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Botched Explorer Launch, Puts CEO on Hot Seat


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23 minutes ago, Harley Lover said:

He deserves the pressure. He's been talking up his changes to the organization - time to skip the talk and produce the results.

 

Yeah, there's been a stumbling of Explorer, but I'm not worried with what's coming in the pipeline.

 

The biggest thing I think about is quality.

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15 minutes ago, rmc523 said:

 

Yeah, there's been a stumbling of Explorer, but I'm not worried with what's coming in the pipeline.

 

The biggest thing I think about is quality.

 

I think quality was what he was referring to.  Unless changes are made why would we not expect these problems with Bronco or Mach-E launches?

 

I hope this will convince Hackett that more attention needs to be paid to quality now.

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33 minutes ago, Harley Lover said:

He deserves the pressure. He's been talking up his changes to the organization - time to skip the talk and produce the results.

 

I agree that Hackett deserves to be in the hot seat. But Ford has been botching new product launches for many years prior to Hackett becoming CEO. Ford's corporate culture tolerates making the same mistakes over and over. And managers & executives blame others when they screw up. 

 

Changing that culture for the better is going to take time. It's a huge challenge even for a good businessman like Hackett. Making things even more challenging is that Ford is a publicly traded company. Investors and analysts are justifiably frustrated at the pace of Ford's "fitness" initiatives.

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29 minutes ago, rmc523 said:

 

Yeah, there's been a stumbling of Explorer, but I'm not worried with what's coming in the pipeline.

 

The biggest thing I think about is quality.

 

The point is he has emphasized his changes to the organization and its processes - where are the results when it comes to quality and new product introduction? As noted by the article, he took ownership of the Explorer - again, where are the results?

 

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7 minutes ago, mackinaw said:

Hackett is the top man, so he'll get all the blame, or the credit, but I'm starting to wonder about Joe Hinrichs.  Manufacturing was supposed to be Hinrichs strong suit.  He's the guy in charge of new model launches.  

 

That's a fair point too. That was his 'claim to fame' coming through the ranks. However, his plate is much larger than manufacturing now, so I'm not sure this can be laid on his doorstep.

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I keep reading about how awful the Chicago plant is, as far as racism, bullying, people not doing their jobs (aka quality issues) and lack of management leadership.  By all accounts, the Explorer/Aviator launch has been an absolute failure. How much of that falls on Chicago vs Ford's generally poor launch woes? 

 

How does Ford correct these systemic issues? 

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29 minutes ago, akirby said:

 

I think quality was what he was referring to.  Unless changes are made why would we not expect these problems with Bronco or Mach-E launches?

 

I hope this will convince Hackett that more attention needs to be paid to quality now.

 

Escape hasn't seemed to have any issues **knocks on wood** which is ironic given the 2013 launch.  They ought to analyze that changeover and apply that to other launches.  Unless it's just because it wasn't such a drastic changeover.

 

14 minutes ago, Harley Lover said:

 

The point is he has emphasized his changes to the organization and its processes - where are the results when it comes to quality and new product introduction? As noted by the article, he took ownership of the Explorer - again, where are the results?

 

 

I mean.  I've never heard him mention quality - which is a huge criticism I have of him.  So it sounds like it's not been a focus of his.

 

It can also be tied to cost cutting....are they tightening the screws on suppliers too much?

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24 minutes ago, Harley Lover said:

 

The point is he has emphasized his changes to the organization and its processes - where are the results when it comes to quality and new product introduction? As noted by the article, he took ownership of the Explorer - again, where are the results?

 

 

I've never heard the changes that Hackett talks about being tied to quality.  They're all tied to changing the product development process and the process of deciding what to build and when (or what not to build) and how that ties back into profitability.   Which is all great.  

 

But accelerating products and designing a lot of new products including some outside the box things like autonomous vehicle management platforms takes money and resources.   I think Hackett is simply putting quality 2nd at this point, exchanging some product issues and a black eye to get things out the door faster and not lose as much revenue.  He may also be cutting costs behind the scenes to fund these other projects.

 

Personally I think a balance would be better - put a little more time and money and effort into retooling and new product launches and delay the products an extra month or two.   Then again I don't see the balance sheet so maybe financially he's making the right decision.   Sure is frustrating though.

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15 minutes ago, jcartwright99 said:

I keep reading about how awful the Chicago plant is, as far as racism, bullying, people not doing their jobs (aka quality issues) and lack of management leadership.  By all accounts, the Explorer/Aviator launch has been an absolute failure. How much of that falls on Chicago vs Ford's generally poor launch woes? 

 

How does Ford correct these systemic issues? 

 

Where is the UAW?  Why aren't they doing something about it?  Ford's options are limited without union cooperation.  From what I've read it's the local union reps doing the bullying.

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15 minutes ago, jcartwright99 said:

I keep reading about how awful the Chicago plant is, as far as racism, bullying, people not doing their jobs (aka quality issues) and lack of management leadership.  By all accounts, the Explorer/Aviator launch has been an absolute failure. How much of that falls on Chicago vs Ford's generally poor launch woes? 

 

How does Ford correct these systemic issues? 

