Ford Quality Czar Says Issues Should Subside in 2023

[fuzzymoomoo]

33 minutes ago, akirby said:

The Chicago plant mgr was either fired or replaced over the Explorer launch. 

Don't forget it cost Joe Hinrichs his job as well. 

[jcartwright99]

To me, this most troubling of the quality issues it seems to stem from three places. Bean counters who always push for the lowest cost suppliers (which tend to have lower quality and higher failure rate), engineering for making some monumental gaffes, and production. They're all guilty. Some vehicles suffer from all 3 of these issues. 

[coupe3w]

20 minutes ago, jcartwright99 said:

To me, this most troubling of the quality issues it seems to stem from three places. Bean counters who always push for the lowest cost suppliers (which tend to have lower quality and higher failure rate), engineering for making some monumental gaffes, and production. They're all guilty. Some vehicles suffer from all 3 of these issues. 

 

You get what you pay for.

[jose]

The whole working from home thing with so many important launches is a huge problem in my o.p

All the while production is hands on,and does get held accountable for the most part. I understand production has no choice,but their just to many moving pieces for engineering not to be with their teams,and visiting suppliers. 

[AM222]

3 hours ago, akirby said:

The Chicago plant mgr was either fired or replaced over the Explorer launch.  It’s not as easy to switch suppliers and not as easy to hold them accountable if you’re nickel and diming them to death.

 

It has to come from Farley all the way down to say quality is more important than cost and schedule delays and employees and suppliers will be held accountable.  Not sure he’s gone that far yet.

I guess the problem is models that came after the 2020 Explorer like the Bronco and Maverick still have serious issues. Engine failure on the Bronco (isn't the 2.7 EB the same engine also used by the F150?) and under hood fire in the Maverick hybrid (same as the electrified Escape and Corsair)

Edited July 12, 2022 by AM222

[fuzzymoomoo]

56 minutes ago, AM222 said:

Engine failure on the Bronco (isn't the 2.7 EB the same engine also used by the F150?) 

It is but the issue was specific to the bronco and traced to a bad batch of valves. 

[akirby]

55 minutes ago, AM222 said:

I guess the problem is models that came after the 2020 Explorer like the Bronco and Maverick still have serious issues. Engine failure on the Bronco (isn't the 2.7 EB the same engine also used by the F150?) and under hood fire in the Maverick hybrid (same as the electrified Escape and Corsair)

The 2.7 issue is a bad batch of valves which goes back to supplier requirements and oversight.  Luck of the draw they mostly ended up in Broncos.

Bronco roof was a combination of too aggressive requirements and not allowing enough time to test and fix the final product along with an overconfident supplier.

Ecoboost coolant intrusion was an engineering defect.

 

Bad engineering, bad parts, bad business decisions and bad assembly all have separate causes and remedies.

[AM222]

28 minutes ago, akirby said:

The 2.7 issue is a bad batch of valves which goes back to supplier requirements and oversight.  Luck of the draw they mostly ended up in Broncos.

Bronco roof was a combination of too aggressive requirements and not allowing enough time to test and fix the final product along with an overconfident supplier.

Ecoboost coolant intrusion was an engineering defect.

 

Bad engineering, bad parts, bad business decisions and bad assembly all have separate causes and remedies.

A chunk of the issues seem to be supplier-related. But having issues one after the other...  something is wrong with the quality control of Ford's suppliers.  

[jasonj80]

1 hour ago, AM222 said:

I guess the problem is models that came after the 2020 Explorer like the Bronco and Maverick still have serious issues. Engine failure on the Bronco (isn't the 2.7 EB the same engine also used by the F150?) and Under Hood fire in the Maverick hybrid (same as the electrified Escape and Corsair)

Maverick/Escape/Corsair is they sealed the engine compartment too well for aero dynamics and created an unintended issue if there is a leak it can build up flammable gas. The fix will end up costing MPGs as they add venting by removing the aero shutters and open the engine underneath. 

2020 Explorer/Aviator was a program that started and stopped so much that many different people worked on the project that had limited knowledge of where the program was at.  The program launched almost 2 years after it was intended with a completely different cast of people that started it back in 2013.  

