Saving the US Auto Industry

[Pico and ME]

Originally Posted by Shawnee123

If you got time to lean
You got time to clean. :p


Just a little tongue in cheek. My guess is if it's that dire then yes, they would go home. But as tw pointed out, running out of parts does not happen there as you say it does at GM (a lot) so running out of parts a lot is part of the bigger problem as well.

Actually I don't know about GM. I know Chrysler. Well my husband does. There have been times when work stopped and they asked for volunteers to go home. Many do, but some stay...usually my husband is one of them and they usually give him a sweeping job if there isn't anything available on another line. But sometimes a line might be waiting on parts from another line and there is nothing to do while they wait. So they might play cards or do crossword puzzles or something. I work at Lowe's and I see a lot of the employees taking extra breaks or just hanging out with each other and talking. Its not that there isn't anything to do (they can always straighten shelves) its just that there aren't any pressing projects or maybe a lull in customers...so they goof off. Down time happens everywhere.

[tw]

Originally Posted by Brianna

why does tw hate MBA's?

Because they are educated in concepts that we also know as communism. Because they are told to be the 'decision maker' when they have no idea how the work gets done.

How many examples would you like? Denny's destroyed when bean counters in TW Industries started destroying the company.

IBM had to fire 100,000 people before they finally identified the bean counters (Akers and Cannavino) as the only reasons for failure. The near destruction of Macy's when bean counters ordered inside purchasing agents what to buy.

Sears and Kmart who continue to die due to top management.

The Challenger - when every engineer said it was not safe to launch. Not one single engineer could be found to say it was safe to launch. So MBA types said the engineers could not vote and then murdered seven astronauts. Columbia - another seven astronauts murdered for the same reasons.

US Coast Guard that has now spent maybe $1billion on ships that are dangerous to use or that cannot perform the functions intended.

Unisys - the power of two when Blumenthal - a classic MBA - said that uniting Burroughs and Sperry would create economies of scale. Therefore the stock went from $60 per share to $2. The power of two because an MBA stifled innovation to honor the myth taught to MBAs - economy of scale.

HP - had to be rescued when another dumb bimbo names Fiorina also preached economies of scale by wasting $millions on Compaq. Stock dropped from $60 per share to $10. Fortunately, the BoDs were patriotic American enough to finally push Fiorina out the door before HP was driven to bankruptcy. Mark Hurd simply rescued innovation. The stock is now maybe $30 per share.

HP - when another MBA wasted so much money to buy Apollo Computer when it looked good on spread sheets BUT contained no innovation.

Microsoft - Ballmer is an MBA like the Vice Principle in school. He is necessary to the school's function as a disciplinarian. But typically is not principle (leader) material. Ballmer cannot innovate which is why his solutions is a big bucks purchase of Yahoo! rather than to develop new markets.

The various CEOs of AT&T who destroyed the one of this nation's largest companies by stifling innovation and then even wasting $150billiion on cable companies that could not do what AT&T needed. AT&T eventually sold those assets to Comcast for maybe $70billion because AT&T to management were only MBAs - cost controllers - stiflers of innovation - communists who will only destroy wealth, jobs, and the American standards of living.

AT&T is a classic example of what MBAs do - from stifling Unix, wasting money on some of the silliest PCs, refusing repeatedly to get into the internet (see Isenberg's paper on the "Dumb Network" - so they had to drive Isenberg from the Bell Labs). BTW, who owns the Bell Labs? The French. AT&T MBAs so impeded innovation that even the Bell Labs had to be sold to foreigners.

RCA who even had CMOS microprocessors about 1970 but could not sell them because management would not even let them create development systems for the product. Intel eventually started using CMOS in their microprocessors about 10 years later.

Bradshaw was so dumb - an MBA - that he all but gave away RCA to GE. Once Jack Welsh has offered Bradshaw a (rumored) $million bonus to make the sale, Bradshaw went for his personal wealth. That is what MBAs do - screw everyone else. RCA was sold to GE so cheaply that Welsh sold off RCA's other assets, and got the NBC TV network for free.

VCR was developed by whom? Japanese? Of course not. Japan only made all the VCRs. VCR was developed by Ampex Corp in California. As soon as Morita offered to buy the patents, the MBA of Ampex quickly sold out. There alone were 1 million American jobs that were instead given to the Japanese. An MBA can only see profits - has near zero concept of value because he is trained in the business schools. Ampex gave away the future because their MBA executive saw a personal big bonus in his paycheck that year.

But the most stunning example of what MBAs do is the 1970s recession. Business schools routinely instituted costs controls. Japanese used 1950's W E Deming - the enemy of business schools. Therefore Americans were fired - lost jobs - to innovative 1970s Japanese industries. Innovative? A large number if not most of those innovations were developed in America and stifled because top American executives were graduates of the business schools - did not come from where the work gets done - had no dirt under their fingernails - could not see an innovation even if it was stuffed up their nose. Sound like a crack addict? Well MBAs so routinely made dumb decisions that converting them to crack addicts may even make America more productive.

How's that for the short answer. Communism. If your roof is leaking, then you will fix it. But in a communist company such as GM, the roof is not leaking until Rick Wagoner says it is. After all, only MBAs are trained to make decisions.

