General Motors failure ‘Darwinian’?
Adapt and evolve… or die
Economics and Darwinism have a lot in common.
The Nurse has been keeping a weather eye on General Motors for a few years now – ensconced in clink at Her Majesty’s Pleasure - and she isn’t surprised they’ve gone belly up.
Over the past decade GM resisted positive change on a spectacular scale. While many Americans turned to smaller, fuel-efficient vehicles, GM continued to focus on gas guzzling monsters. Perhaps they were too big to change quickly enough. Or too arrogant. Or too inflexible. Or too short sighted.
Whatever the reasons, this is a sad day. The death of GM presents a salutory tale. To survive and thrive in the long term - just like living creatures - businesses need to stay lean, nimble and flexible. Or risk extinction.
David from Sunglasses wrote,
I’m an American, and it’s true that it is a very sad day for many of the GM dealers, and a sad day for the American tradition too. However, I think that there was plenty of time and opportunity for GM to change, to adapt and to make sacrifices. If you compare the CEO’s salaries from GM to the salaries of the CEO’s of Toyota, you’ll see a tremendous difference. Along with the unions that ended up doing more harm than good…
Still, I am sad for the many livelihoods that have and will be lost because of all the auto industries turmoil.
Link | June 9th, 2009 at 11:21 pm
Think Free wrote,
Sad that we gave them so many billions of dollars and they STILL went bankrupt. But what did they expect? Their cars have ben sub-par in almost every way to Honda, Toyota, Mazda, the big foreign makers, for years.
Link | June 11th, 2009 at 6:25 am
Steve Orris wrote,
I’ve seen a GM factory from the inside. The money they waste is mind blowing. They will spend thousands of dollars to make the job a little easier or a little safer for just one or two employees. I’m all for safety, but a little common sense goes a long way. The UAW is also to blame. People should be paid well for the jobs they do. But comparatively speaking a minimum wage worker at a fast food place works much harder than many $20/hour factory workers.
Link | June 26th, 2009 at 7:58 pm
Jim from Scrap Car Croydon wrote,
I think it is ridiculous that western car manufacturers such as General Motors has been propped up by governments for so long. They’ve clearly become uncompetitive and bureaucratic as a result. The free market should have been allowed to run its course.
Link | September 14th, 2009 at 4:52 pm