s what yourey asking, despite the legal limits.
And their internal governance is rarely anything resembling a representative democracy.
The verboten comments are hyperbolic and not particularly useful.
The permitted comments include details that would be useful for troubleshooting.
I realize that the blogosphere is filled with comments like the former, but they really are useless. They tell you more about the person who made the comments than they do about the alleged problem. If there is a problem in today’s society, it’s with the unhinged who believe that a dumb, ignorant comment is as valid as an intelligent, factual one.
The ellipses at the end of each of the non-helpful comments suggest that details of GM’s dramatic failures would have followed each one of them. I don’t doubt that whoever compiled the table meant to herd readers to your conclusion, but all they really did was some selective editing.
Not really, people who feel the need to include emotional garbage in descriptions of problems are generally doing something unbelievably stupid, or misunderstanding the ‘problem’.
I work for a small business, however our products are pretty complex.
About 150 steps in testing and programming sometimes lasting several hours.
If anyone returns something with a comment “it broke” or “it doesn’t work” and no more detail we send it right back. Don’t even open the package.
Surprisingly large companies are the worse.
This is not exciting or damning, it’s just another facet of the 21st Century Corporation. We have training that’s very, very similar.
And some of this is just, “explain the ‘issue’ in terms we can understand.”
As Kix and PCH just said: what I read in that one slide was “please explain issues/faults in a manner that will help get them resolved”. As opposed to just judgemental opinions and comments that do nothing. I didn’t see anything particular Orwellian (from this one slide, at least). When I used to test software, we had instructions to record aspects of the test and failure, not just write, “Doesn’t work” or “This sucks”.
Really, there is nothing to see here. Every corporation does this. It’s simply trying to direct internal conversations from hyperbole to something that is descriptive, and therefore more helpful.
This is the bucket of sh*t theory. Its starts as a foul smelling bucket of sh*t, and by the time management gets wind of it, the mid-level people fearing for their positions have morphed it into “it smells sweet and makes plants grow.”
1st time I have seen it codified as company policy though.
Four of the left hand column comments were contextual hyperbole that could be used to emphasize the serious nature of the problem. I would not penalize anyone who was passionate about trying to fix a problem.
But if that’s all they said…
Redav,
We don’t know if that was the entire statement or if the lawyers cherry picked to make a point.
I can see both sides of the argument here. And admittedly have to agree with the liability issues.
I would say this is pretty normal for any company with a legal team. The fortune 100 company I worked for had similar documents and used to have training sessions. And yes it applied to internal communication too as they felt anything that may become discoverable in court should be sanitized. They went so far as to say that if you needed to vent do it in person or over one of the company phone lines that wasnt recorded.
I also worked for a small company that had a lawyer as one of the owning partners they also has similar rules but only applied it to out going correspondence with the press and customers.
I don’t know the specifics of vehicle testing but this seems to be instructions telling GM employees/drivers how to address problems by using specific language.
Nothing wrong with that.
I spent a good portion of my life in military and commercial aviation. When a problem arises Mx wants specificity. Altitude, airspeed, power setting, outside air temperature, what type of maneuvering you we’re doing etc.
I don’t know to whom these instructions are intended (I’m guessing not engineering test drivers) but I agree with what they’re attempting to do which is provide specificity.
Both provide specificity, but also get the information without the employee’s interpretation.
Being to the point is good, but asking a skilled professional to suppress their opinion is a little dehumanizing- even though it can accelerate the flow of information within the organization and help them fight lawsuits (since the interpretation of that information could show intent).
I would do a lot of my actual job for free, because I’m an engineer and enjoy fixing problems. Following policies with like this one is well within the norm, but following slightly dehumanizing corporate policies is what I really trade in exchange for my paycheck.
There are corporate liability issues at stake. Internal communications can be subpoenaed, and many of those statements, while in the opinion of the writer may be true, would be dynamite in a lawsuit even if they weren’t in fact true.
It appears (from the example above) that GM is promoting discussing problems in a frank and honest manner. The left side statements are inflammatory and non-specific.
Exactly what I was going to say.
1. You want feedback from the employee drivers.
2. When some numbskull from HR overreacts to a problem he doesn’t understand, and writes “This thing is a deathtrap! The wipers didn’t work after my son yanked them off” that WILL become, when found during discovery “GM was aware of deadly problems with their wipers”
3. I work in pharma development, and I assure you that I have to abide by similar rules. I can say “The data failed to show efficacy” or “There appears to be a risk associated with…” but I would be fired immediately if I said “Doesn’t work” or “Isn’t safe.” And to be fair, I may be wrong. Or reporting the results of one of a thousand studies, and the study may be flawed. But once I have rung the bell…
Where I’m from it’s called defensive writing and it’s an attempt to maintain the value of the communication without handing some legal teams discovery efforts an index of damning phrases that are pejorative regardless of context or later action on the issue. This document is in no way surprising.
