GM Spotlights 'Future Leaders,' to Kudos - and Competitors
By Michelle Krebs September 15, 2008By Dale Buss
Sheila Jain Sarver, just promoted to vice president of engineering for GM of India, is one of General Motors' most promising executives in the whole world. Alain Visser, chief marketing officer of GM of Europe, also is considered an up-and-comer. And as a product manager who may know more about ethanol power than anyone else in the company, GM do Brasil's Henrique Pereira is becoming a more valuable player too.
But this isn't just inside dope. The whole world now knows GM's high opinion of these executives because -- among the many things the automaker has changed lately -- one of the most intriguing and even iconoclastic has to do with its people, not its cars.
As part of its centennial celebration that concludes this week, the automaker has designated Sarver, Visser, Pereira and about two dozen other executives and managers from throughout the company and around the world as the leading faces of a wide-ranging corporate self-tribute it called GMnext. AutoObserver will profile some of them in the coming days.
With backing from CEO Rick Wagoner on down, the company informally dubbed these people "future leaders," publicly identified them, and even encouraged them to talk with news media and other external constituencies.
"I'm excited about representing the company, especially when you look at all the other guys who had the same shot - and at higher levels than myself," said Henrique Pereira, a powertrain product manager and GM's leading flex-fuel specialist in GM do Brazil.
Also in Sao Paulo, Carlos Barba, GM's 54-year-old general director of design for Latin America, is pleased that "someone in the company is liking" his design work, he said, "and I'm liking myself."
Basis for Boasting
With plans for heavy participation by these future leaders in the worldwide GMnext climax is planned for Tuesday (Sept. 16) -- the hundredth anniversary of its founding date -- the company's initiative has amounted to a huge global brag about GM's bench strength. In that regard, it goes way beyond the other, much more conventional effort that GM recently hatched to mark its centennial: a TV advertising campaign aimed at the general public and featuring company rank-and-filers.
The designees "are strong leaders and, for their ages, are in jobs of great size and scope, running important pieces of our business, and they have relevance both internally and externally," said Andrea Ebbitt, director of human resources for GM's vehicle sales, service and marketing. "These are people who really are defining what is next for GM, in very broad positions that have huge responsibilities already. They're not just spokespeople."
Indeed, this has been a truly topsy-turvy act coming from a corporate giant traditionally so secretive that one of GM watchers' favorite pursuits has been the cloak-and-dagger game of trying to figure out when a junior manager has been designated a "high-pot" - for "high potential," of course.
"It is a bit of a change from our traditional culture, but it also is a change that will benefit our future," said Katy Barclay, GM's vice president of global human resources. "We want to showcase the people that work on [our] vehicles each day and are passionate about them."
Outside Plaudits
GM's move has drawn kudos from many who advise and study Fortune 500 management.
"It's great on a number of levels," said Herb Greenberg, CEO of Caliper, a top Princeton, N.J.-based management-consulting firm that, among other projects, currently is helping Johnson & Johnson with internal development of its future leaders. "It says to these members of GM, 'We care about you; you have a future here; and we're not looking for you just to stay at one place but for you to grow.'"
Besides, Greenberg added, "One of the accusations about the auto industry is that it's so closed; this says that GM is not. They're doing something new and innovative."
Designating some of its expected next generation of leaders also is a way for GM to attract outside talent by casting itself as a leadership factory like Johnson & Johnson and other management icons including General Electric, Procter & Gamble, PepsiCo and IBM.
"It's an interesting idea as a gimmick for showing GM has talent," said Dennis Zeleny, a consultant to Fortune 500 companies on executive development who also has headed human resources for Honeywell, Caremark and other companies. "They're not known for their management depth."
Ebbitt explained that "the talent that's out there and are looking for jobs are people we want to recruit. The employer-employee relationship is being completely redefined, and we all have to change how we go into that relationship."
