Is It Possible to be TOO Transparent?

You know how I'm going to answer that question, right?

But I've been thinking about it all day, after reading an article by Bill Vlasic and Danielle Ivory in today's New York Times, whose headline tells the story: "In recall blitz, GM risks its reputation."

They quote an analyst: "We’re hitting unprecedented numbers and it’s reasonable for people to start asking, When and where will it end?"

(Note that a substantial number of comments to the Times article are along the lines of:  Reputation for quality? What reputation for quality? Unless you mean, Poor quality.)

Still, it made me think of a post I wrote in March (here) in which I encouraged manufacturers with a problem to address it as quickly and directly as possible, as a big hurt now will hurt less than a lot of little hurts later.

But is it possible to recall too many products at once? I don't think so, despite the massive size of the current spate of recalls (more than eight million more vehicles were recalled on Monday, many with ignition-switch issues that appear to be similar to the Cobalt problems that started the wave).

I expect that GM will take a hit in sales in the short term -- although June sales were actually up from a year ago, as were year-to-date sales (see Ward's report, here), thanks to strong government fleet and commercial fleet orders -- but if CEO Mary Barra and her team can show that they are serious about changing the culture of GM, the long-term effects of the recall(s) should be positive.

I'll stick to my old line: To rebuild Trust, embrace Transparency.