I am on the “it’s no big deal side” of the argument. It is simply a directive that when a user (driver of a company car) has a problem, report it clearly as possible in a way useful for an engineer. As an electrical engineer myself, I appreciate this. The last thing I like to hear is “it doesn’t work”.
However, I will say that in the list of “no-no phrases” the term “Brakes like an X-Car” made me giggle. Found in the original jalopnik article, not this one.
It’s telling that GM culture is so insular, they only came up with terrible cars of their own manufacture. The Pinto feels slighted, I’m sure.
I saw the same sort of thing inside a big four auditing company involved in the debacle of a certain brazilian bank, not long ago. This is sadly usual.
I do not see what the flail is about.
An accurate description of the problem rather than a vivid extension of the consequences is required.
Don’t know why transgressions cannot be handled individual basis rather than company revenge.
I think the responses here are a scream. Fully two thirds of those leaving comments clearly have not read the explanation of what this presentation is.
GM, as all car companies, use their employees as “general public” type assessors of vehicles. They let employees drive cars, and then they get reports from them. Many of these employees are not technical people. They have to be trained on how to report problems in a way that assists troubleshooting and resolution. The PPT slide is attempting to teach people how to report issues: what was the phenomenon, when did you observe it, under what operating conditions did it occur, was there something that made it go away, etc. That is all it is. As several posters above had said, comments like “deathtrap” are COMPLETELY USELESS to the people trying to do a root cause analysis and determine corrective actions.
I am sure there is some legal-issue-avoidance content in trying to de-emotionalize the comments, as well, but comments like “so sad, just another example of how GM sucks and the world is going to hell” only show the commenter has: a) never worked in a company developing a product; and/or b) not read the multiple comments directly above that explain (better than I did) what it is that we are looking at.
Let’s get some model rocket engines, spill gasoline all over the place, and “prove” that you can get killed in a Chevy pickup when you’re T boned by someone going 70 mph.
Heap favorite comment.
I would also say these guidelines are standard for any large company developing products in the US. They look so familiar I think there may even be some kind of legal handbook or seminar they came from. I have been taught to have the mentality that any internal statement can and will be used against you in a court of law.
People will use the terms on the left as a first knee-jerk response to any issue regardless of the actual magnitude or cause. For example someone in manufacturing might call a part that doesn’t fit an “unbelievable engineering screw up” when a part was engineered perfectly well but built wrong by the supplier. But that email will never die and the company is on the hook for any future issues with that part.
Others know the weight of these comments and use them to prioritizing their pet issues over real more serious problems.
Nice bit of corporatespeak there p___mill . Pure and utter bs otherwise … but a nice bit of corporatespeak never the less . Gee I’ll guess… errr … corporate attorney ?
I was hoping Derek or someone else would grab hold of this story [ its going viral all across the net today ]
Two thumbs up DK for paying attention !
And yeah …. aint it just wonderful these United States we now live in ? Where not only does GM go out of its way to hide and cover up the truth for years .. and in some cases for almost a decade ..
But now that the Truth is out …. GM is doing everything it can in an attempt to Censor – Silence – Restrict the Free Speech of each and every one of their employees . With severe consequences at the very least being implied [ several other sites have the more complete transcript ] if not plainly stated .
Nice ! Now we can add impingement/restriction of Constitutional Rights to the ongoing list of GMs constant and consistent ills .
Somebody needs to sue the crap out of GM over this one ! This being one time i could get behind the ACLU on something
Such a ‘Free’ country we’re becoming ! Free … only if and when you’ve got the Money and the Power to BE free . Otherwise … you’re just an expendable chattel/commodity to be used and abused at will by those that DO have the Power and the Money
Ahhhh … I’ll tell you what . We most certainly made our fair share of mistakes back in the 60’s early 70’s . But at the core of it all . We were and still are Absolutely Right !
————————
@ Volt 230 – If you’re looking in . Best tell TB its time to heed my advice and head for the door … toot suite … ahh .. he’s a deluded true believer . He’ll never leave until he’s shown the door … which will happen … guaranteed
Since when does an employee have free speech inside the company they work for? The US Constitution is quiet on the issue of comments pertaining to company vehicles in internal memos.
The constitution says you can’t be arrested/tried for free speech.
It doesn’t say you can’t be fired.
Look no further than who could vote in the early republic to see why this never came up.