Running Risks
Naturally, highlighting its potential superstars also creates interest inside the industry. So is this exercise really such a good idea in the long term for a company that obviously is hoping to retain all of these budding executives? It practically screams to competitors, "Here are some of our best people - now come and get 'em!"
"And if you're not on the list, and you're a talented person, you may be disappointed to the point of leaving," said Van Conway, who runs a turnaround business in Birmingham, Mich., mainly for automotive clients. "People in this industry are far more mobile than they used to be."
Moreover, the future leaders initiative has run the risk of confusing both internal and external observers about its true reach and significance. So GM executives have gone out of their way to say that, while there is purpose behind these selections, they're not necessarily anointed at this point as future top executives.
It's also clear that the list is far from a complete cross-section of GM's leadership a few years hence. Reflecting the focus of GMNext, for example, it is short on the finance, marketing and manufacturing types who have historically run GM. The roster also is heavy with folks whose lives or careers somehow have touched the United States, whether by birth, schooling or previous GM postings. And there are a number of people who have been directly mentored by current top executives such as Wagoner and Troy Clarke, president of GM North America and group vice president.
Curiously, there also is a concentration on the list of GMers born in Liverpool, England. Christopher Boroni-Bird, director of advanced technology vehicle concepts in the United States, was born there 43 years ago and used to live on Penny Lane, of Beatles fame. And 43-year-old Mike Devereux, GM's general director of corporate digital marketing, was born just 10 miles and a few months away and has "a dad who talked like Ringo Starr."
Open Company
And as dramatic a departure as the future leaders initiative is from the company's past, GM executives have portrayed it as a mere extension of how they've been revamping the culture since Wagoner became CEO in 2000.
"We've spent considerable time internally really focusing on our employees," Ebbitt said. "We're looking at what they're doing across the business and what's important to them."
The future leaders exercise also bears the stamp of Steve Harris. He retired as GM's public-relations vice president in 2004 and then returned to the same position, at Wagoner's invitation, in early 2006. Harris's "philosophy is one of getting out there and talking, otherwise someone else will," said David Cole, chairman of the Center for Automotive Research, an Ann Arbor, Mich., research concern.
So, for example, Wagoner now addresses more out-of-industry forums, such as the Consumer Electronics Show that is held annually in Las Vegas. And Vice Chairman Robert Lutz has become a cult personality on the Internet with his personal GM blog, where he freely expounds on future products such as the Chevrolet Volt extended-rang hybrid.
"They're becoming much more open about future things, whereas they used to hide things under a basket," said Cole, a lifetime observer of GM as son of Ed Cole, president of the company in the Sixties. "And I believe this is the correct approach."
Chance for Involvement
GMNext clearly has accelerated and highlighted whatever culture change already was underway. Among other things, as its centennial neared, GM chose to underscore its prospects rather than focus on Alfred Sloan and his brand-marketing genius, or the 1957 Chevrolet, or other aspects of the company's glorious and consequential past.
As a result, GMnext consistently has featured GM innovations and people in technology, design, and environmental arenas as well as those who represent the company's broad ideas and wide reach. And that's where executives targeted their search for future leaders.
"We just looked at the business and what we are doing in those areas and who are the people who are leading those areas," Ebbitt said. "Who would be relevant in the marketplace and interesting to their fellow employees?"
When GMnext was unveiled in January, nearly everyone on the list held a one- or two-hour online chat session for news media and other key outside audiences, joining Wagoner and other top GM executives in such an exercise. Many of the future leaders also have been involved in a variety of other GMnext activities including blogging, speaking at company conferences, and organizing centennial gatherings.
Rising to the Occasion
The GMnext designation already has significantly helped raise the profiles of a number of the future leaders.
When the list was revealed in January, for example, Sarver was still director of engineering and operations at GM's five-year-old technical center in Bangalore, India. From there, as part of GMnext, she held a two-hour chat session during the wee hours in North America one January evening. In April, she was one of three people asked to make a presentation to GM's global executive conference in Orlando about developing markets such as India, under the GMnext umbrella.
