Last week the
Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced that over 11 million
Volkswagens have technical software inside used to cheat emission tests. This software installed to cheat emission
tests was used to give their cars a more eco friendly eco-label. During
emission tests the cars would stick to standards of the EPA but when driven,
the cars exceeded that level up to over 40 times!
Consequences
What was Chairman of the Volkswagen Board of Directors Martin
Winterkorn thinking when he gave in to installing this software into the cars back in 2009? Though he got away with it for multiple years it probably will cost him his job.
Today news spread that Winterkorn was asked to step
down from being chairman due to a lack of trust. Volkswagen was known for its eco friendly cars
but it turned out it was all one big lie. The consequences of this crisis are huge as well! Volkswagen had to set aside 7.3 billion US Dollars to pay for this crisis
because they have to get all cars that had the software installed back to the factories. And that’s
not all. Volkswagen’s stock value has been dropping with almost 20% today (September 22)! It looks
like Volkswagen has ruined its entire reputation due to a fraud that lasted
over 6 years and the consequences are incredible. All over the internet people
are talking about this crisis with the hashtag #DieselGate.
Almost every tweet is negative towards Volkswagen so you could say Volkswagen
has done some serious damage towards their reputation.
Transparency
It seems so hard for companies to be honest and
transparent towards their stakeholders. In this case Volkswagen lied to every consumer
that they were this eco friendly car manufacturer that had a good eco label and
passed with flying colors on the EPA emission tests. But as you can see, in the
end the truth will come out and it’s better to be transparent from the
beginning than to lie and hope nobody will ever find out. What do you think
Volkswagen should do to regain their reputation or do you think it’s impossible
to get out of a crisis like this?
Lennart
Michels
I think they’ll survive this crisis, since Volkswagen is the biggest car manufacturer in the world! Although they have received a major blow on the stock market and will lose their number one place as the biggest car manufacturer, I think they took the first step of saving their reputation by letting the CEO resign.
ReplyDeletehttp://fd.nl/ondernemen/1112662/volkswagen-grootste-autofabrikant
- Florian ter Voert -
I am not so sure that Volkswagen will recover from this crisis. In my opinion their only hope is that soon will come out that all other car manufacturers are in fact committing the same deceit: 'The Lance Armstrong-effect'. I agree with Florian that the first step should already have been to let Winterkorn's head roll, it is inexcusable that his has not happened yet. When Winterkorn announced that his ambition was to make VW the global marketleader within a couple of years he inherently took the risk that his employees would overheat and make ill-judged short-term decisions. Apart from intrinsically being responsible in his position of CEO, through expressing his ambitions for VW as a company he is also directly responsible for this situation. After the inevitable let go of Winterkorn, I would advise VW to ask an independent committee to commit an inquiry as to find out exactly who is to be held responsible for the decision making that lead to this deceitful piece of software. It must be made entirely clear to all stakeholders, consumers and the public that all involved will be made to leave VW as soon as possible. Otherwise I do fear for the future of Volkswagen as a company.
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteWell Florian, Volkswagen indeed fired their CEO as you can read in this article: http://www.nu.nl/economie/4131225/topman-volkswagen-stapt-wegens-dieselschandaal.html
ReplyDeleteAnd Maarten, I think that would be a good idea!
Lennart
You know that they also posted a message on their social media account..
ReplyDeletehttps://www.facebook.com/DeBesteSocialMedia/photos/a.123264094536200.1073741828.123258531203423/427392874123319/?type=3&theater
it says that; if something's wrong with your auto, share it with us and win a new car!
Today, a bar posted this picture
https://www.facebook.com/DeBesteSocialMedia/photos/a.166454816883794.1073741829.123258531203423/427737824088824/?type=3&theater
saying that if you show the keys of your Volkswagen, you get a free cup of coffee.
So i guess that this thing will continu for a long long time and that there will be a lot of damage for Volkskwagen.
Danique van Hemsbergen
I think that Volkswagen will not survive the crisis easily, just because it's the worlds' biggest car manufacturer. Switzerland for example announced today that they will stop the sale of diesel cars. Volkswagen might survive the crisis in the end, but if more countries will make such decisions, the car brand will be harmed very badly.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.nu.nl/economie/4133419/zwitserland-verbiedt-verkoop-autos-volkswagen-tijdelijk.html
I never said it would be easy to overcome the crisis because they're the biggest. What I meant with that is that some Organizations are just to big to fail (that is probably why the the German government has a dubious role in all of this). Besides that, more car manufacturers (like BMW; http://www.nu.nl/economie/4137389/toezichthouder-vs-breidt-onderzoek-dieselschandaal-andere-merken.html) are now being examined, which will support the survival of VW I guess.
Delete- Florian ter Voert -
I forgot a link:
Deletehttp://www.hln.be/hln/nl/960/Buitenland/article/detail/2464951/2015/09/23/Duitse-overheid-wist-van-fraude-Volkswagen.dhtml
Right now, there's even a separate webpage for the Volkswagen scandal on nu.nl: http://www.nu.nl/volkswagen-schandaal
ReplyDeleteDanique van Hemsbergen
VW apologized with a huge advertisement campaign in all big german Sunday newspapers yesterday, on German Unity Day, promising they would do everything to earn back our trust.
ReplyDeleteThe advertisement says:
Technically here should have been the congratulation for the 25th anniversary of the German Unity.
Technically we wanted to say how happy we are that Germany has grown together as one country again.
Technically we wanted to say how proud we are to have shaped this country together with all of you in the last 25 years.
Technically this would have been the right time to say thank you - for the trust of our customers in our cars and the encouragement that Volkswagen received during this period of time.
Technically we wanted to say how much we appreciate all our employees and partners from all over Germany.
All that would have technically been right.
But now we only want to say one sentence:
We will do everything to earn back your trust.
Some communication professionals are saying that this was necessary but not enough, that VW should be show more remorse and self-criticism. What do you think?