95% Ford's problem is bean counters get in and force engineering to make changes based on cost, they don't understand engineering and frankly don't care. They get their bonus for cost reductions and walk away from a disaster and just blame engineering or assembly when their are issues. Bean counters don't listen to the people that assembly the vehicles (They are completely below them)  and while engineering isn't always the best at that when fixes are proposed for possible quality issue or ease of assembly they are dismissed as expensive and "that's their job" along with there is no metrics to show that will save money. The higher up MBA bean counters agree with them that the engineer should have seen this or "used a better design". Ford loves Bean counters as the Whizkids put those policies in place in the late 40's and is intertwined in Ford's culture to the core. They are the direct reason for the decontenting that takes place, and Farley is right there with them. Apparently his latest push is to dump the keypad on the drivers side door for more cost savings, he is the direct reason the F-150 doesn't have access on the back doors with keyless entry. Every program now has to fight for any feature that is deemed outside of being necessary. Basically if GM on trucks or Tesla doesn't offer it, Ford doesn't need it. Lincoln is also under brutal attacks for resources, China is saving Lincoln right now from being shutdown. Farley is losing a lot of respect right now from engineering because if it isn't his way, it is wrong even if consumer data or trends is different. There is also a mass exodus from engineering right now at Ford, they don't feel respected in what they do and they want low cost engineers and have run all the senior leaders out with a lot of instructional knowledge so the same mistakes are being repeated over and over and CYA is just as alive at Ford for decisions as it has ever been. 

[coupe3w]

47 minutes ago, AM222 said:

A chunk of the issues seem to be supplier-related. But having issues one after the other...  something is wrong with the quality control of Ford's suppliers.  

 

Ford should do constant supplier site visits and do them unannounced.

[iamweasel]

4 hours ago, jcartwright99 said:

To me, this most troubling of the quality issues it seems to stem from three places. Bean counters who always push for the lowest cost suppliers (which tend to have lower quality and higher failure rate), engineering for making some monumental gaffes, and production. They're all guilty. Some vehicles suffer from all 3 of these issues. 

 

Those 3 things are not the biggest problem when it comes to vehicle quality.  The #1 issue, by far, is supplier component quality.    This is partly why the supplier relations with the "Big 3" have been so controversial over the years.  In a nutshell, Ford would pay 10-20% more for their components versus what the Asian brands pay, and those components were lesser quality, too.  Uh-oh.....

 

To address your concerns:

1)  Bean counters NEVER push for lower cost suppliers.  NEVER.  That's not how it works.  (Speaking as a former Ford Product Development Program Manager for the F-150.)  Those bean counters simply rack-up the data on where the cost of the vehicle stands compared to the budget given by the Board of Directors/Upper Management.  (Marketing management provides revenue assumptions.)  At that point, if the cost/revenue balance is not where it needs to be then the Chief Engineer/Program Manager decide together where costs need to be trimmed, and the finance folks help with that given they control the cost data for every part on the vehicle.  

 

2)  There are some issues in Ford engineering.  Main issue is we had a product development playbook - FOLLOW IT.  Do not let half the team move on past a checkpoint if the other half hasn't finished yet.   That was the biggest issue I saw in my 15 years at the company.  Then you have all these different groups (chassis vs powertrain vs electrical, etc) doing different things at different times for the same truck and things get off-kilter, teams waste time working on old, or duplicate, assumptions, etc.  Left foot and right foot must work together here.  

 

The other "issue" with engineering is packaging.  Sometimes the way the pieces fit together just doesn't work as intended.  (Maybe a harness rubs against something when we thought there was enough space there.)  

 

3)  Production issues rarely matter when it comes to long term durability.  Plants are so dummy-proofed these days.  Generally speaking warranty repairs under 90-days are scrutinized to see what went wrong, and some are plant-related issues and some aren't.   Only about 25% of these issues is due to something done wrong during final assembly.  After 90-days, a high majority of those warranty claims are due to component failure of some sort - not due to how an operator at the plant put it on.

[iamweasel]

1 hour ago, jasonj80 said:

95% Ford's problem is bean counters get in and force engineering to make changes based on cost, they don't understand engineering and frankly don't care. They get their bonus for cost reductions and walk away from a disaster and just blame engineering or assembly when their are issues. Bean counters don't listen to the people that assembly the vehicles (They are completely below them)  and while engineering isn't always the best at that when fixes are proposed for possible quality issue or ease of assembly they are dismissed as expensive and "that's their job" along with there is no metrics to show that will save money. The higher up MBA bean counters agree with them that the engineer should have seen this or "used a better design". Ford loves Bean counters as the Whizkids put those policies in place in the late 40's and is intertwined in Ford's culture to the core. They are the direct reason for the decontenting that takes place, and Farley is right there with them. Apparently his latest push is to dump the keypad on the drivers side door for more cost savings, he is the direct reason the F-150 doesn't have access on the back doors with keyless entry. Every program now has to fight for any feature that is deemed outside of being necessary. Basically if GM on trucks or Tesla doesn't offer it, Ford doesn't need it. Lincoln is also under brutal attacks for resources, China is saving Lincoln right now from being shutdown. Farley is losing a lot of respect right now from engineering because if it isn't his way, it is wrong even if consumer data or trends is different. There is also a mass exodus from engineering right now at Ford, they don't feel respected in what they do and they want low cost engineers and have run all the senior leaders out with a lot of instructional knowledge so the same mistakes are being repeated over and over and CYA is just as alive at Ford for decisions as it has ever been. 

