Mary Barra, the Contender: GM's Next CEO May Not Be a 'Car Guy'

At General Motors’ Detroit headquarters, executive offices tend to be on high floors, have amazing views of the Detroit River, and contain a collection of model cars. The latter is especially true for car guys, that swaggering breed involved in design or engineering as opposed to accounting or human resources. Two things set apart the office of GM’s current No. 1 car guy: One, its occupant is a woman. Two, sitting on a cabinet among the toy cars is an Albert Einstein bobblehead.

Mary Barra, GM’s first female chief product officer, is coy about the bobblehead. Her boss, GM Chief Executive Officer Daniel Akerson, gave it to her after a war-game competition among executives to see who could best attack GM. Barra’s team won. “It was really about what strategy we were going to take,” says Barra, who’s been at the company for 33 years. She’s responsible for the design and quality of all GM cars and trucks. Asked to share her secret to defeating GM, she smiles, and the lessons she learned in the HR and public-relations departments kick in. “Um, I don’t really want to tell you.”