As General Motors’ new Vice President of Diversity, what makes Eric Peterson unique is not that he’s an African-American who has managed to climb the corporate ladder, although he is certainly that. Rather, what stands out instantly is the manner in which Peterson has used his all-too-rare achievement as a platform for community-minded interventions. As director of industry dealer affairs, a job he continues to hold, Peterson was already a point man for GM’s relationships with minority- and women-owned dealerships. In his new post, he becomes the public face of an iconic manufacturer’s efforts at strengthening its ties to minority communities nationwide.
Examiner: In your time at GM, have you had many opportunities to provide mentoring to up-and-coming African-American managers or aspiring executives?
Peterson: My whole approach when I move to an area is, one, to have an open-door policy to support people, but more specifically with African-American employees because I want to try and help others in that aspect. When I go into an area I will determine who the high-potential folks are, who are people who have an interest in moving up within the company and have the skills and such and reaching out to them. But in many instances once people get to know me and realize I’m there they reach out to me. But I specifically try to reach out to African-American employees and assist them with their careers whether they’re executive potential, manager potential or just administrative assistants. I mean I just try to help people when I can and have been pretty successful from that aspect.
Examiner: Is there anyone you would credit with helping you on your way up the corporate ladder?
Peterson: One person that really was influential for me was Roy Roberts, who was VP for Pontiac and GMC. I worked really closely with Roy when I was heading up the minority dealer program. He was over our area and he was very helpful in helping me navigate the board presentations that we had to make and working with the corporate world because being relatively new to that level of the business you needed someone and Roy was very instrumental. I stay in touch with him today even though he’s retired.
Examiner: The decline of manufacturing in the U.S. has been much written and talked-about. Do you have any grand thoughts about the continued relevance of heavy industry to the economy?
Peterson: I don’t think there’s any question that it’s very important for us to maintain a manufacturing base, and I think that’s what President Obama understood in his support of the automotive industry during the economic crisis. My perspective is that we can’t continue down the path of just providing services and being a consumer nation. We’ve got to produce something and when you produce something it drives a lot of related industries whether it’s engineering or design, those kinds of things which just generate jobs. If you farm all of that stuff out then you’re losing a lot of your critical base on which to grow from and so I can tell you that, looking at manufacturing, it’s very, very critical that we maintain that. And I think the foresight of President Obama [is] one reason he wanted to step out and help the domestic auto industry.
Examiner: In your time at GM you have worked with minority- and woman-owned dealerships. What are some of the unique challenges that they face, and how did you help them to meet those challenges?
Peterson: I think the big thing that we found is that women and minority dealers [are] usually first- generation and they don’t have the resources of, say, second-, third- and fourth-generation dealers. The automotive business is a big family-oriented business, quite frankly, and that’s one of the challenges for minority dealers, [that] they’re usually the first-generation. It’s very difficult during an economic crisis as we’re all well aware, and a lot of minority businesses didn’t have the financial reserves to fall back on, and we lost a lot of minority businesses during the downturn.
Since we at GM came out of our own low period, we’ve done two things. One, we have a dealership investment arm called Motors Holding, and we invest with dealer candidates who don’t have all of the resources to go into business. And we also have a process in place for those dealers who don’t have the appropriate capital or don’t have the capital as they go through a tough spell; we will support them and provide an infusion of capital to help them through their low spot until they can get back on their feet.
Examiner: How many, if any, minority-owned dealerships had to be closed because of the government bailout and restructuring of the company?
Peterson: As a part of the restructuring, we lost about 28 percent of our dealers overall, and about 35 percent of our minority dealers, and the reason for is that a few years ago when we were appointing dealers to the Saturn and Hummer franchises, which were our newest dealership opportunities we put a lot of minorities in those stores because they were good opportunities and they provided good opportunities for minorities. Unfortunately, when we had to scale back our structure we eliminated Saturn and Hummer. When you’re reducing the amount of brands that you have and you have minorities in those brands that are being eliminated, they’re going to take a bigger hit.
But the story doesn’t end there. We specifically have those minority dealers who lost their Hummer and Saturn franchises that we’re following up on and that we’re offering different opportunities to depending on the geographical area they’re in, their desire to get back into the business and what kind of investment dollars they have. If we walked away and didn’t plan on offering additional opportunities that wouldn’t be good, but because of our commitment to diversity we have them on the radar screen and we’re working as we speak on providing opportunities to those dealers that lost their dealerships.
Examiner: Is there some rebuilding of trust with Black communities that will have to take place in light of recent events?
Peterson: I think overall that General Motors has traditionally been a good corporate and community citizen. I think the one thing we’re doing is that we’ve stepped back and taken a look at those communities in which we’ve done business, and we have a specific strategy that we’re implementing in those cities where we have manufacturing operations and such. We specifically support the efforts of the leadership and management of those areas as they look at community-based programs and we provide funding for that to make sure that we are visible and that we continue to support the communities and that sort of thing.
Examiner: What’s your relationship like with CEO Dan Akerson?
Peterson: Essentially, I took the opportunity to meet with him and I have to tell you I’ve been very impressed with his grasp of the business, [but also] his support and focus on increasing the diversity within GM not only internally but also externally with the companies that we do business with—whether it’s minority dealers, minority suppliers and that type of thing. So I’ve really been pleased and impressed in a very short period of time. But yes, I have met with him and will do so on an ongoing basis periodically just to keep him updated as to where we’re at on diversity initiatives and to make sure we’re meeting his expectations.
Examiner: What can you point to as being the most important innovations in GM’s approach to diversity since you’ve had a leading role in it?
Peterson: Well, I think a couple of things. GM has always been on the forefront [when it comes to diversity]—we established the first minority supplier program in ’68, the first minority dealer program in ’72 and the first women’s program in 2001. Our commitment to diversity has really been a model for the automotive industry, I don’t think there’s any question about that. We consciously chose this past year to keep our corporate global headquarters right in downtown Detroit, which there’s been a lot written about. What we’ve done on recently is really putting our resources out there, not just paying lip service. We committed $2 million to areas in Detroit to help with recreation centers for after-school programs. We also committed $27 million over five years through the United Way to help improve education and helping specific high schools to improve their curriculum and after-school programs. We’re taking our resources and looking at the landscape and trying to figure out how to help, especially, this big community that we’re in that has fallen on hard times and reinvesting in the community. These were things that were on the radar before but since I’ve been here these are some of the things we’ve done and that’s where I’ve been proud of our leadership, of making these kinds of decisions and investing in the communities where we do business.
Examiner: Back when you were in and around Dallas you were a member of Golden Gate Baptist Church. What can you say about that experience?
Peterson: What I try to do whenever I go into a new community—we’ve moved 11 times—is that I kind of step back and [decide] what groups I want to get involved with, what organizations. Because my whole focus is to give back, because we all stand on other people’s shoulders, we don’t do it all by ourselves. The experience at Golden Gate involved participating in the community because of their outreach program for people that were dependent on drugs and such and I felt that was very important to help those that are less fortunate. I’m doing the same thing right now here in Detroit. I’ve talked to a couple of organizations, evaluating what they do, and a lot of my focus is trying to work to help kids to have opportunities so that they can prepare themselves for adulthood and be productive citizens.
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© Dallas Examiner. All rights reserved.
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