Shift - Inside Nissan's Historic Revival

The turnaround of Nissan has been described as one of the greatest turnarounds of the twentieth century. In Shift - Inside Nissan's Historic Revival, in an unassuming, matter-of-fact style, Carlos Ghosn, the man credited with reviving the fortunes of the ailing Japanese automaker, describes how he managed to achieve a feat which many people thought was impossible.

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The team members were picked carefully. And as in the case of the success of the alliance, Ghosn attributes the success of the teams to the fact that the members were culturally sensitive to needs of other team members, with neither the French nor the Japanese attempting to dominate the other partner. In fact, this is a recurring theme in the book. Ghosn credits Renault with not attempting to take advantage of Nissan's weakened position in the initial period of the alliance. Similarly, he is all praise for the Japanese managers, who embraced the alliance and worked to make it succeed. Ghosn is generous in his assessment of the companies he worked for, his bosses at Michelin and Renault, his colleagues and his subordinates. While he does not seem unduly modest about his own achievements, he appears keen to place it within the appropriate context - the support for the alliance from both the partners, the enlightened and approach adopted by Renault, the circumstances at Nissan which left the company with little alternative but to subject itself to the painful process of restructuring, and the efforts of the various cross-functional teams which were entrusted with the task of formulating and executing the plans for revival.

In fact, in a refreshing change from many memoirs, only one person is criticized in the book - Jose Lopez, the head of purchasing at General Motors, and the hero of the infamous Lopez affair. Lopez left GM in 1992, to join Volkswagen, and was promptly accused by GM of industrial espionage. Ultimately Lopez was fired by Volkswagen. Ghosn, who chanced to interact with Lopez and other GM executives as an OEM tire supplier dismisses Lopez's cost cutting measures as all show and no substance, which served only to worsen GM's relationships with its suppliers.

Ghosn's education in mathematics is reflected in his insistence on analysis and quantitative performance goals. His views of leadership are also interesting. While he claims to have never lost his temper at Nissan, and comes across as a person who cares about and respects people, he is clearly not sentimental about taking hard decisions when necessary.

He is also not opposed to the idea of life time employment as a worthwhile objective for a company. According to him, if a company wants to ensure the loyalty of its employees, it must in turn be willing to demonstrate its loyalty to them, when the occasion so demands.

Given the insularity of the Japanese business world and the distrust with which foreign companies and managers tended to be viewed in the country, Ghosn's achievements are nothing short of astonishing. Within a few years after taking over as CEO of Nissan, not only had he managed to turn the company around completely, but he had also become something of a celebrity - and even a comic book hero - in Japan. He has set even more ambitious targets for Nissan in the years to come. In his new position as CEO of both Nissan and Renault, and in an industry where competition is relentless, achieving these will be no easy task.