????大眾首席執行官馬丁·文德恩已因柴油車排放作弊事件辭職。大眾的新任CEO或許可以從上一位被放在全世界聚光燈下審視的汽車公司負責人那里借鑒一二。

????她就是通用汽車CEO瑪麗·巴拉。為了結點火開關缺陷引發的官司，這家底特律汽車制造商最近才向美國政府支付了9億美元，而這只是整個賠付的一部分；這個問題已經造成124人喪生，275人受傷，迫使通用汽車召回了近3000萬輛汽車。

????這次召回開始于2014年2月，當時距巴拉獲得任命僅隔兩周。而在她上任前，2009年曾申請破產保護的通用汽車一直奮力擺脫困境，在此前15年里，這家公司已經虧損了約180億美元。

????一上任，巴拉就不得不為本次召回事件四次到國會接受聽證調查，通用汽車還為此設立了4億美元的受害者賠償基金。此外，前任美國檢察官安東·瓦盧卡斯提交的一份325頁的內部報告也極具殺傷力。報告指出，通用汽車2001年就發現點火開關有問題，但由于奉行沉默是金的文化，以及公司內部相互推諉，它一直沒有采取任何補救措施。通用汽車因安全問題引發的召回還將持續，而涉及數百例人員傷亡的訴訟依舊在等待判決。

????然而，經歷了這一切的巴拉已經成功贏得了公眾的支持和理解，她應對危機采取的各種措施飽受贊譽。那么，巴拉是怎么做到的呢？

????1. 她很誠實

????在整個危機期間，巴拉一直不憚于為點火開關問題道歉，盡管這些過錯根本不能怪她。在國會聽證會上，巴拉回答問題時坦率真誠，毫不回避或閃爍其辭，參議員們對此大加贊賞。加利福尼亞州共和黨參議員芭巴拉·博克瑟在一次聽證會上說：“愿上帝保佑你，你做的很好。”巴拉讓參議員們相信，她會把這次事件轉化為正能量。她還承諾：“在這些問題得到解決前，我絕不歇事寧人。”

????2. 她致力于做出改變

????巴拉以行踐言。她開除了對點火開關問題負主要責任的15個人，重新構建了通用汽車的司法規程，并且開展了“為安全進言”的活動，允許員工檢舉內部問題。她還利用這次危機來改變通用汽車過于尊重上級的文化。巴拉說：“我不想置之不理，也不想敷衍搪塞，因為我覺得它暴露了公司的一些問題，要予以改變和糾正，我們就得挑戰自己，這一點很關鍵。”雖然改變公司文化需要時間，但借助這次危機，巴拉以一種不尋常的方式來激勵通用汽車的員工。她在一次公司大會上表示：“我絕不希望大家把這件事拋諸腦后。我希望這段痛苦經歷永遠留在我們的共同記憶之中。”這番“非通用式”講話讓那些老員工很受觸動。

????3. 她把注意力集中在利潤上

????說到底，公司業績才是衡量CEO優劣的唯一標準。在重振通用汽車方面，巴拉做的極為出色。她把重點放在整合美國業務上，讓凱迪拉克脫離通用汽車，成為一個“獨立經營實體”；她還為趨于老化的沃倫技術中心投資約10億美元，以增強通用汽車的研發能力。結果如何呢？在7月份的最新業績發布會上，通用汽車公布的第二季度利潤是上年同期的五倍，超過了分析師的預期。復蘇之路還很長，但巴拉的工作可以為大眾新任CEO提供一個怎樣處理公司歷史性危機的藍本。（財富中文網）

????譯者：Charlie

????校對：詹妮

????With news that Volkswagen AG CEO Martin Winterkorn has resigned after the company was found to have cheated on its diesel emissions tests, the next VW CEO could learn a thing or two from the last auto company leader to face worldwide scrutiny.

????That would be Mary Barra, the CEO of General Motors, the Detroit-based automaker who recently handed over $900 million to the U.S. government as part of a settlement over defective ignition switches that sparked a recall of nearly 30 million cars, and had led to 124 deaths and 275 injuries.

????That recall started in February 2014, just two weeks after Barra was appointed to the company’s top post. Even before she began, GM was struggling to recover from its 2009 bankruptcy and around $18 billion in losses over the past 15 years.

????The GM recall, however, would drag Barra through four Congressional hearings, and cause the company to set up a $400 million victim-compensation fund. There was also the damning 325-page internal report released by former U.S. Attorney Anton Valukas, which revealed that GM knew about the switch problem since 2001, but because of a culture of silence and blame games, led to no action to rectify the problem. The company would continue recalling its cars over other safety issues, and hundreds of personal injury and wrongful death lawsuits are still pending.

????But through it all, Barra has succeeded in winning the hearts and minds of the public, and earning tons of goodwill for her response to the crisis. What did she do?

????1. She was honest

????Throughout the crisis, Barra never shied from apologizing for the misdeeds, even if she was absolved from all wrongdoing. During her Congressional hearings, Senators heaped praise on Barra for her contrite, transparent answers. “God bless you, and you’re doing a good job,” said Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) in one hearing. Barra also convinced Senators that this moment was one she would use for good. “I will not rest until these problems are resolved,” was another promise from Barra.

????2. She was committed to change

????Barra backed up her words with action. She fired 15 people who were at the heart of the fault, reorganized GM’s litigation practice and created the “Speaking Up for Safety” program that allowed employees to act as internal whistleblowers. She has also used this crisis to address GM’s internal culture of over-respecting higher-ups, saying: “I don’t want to set it aside and explain it away because I think it uncovered some things in the company that it’s critical we challenge ourselves to change and to fix.” While the culture change is taking time, she used this crisis to motivate GM staff members in an unusual way. “I never want to put this behind us. I want to put this painful experience permanently in our collective memories,” she said in one town hall meeting, a statement that struck long-time employees as very un-GM-like.

????3. She focused on the bottom line

????Ultimately, a CEO is only as good as his or her company’s balance sheet, and Barra has done immensely well in reviving GM’s fortunes. She focused on consolidating operations in the U.S., separated Cadillac from GM as a “separate business unit”, and invested around $1 billion in its aging Warren Technical Center to help improve the company’s R&D efforts. The results? In the last earnings call in July, GM reported that its second-quarter earnings were five times as large as a year ago, beating analysts’ expectations. The road back is still long, but Barra’s work can provide the incoming Volkswagen CEO a blueprint on how to address a historic crisis inside a company.