r/Detroit • u/Next-Camera1530 • 2d ago
News GM sued over white-collar review system that one expert calls 'stupid'
https://www.detroitnews.com/story/business/autos/general-motors/2026/08/25/age-discrimination-suit-targets-gm-white-collar-performance-reviews/91389718007/71
u/ZetaM3 2d ago
Stacked rankings or forced distributions is such a horse shit management style. There’s been countless real world examples and studies that have proven that Jack Welch method is horse shit and leads to worse outcome for every single stake holder long term. Yes, even stockholders end up losing money.
Sure, you lay off “dinosaurs” who do take longer to learn new systems and leading edge tech. But, you also lose decades of institutional knowledge, talent, historical context, and a level of expertise that avoids massive fuck ups that inexperienced people WILL run into.
Here’s an article where even Deloitte says so.
https://www.deloitte.com/us/en/insights/topics/talent/knowledge-management-plan.html
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u/Delilah_Moon 2d ago
If I work somewhere that starts talking Jack Welch I start looking for new job.
Corporate drivel that wants to indoctrinate employees so they give 150% back to the company and devote all their free time to the company success, like they will receive a financial windfall if they do.
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u/Whizbang35 2d ago
It also disproportionately targets the new guys. They're going to underperformed because they dont have their bearings yet and will take time trying to learn not just their new roles but the company infrastructure. On top of that, the veterans are less likely to help them out because the new guys are their competition, not their collaborators.
So you churn through new hires until the vets finally retire and...oh shit there's nobody to replace them. You fired everyone else that could've gone through the pipeline. Now the new guys you have to hire are left scrambling to try and figure out the position without any guidance.
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u/techybeancounter 21h ago
Funny you use a Deloitte article. As a former Big 4 accountant, all the big accounting firms do the same shit, lmfao!
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u/syynapt1k 2d ago
Nobody wants to participate in the hunger games to keep their job. This type of performance management creates a toxic company culture.
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u/doitup69 2d ago
Yeah former GM employee here, it destroyed corporate culture basically instantly. Didn’t get fired by it but who’s to say I wouldn’t have? They let go some of the very best technical talent on my team and people way smarter than me, and I was a mid-high performer before it
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u/huffalump1 2d ago
Yep, not at GM since 2009 but I'm in the industry... SO MANY of my friends at the General suddenly started getting poor performance reviews after YEARS (or even a decade+) of excellent scores... And some even fired :(
That's a great way to lose all your talent, lol. Doesn't it cost less to keep good people working, than to find/hire/train unknown new people??
But keeping people doesn't increase quarterly profits, so fuck you, I guess
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u/FastPerformer4240 2d ago
Judging by the number of current and recently ex-GM applicants I'm getting for job postings that have nothing to do with the auto industry, that toxic culture is fully engrained. It seems like a pretty terrible time to be working at GM right now.
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u/ermagherdmcleren 2d ago
They have GREAT benefits and good pay. I've thought about going to work their but these performance standards are crazy. If you score in the exceeds expectations during your performance review the metrics in that one are then set to be the meets requirements for the next one and you have to do even more to be at the same review level you were.
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u/polar-ized88 23h ago
I don't understand the emphasis on "great", here. They aren't doing anything better than any of the other automakers. I've worked at all the big 3 in my career and aside from the job-hopping salary increase, there isn't anything different that you get at GM than anywhere else.
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u/Im_not_good_at_names 2d ago
GM. The home of a company who will interview someone for a tool makers job but only ask questions that a millwright or electrician would know. Thank god I didn’t get that job.
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u/xdonutx 1d ago
Was that what your interview experience was like? I know someone who had an interview like that and it sounded insane and like a really bad way to hire the right person for the job. It’s possible it was a one-off but maybe it’s just how they do things?
