In February 2017, General Motors CEO Mary T. Barra floated the possibility that the company could exit the large but troubled European market by selling its chronically unprofitable Opel unit to the French maker of Peugot and Citroen cars. This would free GM from persistent losses in Europe and fulfill pledges Barra had made to shareholders to improve overall profit margins. In addition, Barra had stated her intention to continue with the commitment to build the best cars GM had ever produced.

In 2017 General Motors had finally begun to rebound from a decade-long slide in worldwide market share, the 2009 bankruptcy and subsequent government bailout, and was recovering from a series of safety problems that had led to recalls of thousands of vehicles in 2014, and lawsuits related to the deaths of 139 people due to defective ignition switches. Barra had acknowledged the lack of responsibility and accountability that led to these problems and promised this neglect would never happen again.

Appointed as CEO in January 2014, Barra, who had worked her way up within the firm, became the first woman to ever run a big automobile company. She had been a rank-and-file engineer, a plant manager, the head of corporate human resources, and, most recently, the senior executive overseeing all of GM’s global product development. She had inherited a firm with a stagnant market share and a real need for continuous improvement.

In addition to financial problems, worldwide, GM had been hampered by its multiple divisions, multiple nameplates or brands, each doing its own design and marketing. To cut costs, GM had shared designs and parts across divisions, leading to some loss of distinctiveness between the different brands. To improve its ability to revamp its product line on a regular basis, the firm had cut the GM brands down to four: Chevrolet, Cadillac, Buick, and GMC. Hummer, Saab, Saturn, and Pontiac were sold, spun off, or shut down.

Since cutting down its brands, GM had been able to reinvent Chevrolet as a global mass-market brand, with 60 percent of its sales coming from outside the United States. The higher-profit luxury Buick and Cadillac divisions were being refocused in an attempt to update these “refined luxury” brands. Recent sales had been driven by the new Cruze and the plug-in hybrid Volt. The Volt family of vehicles also included the new Bolt all-electric subcompact.

In 2016 GM made a significant investment in the ride sharing service Lyft, and acquired Cruise Automation, a company building the capacity for piloting a car using artificial intelligence. A startup within GM, Maven, would pave the way for a future fleet of autonomous cars that could be tapped for self-driving and ride-sharing.

GM was also attempting to address its product development process bottlenecks by pushing designers and engineers to work together to address inefficiencies and listen to customers, while reducing the number of executives overseeing a vehicle program. In addition, standardization of manufacturing platforms would lead to increased efficiencies and enable new models to come to market faster, all while beefing up the engineering safety teams. By making these moves, GM was constructing a portfolio of assets and addressing entrenched cultural issues, determined to disrupt its own core business from within.

Barra was keenly aware that GM’s 223,000 employees would have to behave differently for its future plans to succeed. She needed to replace a culture of blame and bureaucracy with one driven by accountability and speed. Did GM finally have leadership that would be able to reposition the company? Could GM be reborn as a winner?

1. What are key forces in the general and industry environments that affect the U.S. auto industry, and General Motors?

2. What internal resources and assets does General Motors have to help counter the external forces?

3. What competitive strategy does General Motors use, and how might it position itself for future growth?