Why General Motors Fell...

The latest issue of Fortune Magazine is well worth buying to read the excellent article by Alex Taylor, "GM - Death of An American Dream: How General Motors got it wrong for so long. A corporate memoir." Below you will find a couple of brief excerpts from the article and, yes, Taylor describes the shock among reporters "on the day in October 1999 when GM revealed the Pontiac Aztek... for the first time." The oh-so-beautiful and practical Aztek. (Enough said on that subject.)

On the positive side, Taylor provides some hope that bankruptcy will enable GM to continue to survive and perhaps to even return leaner and meaner.

Excerpts:

In working for the largest company in the industry for so long, they became comfortable, insular, self-referential, and too wedded to the status quo - traits that persist even now, when GM is on the precipice. They prefer stability over conflict, continuity over disorder, and GM's way over anybody else's. They believe that hard work will overcome adversity, and that tomorrow will be better than today - despite four decades of evidence to the contrary. In many ways the story of General Motors since the 1960s is a tale of accelerating irrelevance. Customer preferences changed, competition tightened, technology made big leaps, and GM was always driving a lap behind. It became a red-state company, its Buicks and Pontiacs seldom seen in California or New York City.

Ask Rick Wagoner why GM isn't more like Toyota, and he'd tell you, "We're playing our own game - taking advantage of our own unique heritage and strengths." Turns out GM should have forgotten that and become more like Toyota. Toyota's market cap is now $103.6 billion.

... You have to wonder whether the insular, self-absorbed culture that still dominates GM is up to the job of restructuring the company quickly enough to make it profitable and competitive again. ... As painful as bankruptcy will be, it would give GM the leverage it needs to redo its labor contracts and dealer franchise agreements, downsize the company, recruit new management, and position itself for an economic upturn... that would enable it to regain some fraction of its former glory.