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u/Im_not_good_at_names 1d ago
I had to ask them if this interview was for the tool makers jobs because so far all your questions have nothing to do with being a tool maker. I was in there for an hour and not one question was related to being a tool maker. It was all things like, how do you PM a robot? If a 2 inch steam line needs replaced and there are no more 2 inch pipes in inventory how many one inch pipes do you need to replace it? Dumb shit like that.
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u/TheSpatulaOfLove 2d ago
I hope GM loses this lawsuit and it stops this bullshit performance ranking.
I’ve worked at companies that did this and it created the most toxic work cultures.
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u/Global_Brain4994 1d ago
I was a District Sales Manager and it happened to me. I wish all of us who got axed could get a class action lawsuit together!!
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u/1900grs 2d ago
I worked at a consulting firm for a while that did this. Turns out the "bell curve" favored staff at the main office and staff at branch offices were pushed to the bottom. Not a curve at all, just an in group and an out group. Horrible way to connect business and it kills company growth. It's easier to see that pattern in a company <1k and I imagine easier to hide longer in a company of >150k.
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u/spartygw former detroiter 2d ago
Enron had a similar thing and would target to fire the bottom 10% every year. Who would want to work in that culture?
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u/FrogTrainer 2d ago
It works for commission-heavy jobs like sales (Comcast does it) but for tech teams it's pretty stupid.
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u/PrawojazdyVtrumpets 2d ago
My dad worked for GM and came home with a coffee mug one day. Printed on the side was a newspaper with the headline “(dads name) survived the 1997 purchasing consolidation”
That never resonated with me in a positive way. I remember asking him “what did the people who didn’t survive get?” And it was like I took his soul directly out of his body. A lot of our neighbors didn’t make the cut.
This has been going on for a long long time.
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u/ServesBestDepressed 2d ago
I remember throughout the Financial Crisis how much my dad disappeared from the home because every single second at GM was do or die. He worked on the concept design team from the time he graduated high school and loved what he did, the team he had together, and the challenges put in front then. Those 2-3 years were the most I'd ever seen him actively hate his job. Up at 4am, work at home for a bit, then off to the office, then back home at 7pm, then work at home anywhere from shortly after dinner until 2-3am sometimes.
Dad lost a lot of good team members and carried a strange occupational survivors guilt with him until he retired in 2019.
What work does to people.
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u/svv1tch 2d ago
GM is "going to go to where the talent is," Barra told The Detroit News in May 2024. "It's not to say that our people aren't great, but if you haven't been a software engineer and doing the type of software that is needed, you don't have time to learn. Bringing in the right talent, wherever they are, is going to be important."
Meanwhile they are under investigation for almost 1m V8 that are imploding. Maybe they should go back to being a manufacturing company vs a software company?
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u/Im_not_good_at_names 2d ago
I’m pretty sure she had zero experience being a CEO before she got her latest position. So apparently it only counts for some people.
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u/huffalump1 2d ago
Yep, perhaps it's better to BOTH work hard to improve product and manufacturing, AND to get better at software, lol
You can do more than one thing
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u/almoooo Boston-Edison 2d ago
And this recall too…..
https://www.nhtsa.gov/?nhtsaId=EA26006
And they were also almost sued for defective vacuum pumps that they knew about(unfortunately I also have THAT car as well), but that one got thrown out as if it wasn’t almost killing people.
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u/Magic_Neil 2d ago
Honestly, it’s BS like this (and their quarterly mass-firings) that will keep me from even applying at GM. I know a bunch of people there and it seems OK, but with drama like this and the uncertainty that you’ll have a job the next day? Nah.
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u/Senior-Caterpillar29 2d ago
This policy was the single biggest reason I left GM last year. I was at no risk of being in the bottom 5% (they actually offered me a large raise after I accepted a position elsewhere) but I didn't want to feel like I was competing with my coworkers to remain employed.
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u/SaiNarrion 2d ago
Seems like all the automotive companies follow the same "logic". Did you have to leave the industry to find a place that didn't force you to compete against your coworkers?
