Moreover, the company undertook disciplinary actions against 5 other employees. The engineers and others in the company ignored the issue considering it to be a customer-convenience problem rather than a safety issue. CEO Mary Barra, Mark Reuss, the chief of global product development, two other top executives and Michael Millikin were unaware of the defect till Jan 2014. General Motors also plans to launch a program to compensate the crash victims and the affected families. Under this program, the automaker will be accepting claims from Aug 1. In addition, General Motors undertook five strategies, the first being the appointment of Jeff Boyer as the vice president of Safety. Secondly, General Motors hired 35 safety investigators, to identify and address issues faster. Next, the company introduced Speak Up for Safety program, under which the employees are encouraged to report any potential safety issue.