[tw]

Originally Posted by Pico and ME

Its not that there isn't anything to do (they can always straighten shelves) its just that there aren't any pressing projects or maybe a lull in customers...so they goof off. Down time happens everywhere.

Read "The Goal" by Eliyahu Goldratt and Jeff Cox. Appreciate a concept taught in school science class.

Your observations without first learning underlying concepts provide no knowledge - only myths. To appreciate a deeper meaning - the reality behind your observations - read that book. To know something, one must have both experimental evidence (your observations) AND a basic grasp of the underlying concepts (what results in a hypothesis). Without both, then urban myths are generated using assumptions and speculation. Story in that book explains or demonstrates the underlying concepts that you may not yet understand.

[Pico and ME]

omg

[Clodfobble]

Originally Posted by tw

Ballmer is an MBA like the Vice Principle in school. He is necessary to the school's function as a disciplinarian. But typically is not principle (leader) material.

Huh. What an odd, yet completely appropriate analogy. I'd almost forgotten about the role of the Vice Principal, and I'm a much more recent high school graduate than you are, tw.

I think maybe tw taught high school classes, at some point. Eh?

[lookout123]

I can't imagine TW ever having had any experience in a decision make capacity. People who exist in tight little boxes as he seems to rarely ever move into positions of authority because they are too busy identifying problems to actually get around to doing anything.

[ZenGum]

Those poor kids!

[tw]

Originally Posted by Clodfobble

Huh. What an odd, yet completely appropriate analogy. I'd almost forgotten about the role of the Vice Principal, and I'm a much more recent high school graduate than you are, tw.

They were known as the 'emBallmer' and 'Pearly Gates'. It was a teams that easily manipulated IBM executives (ie Cannavino) who did not know how computers worked anyway.

[tw]

From Dana Milbank of the Washington Post on 20 Nov 2008:

Auto Execs Fly Corporate Jets to D.C., Tin Cups in Hand
There are 24 daily nonstop flights from Detroit to the Washington area. Richard Wagoner, Alan Mulally and Robert Nardelli probably should have taken one of them.

Instead, the chief executives of the Big Three automakers opted to fly their company jets to the capital for their hearings this week before the Senate and House -- an ill-timed display of corporate excess for a trio of executives begging for an additional $25 billion from the public trough this week.

"There's a delicious irony in seeing private luxury jets flying into Washington, D.C., and people coming off of them with tin cups in their hands," Rep. Gary L. Ackerman (D-N.Y.) advised the pampered executives at a hearing yesterday. "It's almost like seeing a guy show up at the soup kitchen in high-hat and tuxedo. . . . I mean, couldn't you all have downgraded to first class or jet-pooled or something to get here?"

The Big Three said nothing, which prompted Rep. Brad Sherman (D-Calif.) to rub it in. "I'm going to ask the three executives here to raise their hand if they flew here commercial," he said. All still at the witness table. "Second," he continued, "I'm going ask you to raise your hand if you're planning to sell your jet . . . and fly back commercial." More stillness. "Let the record show no hands went up," Sherman grandstanded.

That these automakers are trying to be frugal or restructuring - another glaring symptoms that says no. Without bankruptcy, no automaker is willing to make serious and extremely difficult choices ... such as flying on a commercial airplane.

[Trilby]

Wait. Denny's went under?

[Pico and ME]

Originally Posted by tw

From Dana Milbank of the Washington Post on 20 Nov 2008: That these automakers are trying to be frugal or restructuring - another glaring symptoms that says no. Without bankruptcy, no automaker is willing to make serious and extremely difficult choices ... such as flying on a commercial airplane.

This whole thing makes me wonder whether there will be another French Revolution type uprising if the huge job losses do happen.

Oh, and TW...Im not really responding to you here...so if you feel the urge to insult my intelligence again...please dont.

[xoxoxoBruce]

Originally Posted by Pico and ME

Oh, and TW...Im not really responding to you here...so if you feel the urge to insult my intelligence again...please dont.

Fugetaboutit, he's in asshole mode.

[ZenGum]

mode????


ETA: That was a bit unfair. Let me add

[Shawnee123]

Originally Posted by Pico and ME

Actually I don't know about GM. I know Chrysler. Well my husband does. There have been times when work stopped and they asked for volunteers to go home. Many do, but some stay...usually my husband is one of them and they usually give him a sweeping job if there isn't anything available on another line. But sometimes a line might be waiting on parts from another line and there is nothing to do while they wait. So they might play cards or do crossword puzzles or something. I work at Lowe's and I see a lot of the employees taking extra breaks or just hanging out with each other and talking. Its not that there isn't anything to do (they can always straighten shelves) its just that there aren't any pressing projects or maybe a lull in customers...so they goof off. Down time happens everywhere.

I see your point Pico. I broke it down into very simplistic terms, saying "this happens and it shouldn't" but I do understand there are other circumstances. I can't say that in an office we don't occasionally step away and chat.

Some of us come to the Cellar! Not me...

I really hope that things work out for the best for the employees and their families, and for our country. I have no idea what is best!

[classicman]

Kudos to Sherman!