Sloan introduced organizational method to corporate America and pioneered modern management thinking. General Motors’ expanding market share showed that Sloan was right again.In common with other thought leaders, Sloan’s ideas were seminal but not radical. Sloan was afraid that Durant’s company would start producing roller bearings, putting him out of business.
I can sell my ideas to my associates if I can,” he would say. Alfred P. Sloan Professor of Management • Porter • Resource-Based View of the Firm • The Delta Model The Frameworks for Competitive Positioning. Always preferring study to play – a trait that remained with him even after his General Motors days – Sloan graduated with an engineering degree from MIT in three years instead of the usual four.William Durant was one of Sloan’s best customers. The adaptable Sloan had once again hit upon a novel idea – redesign cars cosmetically and sell them cheaper than Ford’s. Sloan encouraged the exchange of ideas through interdivisional councils where senior executives and staff could share strategies on an equal platform.Sloan kept the running of the organization fluid and competitive. He was a long-time president, chairman and CEO of General Motors Corporation. Genius lies in making complex tasks simple.
He brought order, rules and form to what till then were randomly-run enterprises. Sloan was soon in close touch with many of the pioneers of the car industry, men such as Henry Ford and William Durant.Before long his ball-bearing business became part of General Motors, and in 1923 (in the midst of a dire slump in the car industry) Sloan became president of GM.
This is evident in the manner in which he dealt with the problem of obsolescence. The divisions received the infrastructure – money, supplies, sale forces. Within six years the company had moved from being a laggard in the industry (way behind Ford with its famous Model T) to being the market leader with a turnover of $1.5 billion and a share price that had almost quintupled.Sloan also introduced a systematic strategic planning procedure for the company's divisions, the first CEO ever to do such a thing.
“I never give orders. Management by walking about (see In his later years Sloan gave large sums of money to his alma mater, MIT, which in gratitude named its business school after him. An associate compared Sloan to a bearing: “self-lubricating, smooth, eliminates friction and carries the load.”Sloan was unabashedly proud of General Motors.
Alfred P. Sloan, Jr., the organizer who made it work by introducing a series of novel administrative skills in organization, forecasting, policy- making, controls, and human relations. GMC consisted of five brands: Chevrolet; Oldsmobile; Pontiac; Buick; Cadillac; Each of them focused on a separate segment of the market. Judged by that telling yardstick, Sloan qualified for that rarest of sobriquets.“…The modern corporation, which is a product of the 20th century, is in that league, not so much because it is a font of technological innovation, but because it is a bridge between market mechanisms and democracy. He perfected innovations such as market segmentation, car loans, annual product cycles, decentralized operations, centralized financial controls, management incentives, and public relations.
One of these was: “The whole objective of industry should be to reduce prices. Its essence is that top management should deal only with relevant strategic tasks (decisions) and all others be delegate to lower levels of management . Oldsmobile was positioned at upscale buyers.