 

Get out of the city of Chicago which is a racist, corrupt place. Build a new plant in Texas and produce Explorer/Aviator there. ?

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1 minute ago, akirby said:

 

Where is the UAW?  Why aren't they doing something about it?  Ford's options are limited without union cooperation.  From what I've read it's the local union reps doing the bullying.

 

From my extremely limited experience with the union reps, they play favorites. We've seen that these positions (union reps) aren't impervious corruption and poor decision making. Unfortunately, there isn't much that can be done once these folks are elected.It's like hitting the lottery for these folks that get in these positions. Again, this is just my experience in a stamping plant that no longer exists (in it's stamping form). And yes, there was a lot of bullying/racism, and unacceptable behavior that got overlooked.

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18 minutes ago, akirby said:

 

Where is the UAW?  Why aren't they doing something about it?  Ford's options are limited without union cooperation.  From what I've read it's the local union reps doing the bullying.

 

I'm sure you read the Ford Employee sub-forum.  Those Chicago Assembly employees who post there have been talking about serious plant issues at CAP for years.  Racism, sexism and bullying are part of the CAP culture.  You can't build a quality vehicle if you're being harassed.  As for the UAW, considering how messed up their leadership is right now, I expect little to no help from them.

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2 minutes ago, mackinaw said:

 

I'm sure you read the Ford Employee sub-forum.  Those Chicago Assembly employees who post there have been talking about serious plant issues at CAP for years.  Racism, sexism and bullying are part of the CAP culture.  You can't build a quality vehicle if you're being harassed.  As for the UAW, considering how messed up their leadership is right now, I expect little to no help from them.

 

Honestly, if Ford/UAW can't get it under control just close the plant. I don't want them to do that but if it can't get with the program then do it. As a stockholder and a Ford supporter,  results matter. 

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1 hour ago, akirby said:

 

I've never heard the changes that Hackett talks about being tied to quality.  They're all tied to changing the product development process and the process of deciding what to build and when (or what not to build) and how that ties back into profitability.   Which is all great.  

 

But accelerating products and designing a lot of new products including some outside the box things like autonomous vehicle management platforms takes money and resources.   I think Hackett is simply putting quality 2nd at this point, exchanging some product issues and a black eye to get things out the door faster and not lose as much revenue.  He may also be cutting costs behind the scenes to fund these other projects.

 

Personally I think a balance would be better - put a little more time and money and effort into retooling and new product launches and delay the products an extra month or two.   Then again I don't see the balance sheet so maybe financially he's making the right decision.   Sure is frustrating though.

 

Quality is part and parcel to product development, and frankly a part of the entire business process if quality is important to management. What you seem to be saying is that Hackett (by omission) does not place proper emphasis on quality. That's on him - now a critical product launch and Ford's profitability are taking a hit because of that omission. Also on him. 

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54 minutes ago, jcartwright99 said:

 

Honestly, if Ford/UAW can't get it under control just close the plant. I don't want them to do that but if it can't get with the program then do it. As a stockholder and a Ford supporter,  results matter. 


Its not like this is new at Chicago - It has always been S*** when it came to worker problems, and crap build quality. Ford should have closed Chicago and kept Atlanta in 2006. Atlanta always had better quality numbers than Chicago. Only thing I can think of was accountants got involved and realized that the land in Chicago was worthless and the land in Atlanta was with tens of millions, never mind the long term cost of those choices.

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5 minutes ago, jasonj80 said:


Its not like this is new at Chicago - It has always been S*** when it came to worker problems, and crap build quality. Ford should have closed Chicago and kept Atlanta in 2006. Atlanta always had better quality numbers than Chicago. Only thing I can think of was accountants got involved and realized that the land in Chicago was worthless and the land in Atlanta was with tens of millions, never mind the long term cost of those choices.

 

The biggest problem with Atlanta was its so far removed from the supply chain it was much more expensive to ship parts there. 

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39 minutes ago, Harley Lover said:

 

Quality is part and parcel to product development, and frankly a part of the entire business process if quality is important to management. What you seem to be saying is that Hackett (by omission) does not place proper emphasis on quality. That's on him - now a critical product launch and Ford's profitability are taking a hit because of that omission. Also on him. 

 

Exactly.  Or more accurately I'm saying that he's not willing to sacrifice revenue, schedule or new products to avoid current quality issues.   It's always a gamble.  If they have no major problems they're ahead (financially).   If they have major issues then that eats up the savings.

 

Perhaps the changes that would have been required would have caused Bronco or Mach-E to be delayed by 2 months.  That may be worth more than a month or two of poor Explorer sales. 

 

It's always a tradeoff.  TANSTAAFL.  If you spend more money (or lose more money) on one vehicle you have to take it from another vehicle or project.  I just hope those other projects and vehicles are worth the tradeoff.

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Everybody is going off the deep-end and this is just an echo of the BS Bloomberg article that conflated previous allegations with the technical problems of launching a complicated new series of ambitious new products in an all-new factory.  This will all be a distant memory in a matter of months.  I don't know what more to say other than to stand back and don't let clickbait articles fill in the blanks for you.  

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