通用汽车任命新的CEO

Muscle, power, grit. When you say cars and manufacturing, that's what may come to mind. But now, make way for this -- woman. General Motors tapped Mary Barra to be the company's next CEO starting in January. She is the first female to lead one of the big three automakers and the workers she'll be overseeing, mostly men. Just 21 percent of the nation's autoworkers are women. But for Barra, the auto industry was a no brainer. She was simply following in her father's footsteps.

- Automotive is kind of in my blood. I grew up in southeastern Michigan. My dad was dye maker at General Motors for about 39 years. So, you know, from the days where you stood outside the dealerships looking to see the new vehicles, that was kind of how I was raised. So, it seems very natural to go into the auto industry.

At 18, Barra took a job at G.M. to help pay her college tuition. She worked her way up to head a global product development, overseeing major product launches for G.M. like the Cadillac CTS, Motor Trend's car of the year.And even though Barra grew up at G.M., she's got a different way of thinking.

- She's recognized the way G.M worked in the past wasn't working. There needs to be less reliance on rules, less reliance on cost cutting, more reliance on what the company is supposed to do, which is building great cars and trucks .

And now as CEO, Barra will join the ranks of other top women in business. Yahoo!'s Marissa Mayer, Meg Whitman of H.P. and Facebook's Sheryl Sandberg. The departure of her predecessor Dan Akerson marks the end of government motors. He is the last CEO appointed under the treasury's watch after the government this week sold its remaining shares of G.M. The automaker is now in the driver's seat of its own company. And Barra is seizing the moment.

-Opportunities will arise that you simply cannot imagine today. Be open to those opportunities when they occur.

Zain Asher, cnn, New York.