If some stranger on the internet claims that something is unconstitutional, then it almost certainly is constitutional.
Similarly, odds are high that a quote attributed online to Thomas Jefferson is probably something that Jefferson never said.
People who don’t know what they’re talking about enjoy hiding behind their butchered versions of the Constitution. Last refuge of scoundrels and all that.
“Now we can add impingement/restriction of Constitutional Rights to the ongoing list of GMs constant and consistent ills .”
Constitutional rights (in the US) generally only apply to the government. There’s not much you can do if a corporation contractually binds it’s employees, from a constitutional perspective.
Now, if GM was violating labour laws or civil rights, that would be a different story. That’s not the case, here, either.
“Restrict the Free Speech of each and every one of their employees”
What are you, like 12 years old or something? You don’t have free speech within a company.
The university where I used to work had a very clear policy on this, which was necessary since the university owns a lot of public spaces in town.
The overall sense of it was that you had free speech when you weren’t working. BUT if you mixed campaigning for your causes with your job in any way, the continuation of your employment was on the line.
And universities are pretty permissive asbout this sort of thing. That’s one of the reasons I don’t use my real name in blog comments.
I can’t believe you handed this to me gtr. I can’t say it this well, so:
http://xkcd.com/1357/
Points!
These entities called ‘corporations’ can’t be controled by nobody(‘too big to fail’) and don’t(can’t) control themselves(‘too complicated’) ..
As an entity they have ‘psychopath-mentality\'(numbers and efficiency) .. and they all basicly work the same way (you can write the same manuals for coca-cola and GM:) .. , you can jump from the same posision(after short ‘adaptation process’) in one corporation to adequate position in another ..)..
‘The Circle\'(Orwell 2.0) is almost complete .. :)
What Thatkat09 and bloke said. The GM communication is essential if the idea is to solve problems.
This is a classic example of click based auto blogging. Some auto bloggers like to bash the ‘mainstream’ auto media is a bunch of fat clowns who drive cars, gorge on free booze and steaks and then write glowing reviews assuming they are somehow superior.
Then, pieces on Jalopnik (and this one to a lesser extent) dramatically point to a document like this as some sort of ‘gotcha’ moment without having a clue what it is.
This isn’t a PR document Derek. It is the type of document I’ve seen in many companies with two main points.
1. To narrow down feedback and put it properly
2. To avoid legal discovery issues down the road
If you don’t understand the legal discovery issue, then I recommend you do some research on the legal process in this country.
Standard Operating Procedures in many businesses. Articles like the Jalopnik piece and this one are signs of:
1. Lazy or non-existent ‘reporting’ by people who turn around and call some auto media ‘lazy’ for showing up and drinking the booze and driving the free loaner cars.
2. Total lack of understanding of the business world.
Derek’s worried about the public being too stupid?? What about the auto media/blogger/supposed ‘experts that write.
This right here. It’s standard fare at all of the 3 major automakers I’ve worked for. You document the facts, not the emotion. The facts can be used to accurately resolve the problem. Emotion only seeks to exaggerate it.
I do agree that giving details surrounding a problem is a good way to solve it.
Having said that, these kind of rules might make the lawyers happy and keep the development engineering staff from getting hurt feelings, but minimizing or sugarcoating the consequences of a problem can end up causing a defect to be moved into production or making it so a fix isn’t implemented in a reasonable amount of time.
Having worked as a troubleshooter, the column on the right side is much more useful in terms of solving the problem.
Perhaps they should have put you on this beat instead of a former fashion reporter and, in this case, an obviously rushed Derek.
That’s hardly fair to Cameron, who does a fine job covering news from the auto industry. You could equally refer to me as a former waste manager. I’m not an automotive engineer, nor a track driver, nor do I have any formal training in journalism (though I prefer to use the term “writer”). As for Derek, he opened up the topic for debate, didn’t he?
And I’ve been fairly described as a former teat thrashing poop machine, but it doesn’t really define my current abilities or standing. Besides, You ain’t my momma!
‘ As for Derek, he opened up the topic for debate, didn’t he?’
As opposed to the times when the comment section is closed on TTAC? Not sure what you mean by that.
I don’t have a problem with Derek in general. This one looks like a ‘get it out the door’ piece in a busy environment. But, its lacking any understanding of how the business world (not just automotive) operates.
It is similar to some of the FCA coverage recently. Many writers/journalists/bloggers/whatever they want to call themselves cackled and wrote pieces laughing at Sergio’s goals and objectives.
It was as if they had never been a part of any organization/business/team or whatever or had a single moment of education or experience in the business world where aggressive goal/target setting was in place.