"There's not a lot of understanding in the company about what are emerging markets," said the 44-year-old Sarver. "The feedback I got was outstanding."
Sarver was promoted about that same time. And in part, she views her higher platform as a way to tap the managerial skills of Indian women for GM. "Our distribution of women is quite strong on the technical side, but I want to look for other ways to develop them," said the native Michigander born to parents of Indian descent. "Part of GMnext is really growing the diversity that we have globally, and that is the part of my job that I enjoy the most."
After just three years with GM, as head of Opel marketing, Ford émigré Visser was named CMO of GM of Europe late last fall. The GMnext designation came soon after, and he's not being ginger about any of its implications.
"It was a great thing to hear, to be put on a platform where you've been clearly identified as someone who will take on a higher level of responsibility in the future," said the Belgium-born Visser, who is 44 years old. "My ambition is to continue to grow in this business outside of Europe."
Internal Stars
In the meantime, Visser already has succeeded in overseeing the biggest GMnext celebration to date: GM of Europe's two-day meeting in Cologne, Germany, in May, that drew 6,500 people, mostly GM dealers from across the continent, as well as Wagoner and many other GM top executives. "We wanted to show dealers our strategy," explained Visser, who is based at regional headquaters in Russelsheim, Germany. "We went through our plans for the future brand by brand and included some pretty confidential reveals and disclosures about future products."
The GMnext event in Cologne also highlighted another future leader, Anthony Lo. The 43-year-old director of advanced design for GM Europe made a presentation to the main audience and then was called upon to "mingle with dealers and explain our new products," said Lo, who is based in Russelsheim as well. "Sometimes dealers have very special customer feedback that can influence our work."
Since she was named a future leader in January, Maryann Combs has gotten multiple invitations to mentor GM managers around the world who "want to talk about the future and their role in it, and my development experience and how it could be of benefit to them," said the 43-year-old president of GM's Pan Asia Technical Center in Shanghai. That included an invitation from a group of young engineers in Warren, Mich., to talk with them via teleconference over their lunch hour - and her midnight.
Human Capital
The future leaders initiative and everything associated with GMnext is just one aspect, of course, of how GM is trying to combat a "talent squeeze" that persists in the auto industry, Ebbitt said, despite a North American and, increasingly, global downturn.
"We've got an aging organization, and we've got concerns about future attrition both in the United States and globally," she explained. Moreoever, GM's association with the decrepit Michigan economy is a turn-off to many potential employees.
"We also are concerned about our position and presence in emerging markets where they may not be so familiar with GM or the auto industry as a whole," Ebbitt said. "It's a new generation of people out there looking for jobs. GM really is a cool ... global company where someone can expand and take on new jobs but stay within the same company."
Barclay agreed that GM is "call[ing] out the great work that these people do, not only to boost morale, but also to show potential job candidates that GM recognizes the contributions from each of its employees."
For some future leaders, however, the designation has been a mixed blessing. "Some exposure slows you down," said Micky Bly, GM's director of hybrid vehicle integration and controls, his first executive assignment. Already under tremendous pressure to help the company turn out a new hybrid every three months, Bly has found that GMNext activities mean "there are a lot more interviews to do and a lot more corporate responsibility to worry about."
Envy Factor
Human-resources experts said that GM also risks rubbing valuable non-designees the wrong way. "For everyone you anoint, you have the possibility of disaffecting or alienating 100 or 200 or 300 other people," said Zeleny. "And nobody's going to want to cross [those designated]; everyone is going to want to be deferential to them. So if four people are thinking the design of this car should be a certain way, or marketed a certain way, and the anointed one says something, people will be less than candid."
"People inside the organization competing with them for jobs or who feel passed over may be disaffected. They may think about leaving. They may just demonstrate less candor."
