GM's Whitacre Web Chats With Media, Keeps It Light
By Michelle Krebs December 8, 2009General Motors Co. chairman and interim CEO Ed Whitacre conducted a Web chat with 
automotive media Tuesday and the most that can be said is he obviously takes seriously the light connotation behind the term "chat." Although fielding several questions, Whitacre industriously said almost nothing of substance.
The media left the Web chat session with little more than the last time it met with Whitacre face-to-face, when he refused to answer questions following his announcement of CEO Fritz Henderson's resignation last week.
The GM chairman, who also took on the role of CEO after Henderson's hastily announced resignation seemed unwilling to give specific or detailed answers during the Web chat, summarily sidestepping questions about the future of vice chairman Bob Lutz ("We look forward to learning a lot from him. You'll have to ask him when he's going to retire") and breezily non-answering many with brief and evasive replies.
When asked if GM has sales and market-share targets for the first half of 2010 and if GM is satisfied with its current share, Whitacre elaborated only with: "Yes, yes and no."
About the potential for arranging the sale of the flagging Saab Cars division by GM's self-imposed deadline of the end of December: "We're in negotiations with a couple of interested parties. We've got a deadline by the end of the month and we'll let you know how it goes."
Whitacre did say he communicates with members of the federal Task Force on Autos about once week and the task force has kept its promise to be hands-off.
He also disclosed he drives a high-performance Cadillac CTS-V and, true to his Texas heritage, owns a handful of GM pickups and SUVs.
Whitacre also said GM has no plans for further white- or blue-collar job cuts and that GM can't give specifics about how many dealers earmarked for closure may be reinstated after a rash of appeals regarding the strategy and a reexamination of GM's rationale for whether dealers' franchise agreements are renewed. -- Bill Visnic, Senior Contributing Editor
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Suppose they held a Webcast and nobody logged on
Well, this is the "web chat" part of Ed Whitacre which totals to nothing as you already said. BUT I've been told that he is taking the Social Media Impact quite seriously and will start to learn to use the "keyboard" a bişt at least:)
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