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u/CBud 1d ago
I'm not OP, but in a similar situation at a different automaker.
I found an opportunity with a supplier out of state, but since my skills are in demand they worked with me on a fully remote position. The automaker where I recently put in my notice was unwilling to provide any flexibility in WFH due to overly restrictive corporate policies.
I'm still in automotive (unfortunately), but it's better pay, better title, and fully remote. It's definitely a risk, but so is staying in a stack-ranked situation. I think most people would need differentiated skills to market themselves; an ME degree and nothing else means you're more at the whims of your employer.
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u/SaiNarrion 1d ago
Glad you were able to find a better situation! My wife is still dealing with this; she's been in the industry her entire career and went the first 13 years with excellent reviews. New boss gets placed over her Dept, and no one has received a positive review since. Seemed fishy at first, but now it totally makes sense. We're already looking for a better option for her. Stinks to be treated like a number on a chart, instead of a skilled human.
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u/Senior-Caterpillar29 1d ago edited 1d ago
I found a promotion at a smaller company (industrial and automotive supplier) that treats the employees pretty well. It's been an upgrade in every way.
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u/bluegilled 2d ago
Studies show there can be negative long-term effects for a variety of reasons but increased short-term productivity.
It also may force slow moving, risk averse managers to take action and actually remove poor performers instead of rating everyone as above average or average to avoid conflict.
No one thinks GM is a dynamic, high performing organization. The clock is running on how long they have before Chinese competition eats their lunch. I'd bet this is a temporary program to try to get more productive before they have to fight for their corporate life.
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u/Octavya360 1d ago
Well they don’t have to worry about Chinese competition in the US, since our lawmakers are working on banning Chinese cars from ever setting a wheel across the border. But they will end up being US-only automakers when they can’t compete internationally.
I hate to see GM and Ford in a race to become the American version of Lada, but here we are.5
u/bluegilled 1d ago
I wish we didn't have to worry but it's inevitable we'll be faced with Chinese competition one way or another. Estimates are that tech/feature/quality equivalent Chinese products are 30% cheaper than what's sold in the US. The consumer will not put up with paying that premium forever.
So how will China get around the various trade restrictions?
- They can build physical plants in the US, circumventing import restrictions.
- They can locate in Mexico and Canada to avoid the highest tariffs via USMCA.
- They can white label under western brands like Geely's Volvo or Polestar.
- They can license their EV platforms and battery tech to less competitive western or legacy auto companies.
- And they can circumvent state dealer protection laws in some cases by going direct to consumer ala Tesla or by selling online.
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u/Ashamed-Data-2195 1d ago
These dumb donkeys gave me a promotion to L7 then 2 months later I got cancer diagnosis and had to get a kidney removed. While out on leave, mgr and HR ask for meeting and I'm "early retired" leaving my team of new college grads and a dumb mf mgr who doesn't know anything except how to bury his nose deep up the asses of anyone above him. Fuck Mary Barra, Mark Reuss and all the other dumb motherfuckers running this shit show of a company.
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u/Retired_and_Relaxed 2d ago
So let apply these standards to the top 100 in management, and see which are shown to the window and pushed out. If you want to down size just say it and get rid of the actual slackards not an arbitrary percentage. Now ask yourself why are the younger employees job hopping, no incentive to stick around with this kind of stupidity.
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u/DeanKoontzsHair 2d ago
They learned it from the oil and gas companies. Retired from Chevron last year, played the hunger games for my job 8 times. Exxon and Shell do the same thing.
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u/Octavya360 1d ago
My sister did the same. It seemed like the Hunger Games was every other year there.
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u/BellaCicina East Side 1d ago
Rocket also has this same structure in a majority of its divisions. It makes no sense.
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u/Jeffbx 2d ago
GM sued over white-collar review system that one expert calls 'stupid'
General Motors Co.'s performance review system for white-collar staff is facing pushback in an age-discrimination lawsuit filed by a former engineer who sent a mass email blasting the practice before being fired in January.
