Reply #40: Ford and GM [View All]

[melm00se]

directly employ more than 500,000 employees and, indirectly, an untold # of employees (at least 10x - a guess?) at suppliers of everything from sheet metal to screws to fabrics to electronics to tires to to to to.

Unless there is some dramatic change in their fortunes, quite a bit is at risk.

As I see it, a holistic approach would be needed:

Executives
Entry, mid and upper management
Workers

All will be required to give back/give up a lot of things they take for granted.

Line workers putting a nut on a bolt (and yes I know that is simplistic) who are making the equivalent of $100/hour (salary, benefits etc) make as little sense as executives pulling down multi-million dollar bonuses and compensation packages.

The entire management and labor arrangement needs to be re-examined and, more than likely, torn down damn near to the basement and re-assembled to a long term and more sustainable model - people should be compensated for the real skills and value that they bring to the mix - not their ability to negotiate an unreasonable level of compensation.

Once those directly controllable costs are addressed, then the real work can begin of re-evaluating investments into the business - like (as the biggest example) pouring huge amounts of any profits into R&D and out hustling the competition with new technology rather than the number of cup holders in a vehicle that is 2 generations back technology-wise.