Sarah Henderson Defends Fritz on Facebook

Apparently, Fritz Henderson's daughter has spelled out on Facebook exactly what went down at G.M. regarding her dad's ouster using colorful language that many Flintoids are quite familiar with. (It's similar to the language you might use after your Chevette broke down for the fifth time on a cold winter morning on Dort Highway.) I can't really repeat what she wrote here, but go to Jalopnik to get the details.

Fritz Henderson Feedback

Readers respond to the news that Fritz Henderson is no longer running G.M.

JWilly writes:

It's hard to tell how much significance should be given to the "car guys vs. money managers" and "knows the culture and can get stuff done vs. can see the flaws in the culture and force changes" arguments. When the bankers took over from Billy Durant the second time, the money guy they put in charge turned out to be a quick study as a car guy, and became a visionary leader. GM's worst decades were helmed by internally developed money guys who were blind to their strategic death spiral. Ford's Alan Mullally, totally from the outside and knowing nothing about cars, has been brilliant at recognizing the fine distinctions between what works and what doesn't, and turning around their equally broken culture.

On the other hand, it's pretty scary that Ed Whittaker seems to be proud of not knowing anything about cars, or why people buy them, and is backed by a Board that is equally know-nothing except about finance.

From news reports, the specific fault leading to Fritz's firing was the failure to make lots of money selling Opel, Saturn and SAAB. There doesn't seem to be a second half to the story, in which it's explained why it's Fritz's fault that Renault came to its senses regarding Saturn's prospects, no one wants the SAAB carcass, and Opel obviously has been GM's engineering center for mid-sized sedans for the past decade.

Whittaker seems to have been just waiting for an excuse to take over himself. He's a super-sized-ego kind of guy, with a track record heavily influenced by luck in my opinion. Well, now we get to roll the dice with our whole stake bet on him.

Rich Frost writes:

I hate to bring up money, but since American taxpayers pretty much own the company -- how much is Fritz going to be collecting now that he has left this flaming turd known as GM? I only ask this because it seems like the CEOs from all of these bailout companies profit handsomely from all of these failures and the people paying the bills (i.e., the American taxpayer) usually ends up getting screwed.

G.M. Board Tells Fritz Goodbye

The "Tell Fritz" webpage — an empty PR gesture that G.M. trotted out after bankruptcy to show that CEO Fritz Henderson was in touch with consumers — was good for something. Bill Vlasic of The New York Times used it in the lead of today's story on Henderson getting canned:

As part of his bid to make General Motors management appear more accessible and responsive coming out of bankruptcy, the chief executive, Fritz Henderson, set up a Web page called Tell Fritz.

One consumer sent in a question last month asking why G.M. had fared so poorly in a recent Consumer Reports survey.

“We were generally disappointed in our results,” Mr. Henderson responded. “We simply must produce better results.”

On Tuesday, the new G.M. board agreed emphatically with Mr. Henderson’s assessment, and asked him to resign immediately.

Is it just me, or does Fritz Henderson look a little like Charles Foster Kane?

Tell Fritz!

Reading The New York Times story on G.M.'s emergence from bankruptcy, two seemingly minor paragraphs jumped out at me:

1. "[CEO Fritz] Henderson announced several new ways that G.M. planned to reach out to customers through the Internet. A Web site called 'Tell Fritz' will let consumers offer suggestions directly to Mr. Henderson, and the company will experiment with selling vehicles through the online auction site, eBay."

Thanks for the empty P.R. gesture, G.M. Do you think potential customers really believe Fritz will take regular breaks from saving a corporation on the brink of extinction to peruse random email suggestions? This reveals a lot about how G.M. regards the public. At best, the company is out of touch with its customer base. At worse, the G.M. executives think we're all a bunch of idiots.

2. "Robert A. Lutz, a G.M. vice chairman who planned to retire at the end of the year, will stay to oversee marketing and communications. Mr. Lutz, 77, is responsible for the improvements that G.M. has made in vehicle design recently, with notable examples such as the Chevrolet Malibu and the newly revived Chevrolet Camaro."

Do you really want a 77-year old, regardless of his management skills, in charge of marketing a company that is notoriously alienated from the younger demographic?

UPDATE: Anyone remember Chrysler's ill-fated "Ask Dr. Z"?