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http://finance.yahoo.com/news/GM-board-looks-to-the-outside-apf-819595520.html?x=0&sec=topStories&pos=8&asset=&ccode=


Excerpt from the above recent article:

"GM has to find someone who is financially secure and not looking for a quick payoff, said Gerald Meyers, a former chairman of American Motors Corp. who now teaches at the University of Michigan. They also have to understand autos, something that the current board now lacks, Meyers said."

PAY CLOSE ATTENTION to the last sentence in the above quote.
It took a real genius to figure that one out, eh???

It will be interesting to see if GM picks a Chrysler refugee for the job. Gufwah ha hah ha ha ha. */

Thanks Guscha. I fixed the link in my first post with your help.

It's hard to believe there is so little executive talent in America today, and at such high prices.

Maybe it's because the business climate has changed. It's not so much that they are greedy short sighted fools, more like that's the kind of behavior that pays big under today's laws.

Lee Iaccoca was the last "hero" auto executive. But if you compare him to Ford, Chrysler, Nash, Durant, and Sloan you will come to the conclusion that in their days, he would have made a good office boy.

As my father was a Service Manager in a GM store for over 25 years, I grew up around a lot of GM products and have plenty of fond memories of them - up to a point.

However, it just sickens me how GM has squandered its past success over the past three decades, with so much lackluster styling and too many bad product decisions. There's been too much skimming the cream in the marketplace with too many executives who take the money and run. I don't see where anything has changed in that regard with the new GM.

Six months ago, I felt that the only GM brands to survive this mess would be Chevrolet, Cadillac and a single truck brand. Now, we'll be lucky if Chevrolet and Chevy Truck can escape the grip of the growing black hole that is GM.

I still love GM cars of the past, but GM couldn't care less about those cars - except to collect licensing fees from third parties who make the parts.

Meanwhile, don't let the new name Ally Bank fool you; that's just a new mask for the same old GMAC, which recently went back to the gubbamint asking for a THIRD handout.

Caveat emptor!

BH. Many thanks for the tip on Ally Bank. I was not aware of that.

Rusty: If it hadn't been for Durant and his mishandling of GM twice. I just wonder if there would have been a Chrysler Corp or AMC. It Durant had done things right you would have never known who Alfred Sloan was.

Lee Iaccoca to me was nothing more than a bag of hot air that came across good in public. If it were not for people like Bob Lutz and a few hard working other persons Chrysler would have gone under long ago.

John F. Shireman

Iacocca was very good at understanding the corporate structure, then working around it, something that is lacking today. He brought a lot of talent into Chrysler from Ford and fixed a lot of endemic problems there. I don't know that he would have all the answers today.
GM got rid of Fritz, he was too Detroit, too inside, I just don't think the person exsists that they are looking for.
When this current economic climate ends and we get another buying cycle (same thing happened in 1981-4, no one wanted to buy a car because of the economy, eventually things improved slightly, all of the exsisting cars got long in the tooth, needing expensive repairs, and 1985-90 was great) all bets will be off, old loyalties will be gone and it will be a new day. I think the Korean brands stand to gain a lot of market share, and Volkswagen will continue their increase in share.

Quote: Totally agree. It is amazing that a few yrs ago, Korean cars were almost, if not dead last in reliability, features, just about everything and today they have come to have as good a ratings as any and lots better than some of the stellar brands of just a short time ago. Believe most of the better rated ones are even assembled in US yet still maintain a price advantage over other Asian or Mexican assembled imports.

THe 'Big 3' lost their way due to their own stupidity. It started with the so-called energy crisis of the mid 70's. The energy crisis was actualy orchestrated by the 'Big 3' in an attempt to sell the public 1/2 the car at the same price of a big car. This same strategy applies to emmissions, fuel economy etc. Strictly a gimmick to sell the public catalytic converters, ECM's, acid rain protection etc etc.

But what happened is that the buying public lost their sense of automotive adventure and prestige of ownership to causes designed to 'save the world'.

Case in point: Betwenn 1955 and 1975 it was nearly impossible to give away a good low mileage 3 or 4 year old 6 cyl 3spd chevy,ford or plymouth. Such abortions like Simca, Renault, Pugeot and the like were nearly considered poverty. America was in love with V8's, 4 speeds, 4 bbls and bucket seats. THAT IS WHAT made the auto companies so wealthy during the post war era.
So the Big-3's attempt to offer 1/2 the car at the same price in the name of economy ruined the public demand that the Big-3 had worked so hard to develope.

Basically, the Big-3 cut their own throat.

PackardV8 -

I generally agree with what you're saying, but remember that Big Oil is equally complicit (and no doubt in cahoots with the Big Three) in that scenario.

Getting back to the automakers, one of GM's longstanding strengths was their high level of vertical integration and the intelligent use of shared components between different platforms and brands, while designing a skin and complement of equipment that built and maintained brand identity and loyalty. Yet, too much of a good thing can be bad, and they prostituted Sloan's vision of excellence.


While GM headed down the garden path, Iaccoca masterfully assembled and conducted a team to bring Chrysler back form the brink by following a similar strategy, though he relied a lot more on outside suppliers, initially. While the new K-car platform would yield a lot of models for buyers to choose from, but they clung to too many old platforms for truck and RWD car lines masquerading as all-new models. Getting deeper in bed with MMC didn't help matters, either. I believe it was extensive cost-cutting measures introduced in production during the 1990s that kept them afloat, but that stuff only goes so far. Chrysler fell into the same ditch that GM had plowed - with extensive brand/model mismanagement.

I've worked for GM (twice in my life) at the retail level and Chrysler at the Zone level, but won't shed a sympathetic tear for either.