Rick Wagoner
Rick Wagoner
George Richard "Rick" Wagoner, Jr.is an American businessman and former Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of General Motors. Wagoner resigned as Chairman and CEO at General Motors on March 29, 2009, at the request of the White House. The latter part of Wagoner's tenure as CEO of General Motors found him under heavy criticism as the market valuation of GM went down by more than 90% and the company lost more than $82 billion USD. This led to his being...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionBusinessman
Date of Birth9 February 1953
CountryUnited States of America
competition continues demand efforts eliminate industry intensely lower mixed pressures price reinforce results step strong territory venture waste
These results reinforce the need to step up our efforts to eliminate waste and lower costs, ... The industry continues to venture into new territory -- near-record demand mixed with unprecedented price pressures and intensely strong competition on all fronts.
continues financial performance quite
Our financial performance continues to be quite disappointing,
continued expand gm growth key markets notable sales successes
GM had some notable sales successes as we continued to expand in key growth markets around the world in 2005.
action benefits companies conceived continue costs decades difficult explosive face foreseen global greatest high increasing inflation necessary number recent rise rising similar simply taken
This is a difficult but necessary decision, and it was made only after the greatest deliberation. A number of other U.S. companies have already taken similar action in the face of these rising costs and increasing global competition. In particular, U.S. health-care costs continue to rise at high rates. When these benefits were conceived decades ago, no one could have foreseen the explosive cost inflation that we have been experiencing in recent years. These costs are simply not sustainable.
asked board career chairman continues develop fritz gm grow hope identify job jobs logical took
That's silly. Fritz took the CFO job because I asked him to, and the board approved. It was a logical progression in his career and I hope Fritz continues to develop and grow. One of my most important jobs as chairman of GM is to identify and grow talent.
bring continue existing facilities foundation future global pivotal plants played processes provide role
Don has played a pivotal role in strengthening GM's global manufacturing competitiveness, ... His contributions provide an important foundation for our future as we continue to bring these world-class manufacturing processes to new plants and existing facilities around the world.
befall capacity china chinese continues deserve flip growth guess japan learned lessons meet silly strong threat
I think it's going to be silly not to take the competitive threat seriously. If we haven't learned any lessons from Japan and Korea, we deserve the things that befall us, ... On the flip side, the growth in China continues to be so strong that our guess is that most of the capacity in China will be used to meet Chinese needs.
exactly last sure
That's about what it was in 2004. We're not exactly sure about 2005, but we don't think it will be any different than last year, or what it has been in 2002, 2003 and 2004,
industry mix products reflects reliance sales shifting
The industry sales mix is shifting away from the larger, higher-profit vehicles, even pickups, ... reflects too much reliance on those products for profitability.
basics gradual growth
You've got to have a consistent, gradual growth strategy, and I think some basics are going to be required,
compelling consumers given lower prices reason
The lower prices have given consumers a compelling reason to try our new vehicles, and it's working.
progress sure
I'm not sure I'm going to make a lot of progress by scorekeeping everybody's sacrifice.
pass toyota
I think we'll probably pass Toyota in the U.S. on the workers-per-vehicle metric.
exactly people piece run sacrifice trying versus work
Everybody's got a piece of it. What we're trying to do is look at each piece and say, 'Where are we really uncompetitive versus the people we run against?'... If we're out of line, that's what we need to work on. So, it may not be exactly the same sacrifice everywhere, but I think just about everybody's got a piece of it.