Whatever Müller says, if, as is widely expected, he becomes VW’s chief executive today, it won’t be anything like this.
Nor will it be said by any of his rivals if VW springs a surprise. It’s not as if there is any real pressure from the complacent fund managers who represent the mainstream of the investment community to do so.
Which is partly why we will all be here again when some other company falls on its face.
Müller’s mentor, Martin Winterkorn, professed himself “shocked” at the revelations of VW installing devices in some of its diesel vehicles to cheat US emissions tests.
Resignation: Martin Winterkorn
Sean Gallup/Getty Images
Upon resigning on a €1m-a-year pension, he said: “I am not aware of any wrongdoing on my part.”
In so doing Winterkorn was simply repeating the words of bankers confronted with evidence of the scandals that have blackened their industry’s name, and exacted a brutal toll upon their investors.
“Hang on, my man had skin in the game,” one of his spin doctors told me just before his man walked. “He’s got stacks of shares.”
But those shares were no-questions-asked gifts. So they weren’t valued, not in the way they would have been had they been secured through blood, sweat and the risk of ruin. Which is what genuine entrepreneurs face.
When things go wrong, the professional managers that run big public companies lose their jobs, and some of their respect. They may trade being very wealthy for being slightly less wealthy.
So scandals like that at VW will recur because executives know that the consequences of falling asleep at the wheel are far from deadly.
.jpeg?quality=75&auto=webp&width=320&crop=8:5,smart)
