Inside GM: "Too Little, Too Late"

I’ve started to get emails from more ex-GM employees. Here’s one, with details omitted to protect the correspondent’s identity… “I’ve worked for GM nearly 9 years. No barfing in the toilets that I saw (at least when they weren’t closed for cleaning during the day–you know, after they did away with nightly maintenance to cut costs). But I did break down in tears in the parking deck. This was after fighting for 3 years to get a lateral move that was necessary for career development, getting resisted by management who told me I had to find own my replacement, only to have my director (a long-timer, my-way-or-the-highway type) move me to a completely different group during the 2006 layoff/reorg without bothering to ask me first. Fortunately I did pick up skills to qualify me for my current job. But too little, too late — that’s essentially been GM’s problem for the last 30 years, in fact.

During my whole time there I remember a constant pressure to reduce costs–benefits cuts, services cuts, fired contract help. I remember the FUD really getting strong in early 2006, when layoff rumors were running rampant. After the bloodletting and reorg, it died down some, although everyone was working 2-3 times as hard and all the managers were working OT and 7-day weeks.

The people who were most pleasant to work with (and most productive) were the 3D contract designers–one of them ran the coffee station and raised money for Iraqi troops and organized potlucks and stuff. But my area never did anything fun like that because we had only 1 admin and she was overwhelmed taking care of several executive directors–no Christmas potluck or anything.

I was in XXXX during my last year, which had a healthier culture than XXXX. Not as much FUD there, although there definitely was some present. When I left earlier this year, my director announced that I would not be replaced. They wanted to distribute my work amongst the other engineers, but they protested enough for my manager to declare that the efforts for my programs would be put on hold. I’m guessing that the FUD ramped up from that point on.

GM screwed up by being the grasshopper instead of the ants in the summer, and now it’s winter. I don’t want my new company to make that mistake, so I’m going to push for cost-cutting innovations.

I am rooting for the bailout loans to fail at this point, at least for GM. It needs to go C11 and reinvent itself. It will suck, but it’s going to suck anyway, and with C11 at least GM has a chance or surviving as GM.