Visser confirmed that being put on a platform can invite spitballs. "Almost by definition there's going to be some level of jealousy - sometimes it's demonstrated, and sometimes it's not," said the GM of Europe CMO. "But that's human, and its part of my job to live with that."
And Ebbitt insisted that a more common reaction inside GM has been that "our employees are well pleased to see representatives from different aspects of the company, and in different functions and regions, representing them - and that it's not just the top leaders of the company getting the message out."
Borroni-Bird confirmed that view. "It's important internally," said the future leader who works out of the GM Technical Center in Warren. "It allows me to be more visible so that [other GMers] know what our group is doing and can more easily contact us."
It's an Honor
And while Zeleny noted that the acknowledgment "is a great thing to put on a resume," GM's Barclay downplayed that aspect. "The opportunity to highlight and reward these individuals outweighs any risk and is giving our employees every opportunity to grow within the company and advance their own careers," she said. Top management, Barclay concluded, is "excited to let these employees be the 'new face' of the company."
Ebbitt added that GM made a calculated decision to expose top management's high opinion of the future leaders and wasn't "overly concerned that these folks are going to leave us tomorrow." They're "all in challenging jobs," she noted, "and they're in challenges they want. So we'll keep them."
Cole agreed, noting that despite GM's very recent struggles with the U.S. market and further downsizing, "morale and esprit de corps has improved dramatically over the last few years."
Greenberg, of Caliper, also said that such concerns are overblown. "People in the industry certainly know the fast-track people in their industry, and if they're going to steal, they're going to steal," he said.
"If anything, rather than expose these people to theft, it brings on one kind - or maybe the best kind - of golden handcuffs. They think, 'Hey, I've got a future here, and they're investing a lot of money in me and letting the world know that I'm a fast-tracker.'"
GM FUTURE LEADERS LIST
Bob Babik, director, vehicle emissions issues, Detroit, USA
Carlos Barba, general director, LAAM design, Sao Paulo, Brazil
Ray Bierzynski, GMAP vice president engineering, executive director GM China engineering, Shanghai, China
Micky Bly, director, hybrid vehicle integration and controls, Detroit, USA
Christopher Borroni-Bird, director, advanced technology vehicle concepts, Warren Tech Center, Detroit, USA
David Chen, general manager, GM Beijing operations, Beijing, China
Steve Clarke, vice president, technical center, GM Daewoo, Incheon, China
Maryann Combs, president, Pan Asia Technical Automotive Center, Shanghai, China
Mike Devereux, general director, corporate digital marketing and CRM, Detroit, USA
Rita Forst, executive director, product engineering, GM powertrain Europe, Turin, Italy
Bernardo Garcia, corporate social responsibility manager, GM Argentina, Buenos Aires, Argentina
Malcolm Gauld, vice president, sales and marketing, GMSA, Johannesburg, South Africa
Jeffrey Kimpan, vice president, human resources GM Asia Pacific, Shanghai, China
Anthony Lo, director advanced design, GM Europe design, Russelsheim, Germany
Pedro Manuchakian, LAAM vice president, product engineering, Sao Paulo, Brazil
Pyongwan Park, managing director, powertrain engineering, GM Daewoo Technical Center, Incheon, Korea
Ken Parkinson, vice president design, GM Asia-Pacific, Shanghai, China
Henrique Pereira, product manager / GM powertrain, flex fuel specialist, Sao Paulo, Brazil
Sheila Jain Sarver, director of engineering, GM of India, Bangalore, India
Frank Saucedo, director, design for GM Advance Concepts, California Design Studio, California, USA
Richard Scheer, director, design center, GM Daewoo, Incheon, Korea
Gary Smyth, director, powertrain systems research laboratory, GM R&D, Detroit, USA
Antony Stolfo, design director, GM Holden design - GM global rear wheel drive architecture, Port Melbourne, Australia
David Tulauskas, director of public policy, GM Asia-Pacific, Shanghai, China
Kevin Wale, president and managing director, GM China Group, Shanghai, China
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