My Years with General Motors

by Alfred Sloan

Number of pages: 496

BBB Library: Business Classics, Corporate Success

ISBN: 978-0385042352

About the Author

Alfred Pritchard Sloan, Jr. (May 23, 1875 – February 17, 1966) was an American business executive in the automotive industry. He was a long-time President, chairman and CEO of General Motors Corporation.[2] Sloan, first as a senior executive and later as the head of the organization, helped GM grow from the 1920s through the 1950s, decades when concepts such as the annual model change, brand architecture, industrial design, automotive design (styling), and planned obsolescence transformed the industry, and when the industry changed lifestyles and the built environment in America and throughout the world.

Editorial Review

In this summary, Alfred Sloan, the American business executive in the automotive industry, presents his vision and experience in General Motors, the corporate structure he worked in. Sloan explains the concepts and practices that he mastered throughout his journey. Sloan’s long professional life and informative insights makes this book a business classic.

Book Reviews

“It is harder, though, to pinpoint exactly what lessons today’s managers might takefrom what has been called “the best business book you’ll never read.” Fifty years on, Sloan’s My Years at General Motors might seem to have all the freshness of an insect in amber." – Harvard Business Review

“All in all, it is a very good book. It is a great read for anyone interested in economic history or how to manage a large cooperation. I think it is also interesting for investors in order to understand what challenges are there running large companies and helping to differentiate between well run businesses and bad ones. I don’t know any other book where you can not only read what a very succesful businessman has thought but how he transformed those thoughts into communication and action. This is something, a professor for instance can’t do”– Value and Opportunity

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We believe that the most effective results and the maximum progress and stability of the business are achieved by placing its executives in the same relative position.

The interests of the corporation and its stockholders are best served by making key employees partners in the corporation's prosperity.

Each individual should be rewarded in proportion to his contribution to the profit of his own division and of the corporation as a whole.

Experience has convinced me that for those who are responsible for a business, two important factors are motivation and opportunity.

From decentralization we get initiative, responsibility, development of personnel, decisions close to the facts, flexibility—in short, all the qualities necessary for an organization to adapt to new conditions.

From coordination we get efficiencies and economies.

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The corporation's overseas business hinges largely on its overseas production facilities.

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The development of appropriations procedures in General Motors depends on the determination of the propriety of proposed projects