These people wrote/blogged/whatever pieces as to the absurdity of certain sales targets as if the failure to reach said target 5 years down the road was some sort of massive failure and certain path to losing money followed by starvation and ultimately death.
FCA won’t hit all their targets Sergio laid out there. That said, they will be selling a lot more vehicles by 2018 and, most likely, at better margins. Many ridiculed the long day and multiple powerpoints and how this one was just like the one 5 years ago, but I never really saw any ‘reporting’ as to how FCA performed to their targets from 5 years ago. From what I see, they met or exceeded many of those goals/targets.
As for Cameron? I don’t think it was unfair. She re-writes autonews.com the next day. She used to blog about fashion. It is clear her job here is to provide regurgitated content and she seems to have the daily ‘GM’ beat. Am I wrong?
My point was that you have had a bit more insight in to this type of piece given your business experience versus a fashion background if there was going to be analysis.
“Many ridiculed the long day and multiple powerpoints and how this one was just like the one 5 years ago…”
Just because it is the life we live day-to-day does not mean that it above ridicule by outsiders or an efficient way to run things.
It is certainly not how my day to day work goes and I think you totally missed my point.
My point was related to some auto writers/journalist/bloggers/whatever who seem to have zero education and knowledge of the business or automotive world even though they try to write/blog/tweet/whatever about it.
@sunridgeplace: if that’s what yoiu think, then the comments on this article are a pretty good education, eh?
Haha! Awkward!
Let’s talk about data retention. Companies retain documents related to product development for a certain number of years. That includes e-mails between people that cross their servers, yes even THAT e-mail to your wife. They are legally required to be retained for a certain amount of time.
Note: just because you deleted it from your Outlook doesn’t mean it was deleted. It was saved on the server in a giant repository.
Let’s talk about Lawyers. Lawyers don’t care about people. This includes the victims, the engineers, the company, everyone.
Lawyers have lots of time, and lots of lackeys. They will do a search of that giant e-mail data base, yes even THAT e-mail to your wife, and they’ll drag out anything even remotely incriminating, ESPECIALLY if it can be taken out of context. They are not trying to find the truth, they are trying to build a narrative wherein their client is 100% right and deserving of billions of dollars.
You don’t say certain words that will 100% hose you, and you don’t say certain phrases that may overstate or misrepresent the truth.
At the end of the day, no one is trying to hurt anyone, but NO ONE wants to be in the shoes of that GM engineer currently getting destroyed in Congress, ESPECIALLY for wrong reasons.
GM’s problem is called institutionalisation.
Once an organisation/corporation, etc reaches this point it’s all down hill, unless the culture is carefully managed. Detroit’s Big 3 have this problem. They still think they are of ‘old’. They state they want change, but as you can see the institutionalised paradigms of old still exist, or these issues wouldn’t be recurring.
The biggest issue with institutionalisation is the order of priority changes.
1st. The institution come first, the outcome is the institution is protected at all levels. Break this code and you will find you are screwed.
2nd. The management structure is protected next. Generally the lowest common point is found to be ‘guilty’ to protect the influence and culture of superiors and institution. This makes it awkward for cultural change as the higher up you go the less change occurs.
3rd. The end user, consumer, victim, etc. These are the least protected in an institutionalised entity.
This is GM’s problem, like many large institutionalised organisations they have been able to protect the institution and management from external forces. Why do you think the change was made at the top?
This gives the perception of change, like a leadership change in politics. But, how often is the required changes made? The new leader needs the support of prior lower level managers for their (her) ability to be the boss.
Institutions will always place themselves in front of a country, political party, individuals, etc. Anything other than that is mainly marketing.
Institutionalisation occurs in all large bodies involving humans, whether left or right politically, profit or non-profit.
+1000
This vaguely reminds me of the time I saw the words “Uncontained blade liberation” used to describe the failure of a helicopter rotor.
@hgrunt
Army? ;)
Derek, this is where your lack of experience working within a major corporation that does product development shows.
Emails never get deleted, so it’s critical to choose words carefully. There’s no request to muffle accurate descriptions of events, but it’s not the complaintant’s job to add commentary that’s useful only to a trial lawyer.
Truth.
And, it goes far, far beyond just companies involved in product development.
“Emails never get deleted, so it’s critical to choose words carefully.”
What kind of stone-age, deathwish company sends sensitive information through email these days?
Any publicly traded company has to meet the retention requirements of Sarbanes Oxley since 2002, and it’s hardly limited to email; important documents must be retained. I’m not an expert, but I do have access to the internet. Not sure if these communications are important to financial disclosure and auditing, but most implementation plans include keeping email server data roughly forever.
SOX doesn’t require employees to sling stuff around Outlook like it’s Facebook circa 2007.
