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
We are viewing the U.S. economic and auto market environment with considerable caution, ... That, combined with our poor business results in the first three quarters this year, really highlight that we are at a critical juncture in our company's history. And so we are accelerating the pace and scope of our turnaround actions.
I have given no thought to anything but turning the business around, ... I wasn't brought up to run and hide when things get tough.
I've given no thought to anything but turning the business around, ... I wasn't brought up to run and hide when things get tough. I'm convinced that's the way that things get righted.
We're pleased to see the significant progress in our first quarter results and in the implementation of all four elements of our North American turnaround plan.
Over the last nine months we have been aggressively implementing our North American turnaround plan.
This is the kind of thing we need to do. I don't have a big scoreboard in my office, depicting which groups had taken cuts. I think you can say the whole family is participating in the effort to turn GM around.
This agreement is another important milestone in the turnaround of General Motors.
Our fate is going to be determined in the next three to five years on getting this business in the U.S. turned around and profitable,
GM's top priority is to restore our North American operations to profitability and positive cash flow as quickly as possible. In 2005, we laid out a comprehensive and integrated strategy to address the structural issues that impede our competitiveness and profitability, and we are focused on rapidly executing all aspects of the turnaround plan.
I've taken a significant pay cut this year, ... I think I'll have a 50 percent pay cut.
These bold initiatives are designed to immediately improve our competitiveness and position GM for long-term success and today's transition is a further step in that direction.
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.
These negotiations were done in a positive, cooperative, problem-solving spirit, ... While it may have taken some time to reach this cooperative solution, I think it was time well-spent.
These markets are going to grow. They're going to have their ups and downs, just like the American market. But Asia will be the fastest growing area of the world.