#122 Alfred Sloan (General Motors)

**David Senra** (0:00)
I want to tell you about a one-time only limited event that I don't think you're going to want to miss. I am doing a live show with Patrick O'Shaughnessy from the Invest Like the Best podcast in New York City on October 19th. Patrick has interviewed over 300 of the world's best investors and founders for his podcast. I've read over 300 biographies of history's greatest entrepreneurs for my podcast. We'll be talking about what we learned from seven years of podcasting, sharing our favorite ideas and stories, and doing a live Q&A. There will also be special event-only swag. If you live in New York City, I think it's a no-brainer. But if not, I think it's a great excuse to fly in. I've already heard from a bunch of people that bought tickets. They're flying in from other cities. Some people are flying in from other countries. That's setting the bar really high, so I will have at least four shots of espresso or four energy drinks before or during the show so we can make it a night that you'll never forget. If you're interested in attending this unique live event, I will leave a link down below. I highly recommend you get your tickets today, and I hope I get to see you in New York on October 19th. We knew that the product had great potential, but I can hardly say that any of us realize the extent to which the automobile would transform the world, reshape the entire economy, call new industries into being, and alter the pace and style of everyday life. It was my personal satisfaction to be associated as a supplier or a competitor with a large number of the able citizens who created and contributed to the development of this industry. The names of a few of them, by their association with cars and companies, stand for a new American legend. Mr. Ford, Mr. Buick, Mr. Chevrolet, Mr. Olds, Mr. Chrysler.
Involved with thousands of others in the destiny of this industry, they conducted the prosaic operations of running a business without being aware of the revolution they were making.
The field was open to all. Technical knowledge flows from a common storehouse of scientific progress. The techniques of production are an open book. The market is worldwide and there are no favorites, except those chosen by the customers.
When we started on this great adventure in the early 1900s, the whole automotive industry was searching for ways and means to find itself.
In those early days, we lacked the techniques that today are taken for granted. Things just seemed to happen to us and to the industry. The number of sales by dealers was unknown. The number of cars held by dealers was unknown. Trends in consumer demands were unknown. There was no awareness of the importance of the used car market. There were no statistics on the different cars market penetration. No one kept track of registrations. Production schedules were set with no real relationship to final demand. Our products had no planned relation to one another or to the market. The concept of a line of products to meet the full challenge of the market had not been thought of. We had to start from that beginning.
My impressions of all of this after more than 65 years in and around the automobile industry, 45 of them with General Motors are the basis for this book.
All right, so that's an excerpt from the book that I'm going to talk to you about today, which is My Years with General Motors by Alfred Sloan. Okay, back on Founders 110, I covered, this is the second podcast I did on Henry Singleton, and I talked to you about the book called Distant Force, a Memoir of the Teledyne Corporation and the Man Who Created It. This is the book I was reading where I first found out about Alfred Sloan's autobiography, which is the one I'm going to talk to you about today. But I want to read an excerpt before I jump into the lessons from Alfred Sloan from Distant Force.
And it says, Henry talked to me on several occasions about a book by the former chairman of General Motors Corporation. He told me he had learned a very important concept from that book, which he wished to use in the growth of Teledyne. He explained that in about 1921 or 1922, after World War I, and during a very difficult economic time of recession, General Motors had needed additional funds to finance their growth and had a plan to sell bonds to the general public. The bond sale was a complete failure, and the chairman had written in his book that it taught him an important lesson. It was that for a corporation to grow and to have a strong financial base, it needed to have, as part of itself, an interest in substantial, financially-oriented institutions.