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Omaha Steve

(99,073 posts)
Tue Jun 3, 2014, 03:31 PM Jun 2014

Before recalls, safety was low in GM hierarchy

Source: AP-Excite

By TOM KRISHER

DETROIT (AP) — To understand how General Motors allowed a problem with a small part to balloon into a crisis, look at the organization chart.

As of early last year, the director of vehicle safety was four rungs down the ladder from the CEO, according to a copy of the chart obtained by The Associated Press. Finance, sales and public relations had a direct path to the top.

"What's a higher priority than product safety?" asks Yale University management and law professor Jonathan Macey, author of a book on corporate governance. "The organization chart does obviously reflect a company's priorities."

That structure — as well as what new CEO Mary Barra has called a culture that valued cost savings over safety — is likely to be a prime target in a report expected this week from former U.S. Attorney Anton Valukas. He was hired by GM to investigate why the company took more than a decade to recall millions of cars with a defective ignition switch that has now been linked to at least 13 deaths.

FULL story at link.



Read more: http://apnews.excite.com/article/20140603/us-general-motors-bureaucracy-42fce8e946.html



GM will end up paying for this. Why doesn't that happen to bankers etc? Some non-Berghdal news 4 a change.



FILE - In this April 20, 2010 file photo, former U.S. Attorney Anton R. Valukas testifies before the House Financial Services Committee regarding Lehman Brothers and financial reform on Capitol Hill in Washington. Valukas was hired to investigate why it took GM more than a decade to recall 2.6 million cars with an ignition switch defect that the company ties to 13 deaths. AP Photo/Charles Dharapak, File)
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Before recalls, safety was low in GM hierarchy (Original Post) Omaha Steve Jun 2014 OP
Could be worse jakeXT Jun 2014 #1
this sounds familiar! and it's actually why studing an institution's culture and structure MisterP Jun 2014 #2
There were three great revelations... CanSocDem Jun 2014 #3

jakeXT

(10,575 posts)
1. Could be worse
Tue Jun 3, 2014, 03:43 PM
Jun 2014
Exclusive: At least 74 dead in crashes similar to those GM linked to faulty switches

(Reuters) - At least 74 people have died in General Motors cars in accidents with some key similarities to those that GM has linked to 13 deaths involving defective ignition switches, a Reuters analysis of government fatal-crash data has determined. Such accidents also occurred at a higher rate in the GM cars than in top competitors’ models, the analysis showed.

Reuters searched the Fatality Analysis Reporting System (FARS), a national database of crash information submitted by local law-enforcement agencies, for single-car frontal collisions where no front air bags deployed and the driver or front-seat passenger was killed.

The news agency compared the incidence of this kind of deadly accident in the Chevrolet Cobalt and the Saturn Ion, the highest-profile cars in GM's recall of 2.6 million cars with defective switches, against the records of three popular small-car competitors: Ford Focus, Honda Civic and Toyota Corolla.

The analysis found that the frequency of such accidents in the Ion was nearly six times that of the Corolla and twice that of the Focus. The Ion had 5.9 such fatal crashes per 100,000 cars sold, followed by the Cobalt, with 4.1, the Ford Focus with 2.9, the Civic with 1.6, and the Corolla with 1.0.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/06/03/us-gm-recall-idUSKBN0EE01920140603

MisterP

(23,730 posts)
2. this sounds familiar! and it's actually why studing an institution's culture and structure
Tue Jun 3, 2014, 04:18 PM
Jun 2014

are so important: they're NOT the sum of their parts, and can basically have tacit ideas or preferred outcomes that NONE of the members holds

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roger_Boisjoly

 

CanSocDem

(3,286 posts)
3. There were three great revelations...
Tue Jun 3, 2014, 05:19 PM
Jun 2014


...about the "culture" of GM in my lifetime and it looks like we still don't get it.

Unsafe At Any Speed gave us a good look at how GM ignored the unsafe technology of the Corvair which led to Consumer Rights Laws and a wide variety of consumer protection regulations.

And then, in the 80's there was On a Clear Day You Can See General Motors which was like an expose' on the sophomoric management style of GM.

And who can forget about Roger and Me.

DAMN those messengers!!!


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