Giving Your Addicted Child An Allowance

"Mom, dad, can I have another sixteen billion dollars?"

"Hmmmmm, well honey, what did you do with the thirteen billion we just gave you?"

"Uh, spent it?"

"Spent it? On what?"

"Things...."

Well, you get the idea. GM is addicted to doing business the same old way it has always done business. It hasn't developed new products that consumers are actually looking for. It hasn't opened its eyes to the resource problem we and the rest of the world are having with oil. It hasn't, in the face of failure, shown an ability to get off its addiction to antiquated thinking and given anyone the least bit of assurance that it can, in fact, change.

Aside from the fact that General Motors can't seem to manage its business. It's definately not carrying through on its brand promise for being an innovative, forward thinking company. Instead, it's showing itself as a tired, old company, set in its ways, and groaning about how bad things are. Hmmmmm, would you buy a tired old man on a porch?

Perhaps I'm being overly harsh on this. After all, they did just shed Hummer. Okay, not quite forward thinking, but it's a step. And they did create the Saturn concept. Which while admittedly was innovative in the 80s, their decision to hide it in the closet in the 90s, leads me to think more of a [once again] tired old man too embarassed when his kid dyed her hair green and started listening to Kurt Cobain.

So even if they do survive, what will their brand be remembered for? Have they already tarnished it so badly with their management [or lack thereof]? Or do they have to hire someone under 50 who can truly reinvent the company.

Hmmmmm, wait a minute, isn't that what we're doing with Barack Obama and the United States?

Well, perhaps both brands can be saved after all. It will be an interesting year...