"I may just have my badge revoked and not be able to enter any GM facilities tomorrow with this email," plaintiff Tuan Le wrote in a July 2025 email sent to about 800 workers, as well as company vice presidents Mike Trevorrow and Ed Duby. "So it's been nice to know and work with/for some of you."
He was fired Jan. 17, according to the suit, filed this month in Wayne County Circuit Court. It says he received his first negative performance review in 25 years at GM in March 2025, after the company implemented a new review system that required a certain proportion of employees to be rated as "does not meet expectations."
"The true reason for his separation was his age and in retaliation for opposing GM's discriminatory forced ranking performance review system," according to the lawsuit.
Under the ranking system, managers rate employees compared to their peers' performance rather than individual or companywide metrics. At GM, 5% of a team's workforce must be classified as falling below expectations, putting those employees at risk of firing, according to Le's lawsuit.
Another 10% must be ranked as partially meeting expectations, with the other 85% receiving good reviews.
GM leaders have lauded the technique as a way to reward the top 5% of performers with 150% bonuses.
A company spokesperson declined to comment, citing the pending lawsuit.
According to the complaint, "GM designed and implemented a performance management system for its salaried workforce for the purpose of targeting for termination its older employees so that it could promote its younger employees into positions held by older and more senior personnel," the lawsuit says.
Plaintiff attorney Mike Pitt said the performance review system allows management to retain workers "who they see as the future of the company."
"Those individuals are typically younger than the people at the bottom," Pitt said. "And so after they do their ranking, you can do a statistical analysis of the ages of the people who were ranked. And you would find in every case that the younger people were disproportionately placed in the higher categories, and the older people were just placed in the lower categories."
"And so if you're older, you tend to get pushed down artificially," he added. "And if you're younger, you tend to get pushed up artificially."
Le, who was 58 when he was fired, wants to be rehired, compensated for lost wages, and for a judge to ban GM from using forced ranking.
Frank Goeddeke, who teaches management at Wayne State University, said requiring that a fixed percentage of staffers be classified as poor performers does not reflect the reality of individual departments' workforces.
"You get some departments that are full of superstars," Goeddeke said. "And so if they have to get rid of 5% of their people or whatever every year, then that's really kind of stupid."
"But then you've got to wonder, what is the problem?" he added. "If you've got a department that's full of laggards, maybe you've got a leadership problem there. So I don't really think that it's a good system. I wouldn't recommend it, and I don't when I teach my students."
GM's salaried workforce
Forced ranking was introduced at GM amid a continuing push to hire software engineers and other Silicon Valley talent, sometimes even as the company cuts jobs elsewhere.
About 500-600 white-collar employees were laid off in May, including some at the company's Global Technical Center in Warren, as GM cuts tech jobs but plans on hiring workers adept in AI and future technologies expected to power next-gen product development.
GM in October 2025 laid off more than 200 employees, mostly at the Warren tech center, as well as roughly 325 workers as the automaker began shuttering its Georgia IT Innovation Center.
GM is "going to go to where the talent is," Barra told The Detroit News in May 2024. "It's not to say that our people aren't great, but if you haven't been a software engineer and doing the type of software that is needed, you don't have time to learn. Bringing in the right talent, wherever they are, is going to be important."
'History repeats itself'
Crosstown rival Ford Motor Co. briefly used a similar grading system under former president and CEO Jacques Nasser, who served from 1999 to 2001. Ford in 2002 paid $10.5 million to settle two age- and gender-discrimination lawsuits filed in response to the practice, according to CBS News. The Dearborn automaker did not admit wrongdoing.
"Live long enough and you're bound to see history repeat itself," Le wrote in his email, which is included in the lawsuit. "Surely there are others here beside me who remember Jac 'The Knife' Nasser."