tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3917355955602478696.post3323738895167805560..comments2023-05-01T04:36:18.591-04:00Comments on completelybaked: Give the Big Three A Breakcompletelybakedhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09938001015943655138noreply@blogger.comBlogger5125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3917355955602478696.post-16423551960666103752009-03-30T17:57:00.000-04:002009-03-30T17:57:00.000-04:00From everything that I have seen of most corporati...From everything that I have seen of most corporations, and I have seen a few (Wall Street, Energy, Manufacturing, Government contractors), they have become hiding grounds for overpaid, overeducated managers who focus on budgets rather than on their people and their product. I, for one, lay a significant part of the blame on our culture and educational system that is more adept at creating managers rather than engineers. That is why I believe that any long-term change, if one is possible, will not come in a year or two but in decades and will occur only once we have a society focused on creation and innovation rather than on increasing shareholder value (which as Steve Jobs has aptly demonstrated is also better served via a better product).<br>I feed sad for Michigan and manufacturing in this country. While it appears Wall Street is critical to fix the immediate crisis (and it is), in the long run it will be manufacturing that will save us. To parapharase Mark Twain, we cannot all pay our bills by doing each others laundry.<br>Thanks for saying what needs to be said. Good luck to you, your beautiful state, the people of Michigan and the Big 3.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3917355955602478696.post-85802410723839467792009-03-30T18:21:00.000-04:002009-03-30T18:21:00.000-04:00Thanks for your thoughts, I especially agree with ...Thanks for your thoughts, I especially agree with regard to manufacturing slipping away. It was our long term path to broad economic prosperity.jim welkehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15925369523777487451noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3917355955602478696.post-18696573908740608092009-06-11T11:27:05.061-04:002009-06-11T11:27:05.061-04:00I just routed myself here via your Reader Comment ...I just routed myself here via your Reader Comment to the June 11, 2009 New York Times online article "U.S. Takes on Insular G.M. Culture".<br>Your views, all that you say, is as accurate and succinct as anything I've read. Maybe more so. I am a designer who returned to central Ohio after 20 years in Traverse City. While I didn't work in or with the auto industry, your observations could be transposed verbatim to virtually any major corporate or institutional client I have ever worked with. At the top (or more precisely among the mid-level managers on up to the top), it has always been about not rocking the boat, which in the design and creative process is deadly.<br>Wonderful blog. Thank you.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3917355955602478696.post-85915545882407850202009-06-16T06:16:26.538-04:002009-06-16T06:16:26.538-04:00That's why darwinain capitalism time and time ...That's why darwinain capitalism time and time again is the best possible economic model. I beleive that sefety nets are needed toc acth the fallen once there out, but all these organizations have for years sheltered behind government, regulatory and other structural wind breaks. Think of all that talent that would have been released to form new and budding companies, if the too big to fail could actually be left to fail. The true waist is all those who have been trapped in the dinasours, thinking they wree safe. In other fearicly competative parts of the economy, America is a world champion value producer, with world class products, and business models. <br><br>As to who runs organizations, some lessons in industrial history is in order, smaller and younger companies tend to be run by engineers, but larger one's are not, that's because management is a skill set in of itself. Every social worker i've met is convinced that the worlds problems could be solved with more social workers, ditto for librarians and ditto for engineers.<br><br>Lastly, the obsession with manufacturing, from an economists point of veiw, is a parrelel to the shortsightedness, you witnessed with the management at your former company. A focus on what worked at some period in the past, and a yearning to bring it back, to current conditions that are very different. Manufacturing, like agriculture before it, and Information Technology now, is simply a phase in a sequence of economic evolution. Like in agriculture before it, productivity and efficiency gains have been steadily shrinking the required manufacturing base. Look around you, we have no shortage of stuff, the old saw about making things is rubbish, the same was said for growing things, and it will be soon said for thought work as well. So the complaint is about who's making it. Most importantly, what you make is more critical than how much manufacturing you have. <br><br>Beyond the prowess of a Beoing, Caterpillar, medtronics, and apple. Google, or Pixar, produce world class products with huge margins and global appeal, that maintain high wages for their workers. They have very little competition. The millions of people worldwide who will pay to use their products, will be busy producing the other parts of that equation, from the DVD players on down to the fabric in the cinema seats. All those others have much more competition and lower margins subsequently lower wages. It is a very well established system of weralth creation via free trade, and we have bennefited massively from it. It is a profound shame that very few Americans really understand the extent to which so much of our prosperity has been built on open systems and open trade. But that is a question for our education system.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3917355955602478696.post-72948800835645169702009-06-17T12:48:18.436-04:002009-06-17T12:48:18.436-04:00Thanks for the comments.By way of reply to the las...Thanks for the comments.<br><br>By way of reply to the last, I just added a post where I attempt to clarify my pro-domestic manufacturing, anti-free trade position. Find that here: http://cyclopsvue.blogspot.com/2009/06/domestic-manufacturing-vs.html<br><br>I've gotta say I really take issue with "It is a profound shame that very few Americans really understand the extent to which so much of our prosperity has been built on open systems and open trade." <br><br>Define prosperity. Do you mean a tiny minority benefiting at the expense of the vast majority? As far as I can tell, that's what has happened since our trade deficits really went through the roof (even excluding oil). Middle class wages have been stagnant for 30 years!jim welkehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15925369523777487451noreply@blogger.com