Spartan Profiles: James Holden
PRESIDENT OF DAIMLER-CHRYSLER
Hailed as “a star inside Chrysler” by Business Week (Nov. 29, 1999), which also credits him for driving “key reforms” in the 1990s and for “revitalizing Chrysler and its culture,” James P. Holden, MBA ’90, the new president of DaimlerChrysler Corp., seems the optimum candidate to steer his company in the turbulent aftermath of 1998’s $36-billion merger between Chrysler and Germany’s Daimler-Benz.
“Our challenge is to emphasize the Chrysler part of DaimlerChrysler,” explains Holden, who hastens to add, “There’s no playbook.”
After four and a half months as president, he says, “We’re feeling pretty good where we stand. We’re developing a better esprit de corps and an understanding of what made Chrysler what it was.”
James is the third alumnus of MSU’s Executive MBA Program in Troy to head one of the “Big Three” auto companies—previously, Robert Stempel, MBA ‘70, headed General Motors, and Alexander Trotman, MBA ‘72, headed Ford Motor Co.
A native of Windsor, Ontario, he joined Ford after graduating from Western Michigan in 1973. In 1981, he moved to Chrysler as a truck division sales manager. In 1988, just when his job—fine turning dealer incentives—would have a direct impact on the company’s financial survival, he began his MBA program. “Yes, it made a critical difference for the company,” he recalls, “but my MBA also made a critical difference to my career.”
In retrospect, James calls his degree-completion “pretty amazing.” He notes, “I had no free time. But I knew it, so I made it work. I’d dictate a school paper or a memo without remembering which one it was. But the MBA was very helpful. It prepared me to look at the total picture. My classmates and I still get together every year.”
