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It doesn't matter what the engineer did. The fact that the car company had so few controls that a single engineer could approve something faulty then change the

It doesn't matter what the engineer did. The fact that the car company had so few controls that a single engineer could approve something faulty then change the specs of it in future models without anyone noticing is worrying to say the least. It is a bit like banking and these "rogue traders" who spend a billion dollars. They are at fault certainly BUT more so it is the banks fault for having such lax measures that they had access to this much money.

oldmanjay 12y ago
it definitely matters what the engineerr did. your point of view is equivalent to blaming the police for crime.
- keyme 12y ago
  More like blaming lack of policing for crime...
  - oldmanjay 12y ago
    you're incorrect in this case. according to the article, this blameless paragon of virtue deliberately hid his actions.
  - jusben1369 12y ago
    Right. They're called checks and balances for a reason. It's more than fair for GM to assume that it's paid employees follow procedures to ensure that this type of thing doesn't happen. So to say it doesn't matter what the engineer did is a poor choice of words. Given the stakes though it's also incumbent upon GM to ensure that there are other procedures and processes in place should an employee not do the right thing. It sounds like multiple people over the course of time (failure at a media launch?!) were suspicious about this switch but no one escalated the issue.
spindritf 12y ago
They had checks in place for errors, not for being deliberately misled by one of their own employees. If they had checks against that, we'd be reading a blog about procedures and corporate culture in GM suffocating engineering.
- bilbo0s 12y ago
  Being a pretty big process guy... I have to agree with SilkRoadie here. I should preface this by saying that my experience comes from developing FDA regulated medical diagnostic software and not automobiles. So I realize there may be a significantly lower quality threshold that GM is obliged to meet. Having mentioned that, I can tell you that, at least in that medical diagnostic software startup, the idea that an engineer could design and implement ANYTHING and get it into the software build without QA noticing is somewhat fanciful. Someone from QA would have had to be in on it. The process and company structure pretty much made it impossible for the the type of situation outlined in the article to occur. Just as a 30,000 ft overview of the process... imagine a place where every little change required a minimum of 4 signatures, engineer, QA engineer, Head of QA/Reg, and CEO. This allows not only QA, but also the FDA to determine precisely who was responsible for each change. Imagine further that the signatures have to be on paper, and that giant mass of paper documentation has to be submitted to the FDA, along with mountains of other documentation as well as the software itself, for approval. (But everyone understands that it's also submitted so that the FDA knows who to throw in prison if serious bugs crop up.) The situation outlined in the article should be STRUCTURALLY impossible as well. At the startup I worked at for instance, build engineering was under QA. This meant that a development engineer could not give the build team a build directive. Only the head of QA/Reg could do that. Also, the head of QA/Reg didn't report to the COO or CFO or Chief Counsel or anything like that, she reported directly to the CEO. As well, she was a frequent contributor at board meetings. There was just no way to pull an end around on her. That's just a rudimentary outline of the controls we had in place at that startup. Believe me, it actually got a WHOLE lot more restrictive than what I've outlined, but the other stuff is not important to the point I'm trying to make. And that point is this... While I realize that for cars the safety standard is probably lower than it is for medical imaging and RTP packages, you would think GM would have those rudimentary controls in place at a minimum ???
calinet6 12y ago
Yes! Systems are the problem here. He did not make that decision in isolation—there was some pressure from the supply chain, his manager, or cost that he would have been punished for had he not made this decision. A fear or motivation existed which was the result of poor management practices or a fragile quality process at odds with many other variables. No matter how you slice it, this is a management problem, and a cultural problem. It is not an individual responsibility to ensure quality. If it is left to an individual, then things like this happen out of sheer statistical probability. The only thing you can depend on is human fallibility, so your systems should be designed for it; they should expect it, more than anything. We should all look at quality as a systems, management, and fundamentally cultural pursuit. Sadly, the individual getting the brunt of all the blame here will only worsen the cultural and management factors that caused it in the first place. Future employees will fear individual retribution, and will make rash, illogical, uninformed decisions in the future out of fear. This, too, will not be their "fault" but the fault of the company, the management, and the systems around them. Deming. Look him up. There's a reason this does not happen in Japanese car companies. There's a reason that when it does, individual employees are not blamed. The reason is critically important to the success of American manufacturing in the future.
- specialp 12y ago
  The fact remains though that if you are doing anything that could result in injury or death to third parties, you should never bow to management pressure. I used to inspect amusement rides for safety when I was in college. Occasionally there would be a defect that would arise that would make me feel it was not as safe as I thought it could be. Managers and owners of course would not want their ride shut down on a busy summer day and would pressure me not to close it but I did not care. I knew if children were hurt or killed I would feel horrible, and be the guy taking the blame or criminal penalty for negligence. So if you are an engineer for some safety critical system never bow in to management pressure as it will be viewed as 100% your fault when something goes wrong. It is not all this engineer's fault as people have pointed out, but when you put your name on the line approving something it is then your responsibility.