If you are doing something that an auditor, the SEC, or the IRS is going to care about then there is almost certainly a specific documentation policy related to it and probably an entire unique program.
The trouble is more that employees will send emails with sensitive information for many reasons including ignorance, or even to cover there own ass down the line. Believe me I have seen some ridiculous emails from fortune 500 VP’s. The other problem is even some internal system sometimes end up in court. I worked for a company that had an internal network notation system for legal staff (store case notes legal information etc)This system would invariably be mentioned on something in an email etc causing the lawyer on the other side to request the internal files. Basically anything written down anywhere in a corporate system has to be sanitized. As I mentioned before they would prefer phone conversations for these as long as they weren’t on one of the incoming 800 lines that were constantly being recorded.
@mopar
In my BPO consulting days, I had many discussions with clients on how to handle the recorded inbound calls.
Typically, it wasn’t that they were afraid of what was being recorded. More often that not, it was the enormous cost associated with storage of voice recordings and the added cost of retrieval in legal discovery. Plaintiff lawyers subpoenaing every scrap of information related to anything remotely related to their client’s concern.
If my memory is correct, a company could reduce their call center recordings beneath a certain threshold (33% if I recall correctly) and be excluded from any discovery search requirements.
‘Your call MAY be recorded or monitored for quality assurance’
It should have said:
‘Your call probably WON’T be recorded to avoid massive expense and possible legal disclosure’
Its obvious that those ‘no-no’ words were culled from reports wherein there was used before and in that context, “Corvair-Like” and “Brakes like an X-Car” are absolutely hilarious.
@Big Al–I agree that GM is too institutionalized but unfortunately that is what most big corporations and governments become. I do not entirely disagree with GM instructing those that drive its products to give a more accurate description of a problem than just to say this is a death trap or this has brakes like an X car. On the other hand the mere fact that we are reading about this is harmful to GM because of everything that has happened recently with GM. This has the appearance of a cover up by GM even if GM never intended it to be. “Damned if you do, and damned if you do not.” GM is going to have to become more transparent to gain back the trust of the public.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/jury-hyundai-owes-240m-in-punitive-damages/2014/05/15/fd27ce60-dbe5-11e3-a837-8835df6c12c4_story.html
This is why companies worry over these types of issues. I’m not a Big Corporation apologist, but when jurors can award a quarter of a BILLION dollars for an anccident that may have been caused by exploding fireworks and the company is not allowed to present mitigating evidence, corporations are forced to take an everyone is out to get me attitude, and plan accordingly.
Poor GM should find a Santeria priestess to reverse this curse.
It’s an internal document to advise staff how to communicate an “issue” (there, I said it) in an effective manner. Colourful language and speculation don’t describe what is happening.
Am I the only one entertained by the corny reference to the Michigan driver manual?
No .
-Nate
I have a LOT of problems with GM, but I have no problem with this. As an aircraft mechanic, vague write ups from the aircrew and pilots are the bane of my (our) existence. Specifics are mandated because they save many man-hours of troubleshooting time. And judging by the specifics of the bullets on the right I’m assuming this is referring to directives on describing problems to those whose job it is to fix them.
I work for a large corporation and we spend an inordinate amount of time focused on “word smithing” issue reports to most accurately capture the condition observed, the potential causes and potential consequences. There is great benefit in stating in quantifiable terms the ‘problem’ or the delta between what was expected to happen and what actually happened.
The alarming language used on the left makes decision makers very uneasy, which is probably a good thing in some cases. There is room for expressive or opinionated discussion but I do not see anything wrong with enforcing a policy that omits such language from formal issue reporting channels. A succinct description of the problem is probably all that they are being asked for, any implications that problem may have on safety are probably best left to formal analysis or investigation.
Coming from a heavily regulated industry where our formal issue reports are made public, it is very important to use words like ‘safe’ and ‘illegal’ carefully.
Personally, I’m of the belief that you should NEVER document ANYTHING in the first place.
Red Green once said, while building a custom trailer for a car, that he wanted to make sure that the trailer tongue was fastened onto the body of the unit very securely, because loose tongues had a way of getting guys like him in trouble.
GM is assuredly not alone.
Two different observations:
One, the PowerPoint is absolutely correct that problems can only be solved with precise detailed documentation of what actually happened, not by some emotional outburst. All of the people who “get” to drive evaluation vehicles are paid well for the privilege. Either it is a coveted off the assembly line job for an hourly worker, or a management perk. They are professionals and should report any issues professionally.
Two, my favorite Orwellism used by my former employer is “thermal event” for fire. That, of course, was the truly forbidden 4 letter F word.