oldmanjay 12y ago

it definitely matters what the engineerr did. your point of view is equivalent to blaming the police for crime.

keyme 12y ago
More like blaming lack of policing for crime...
- oldmanjay 12y ago
  you're incorrect in this case. according to the article, this blameless paragon of virtue deliberately hid his actions.
- jusben1369 12y ago
  Right. They're called checks and balances for a reason. It's more than fair for GM to assume that it's paid employees follow procedures to ensure that this type of thing doesn't happen. So to say it doesn't matter what the engineer did is a poor choice of words. Given the stakes though it's also incumbent upon GM to ensure that there are other procedures and processes in place should an employee not do the right thing. It sounds like multiple people over the course of time (failure at a media launch?!) were suspicious about this switch but no one escalated the issue.

spindritf 12y ago

They had checks in place for errors, not for being deliberately misled by one of their own employees. If they had checks against that, we'd be reading a blog about procedures and corporate culture in GM suffocating engineering.

bilbo0s 12y ago
Being a pretty big process guy... I have to agree with SilkRoadie here. I should preface this by saying that my experience comes from developing FDA regulated medical diagnostic software and not automobiles. So I realize there may be a significantly lower quality threshold that GM is obliged to meet. Having mentioned that, I can tell you that, at least in that medical diagnostic software startup, the idea that an engineer could design and implement ANYTHING and get it into the software build without QA noticing is somewhat fanciful. Someone from QA would have had to be in on it. The process and company structure pretty much made it impossible for the the type of situation outlined in the article to occur. Just as a 30,000 ft overview of the process... imagine a place where every little change required a minimum of 4 signatures, engineer, QA engineer, Head of QA/Reg, and CEO. This allows not only QA, but also the FDA to determine precisely who was responsible for each change. Imagine further that the signatures have to be on paper, and that giant mass of paper documentation has to be submitted to the FDA, along with mountains of other documentation as well as the software itself, for approval. (But everyone understands that it's also submitted so that the FDA knows who to throw in prison if serious bugs crop up.) The situation outlined in the article should be STRUCTURALLY impossible as well. At the startup I worked at for instance, build engineering was under QA. This meant that a development engineer could not give the build team a build directive. Only the head of QA/Reg could do that. Also, the head of QA/Reg didn't report to the COO or CFO or Chief Counsel or anything like that, she reported directly to the CEO. As well, she was a frequent contributor at board meetings. There was just no way to pull an end around on her. That's just a rudimentary outline of the controls we had in place at that startup. Believe me, it actually got a WHOLE lot more restrictive than what I've outlined, but the other stuff is not important to the point I'm trying to make. And that point is this... While I realize that for cars the safety standard is probably lower than it is for medical imaging and RTP packages, you would think GM would have those rudimentary controls in place at a minimum ???

calinet6 12y ago

Yes! Systems are the problem here. He did not make that decision in isolation—there was some pressure from the supply chain, his manager, or cost that he would have been punished for had he not made this decision. A fear or motivation existed which was the result of poor management practices or a fragile quality process at odds with many other variables. No matter how you slice it, this is a management problem, and a cultural problem. It is not an individual responsibility to ensure quality. If it is left to an individual, then things like this happen out of sheer statistical probability. The only thing you can depend on is human fallibility, so your systems should be designed for it; they should expect it, more than anything. We should all look at quality as a systems, management, and fundamentally cultural pursuit. Sadly, the individual getting the brunt of all the blame here will only worsen the cultural and management factors that caused it in the first place. Future employees will fear individual retribution, and will make rash, illogical, uninformed decisions in the future out of fear. This, too, will not be their "fault" but the fault of the company, the management, and the systems around them. Deming. Look him up. There's a reason this does not happen in Japanese car companies. There's a reason that when it does, individual employees are not blamed. The reason is critically important to the success of American manufacturing in the future.

specialp 12y ago
The fact remains though that if you are doing anything that could result in injury or death to third parties, you should never bow to management pressure. I used to inspect amusement rides for safety when I was in college. Occasionally there would be a defect that would arise that would make me feel it was not as safe as I thought it could be. Managers and owners of course would not want their ride shut down on a busy summer day and would pressure me not to close it but I did not care. I knew if children were hurt or killed I would feel horrible, and be the guy taking the blame or criminal penalty for negligence. So if you are an engineer for some safety critical system never bow in to management pressure as it will be viewed as 100% your fault when something goes wrong. It is not all this engineer's fault as people have pointed out, but when you put your name on the line approving something it is then your responsibility.