 

So much mis-information in this post.  Wow......

 

Again, as I said in my prior post, bean counters do not force cost reductions on anything.  The Chief Engineer/Program Manager are in charge of that.  Just because the bean counters give them the reports showing how far over cost they are doesn't mean they are telling engineers to shave dollars off their parts.  For starters, they don't know enough about vehicle mechanics/engineering to have those conversations.  

 

Oh, and bean counters don't get bonuses like that, either.  (Before I was a Program Manager I was a bean counter - so I know how it goes.)

 

Product level bean counters don't really get involved in plant assembly.  That's an entirely different crew and ergonomic engineers drive the bus on all of that.

 

As far as the door keypad/rear tailgate stuff, again not a bean counter decision but if Marketing says those are things that will not incur any additional revenue or the incremental revenue is below cost then why do it?  Think about it for a second - is the keypad on the door nice?  Of course....I love it.  But would I buy a Ford over something else because of it?  No.

 

I do agree with you on the mass exodus from engineering. That's been a longtime problem.  Those jobs are rough......they are less designers (which is what they want to be) and more paperwork pushers, and they have to deal with suppliers all the time which sucks.

 

 

[iamweasel]

1 hour ago, coupe3w said:

 

Ford should do constant supplier site visits and do them unannounced.

 

The problem is there is nowhere to go in many cases.  There are only so many suppliers in the world, and many of them aren't open to taking on new clients.  (Ever heard of Keiretsu?  It's still alive and well in many cases.)  

 

When I was on F-150, we were mandated to change our offshore sourcing from 2% to 10% for my program.  That meant we had to fire North American suppliers and get a replacement from Asia.  OH-MY-GOD that was painful as hell and a miserable experience.  I still can't walk by an 2009-2014 F-150 and stop myself from swearing at the antenna because re-sourcing that was one of the most miserable experiences I had.  Cannot count how many hours I spent on that for a freaking $10 part.

 

What happened was the A/B-Tier suppliers refused to do business with us, so we ended up dealing with C/D-Tier suppliers (think startups) to satisfy our offshore sourcing requirement.  We did save a few bucks, but I know the quality was worse - no doubt about it.

[fuzzymoomoo]

28 minutes ago, iamweasel said:

I do agree with you on the mass exodus from engineering. That's been a longtime problem.  Those jobs are rough......they are less designers (which is what they want to be) and more paperwork pushers, and they have to deal with suppliers all the time which sucks.

Its a problem with suppliers too. My dad as worked most of my life at suppliers and only a small time directly at Ford when I was young, first at Roush for 12 years, then at Cooper Standard for a few years and now at Magna for the last 8, most of the time on Ford programs and the amount of goalpost moving he's had to endure over the years would make most people's head spin. It's why he's always stuck to being a designer despite dozens of opportunities to move up to engineering over the years. 

[fuzzymoomoo]

31 minutes ago, iamweasel said:

Product level bean counters don't really get involved in plant assembly.  That's an entirely different crew and ergonomic engineers drive the bus on all of that.

For those that aren't aware, the unions in US and Canada have a lot of say in that as well, especially when it comes to ergonomics. Not sure about Mexico since their "unions" are pretty much that in name only. 

[akirby]

32 minutes ago, iamweasel said:

As far as the door keypad/rear tailgate stuff, again not a bean counter decision but if Marketing says those are things that will not incur any additional revenue or the incremental revenue is below cost then why do it?  Think about it for a second - is the keypad on the door nice?  Of course....I love it.  But would I buy a Ford over something else because of it?  No.

I would and so would a lot of folks.  But it’s not just 1 feature.  You do that a dozen times and customers get pissed off especially conveniences like rear door IAT sensors.  That was a real bitch for me coming from a Fusion that had them to an Escape that didn’t.  And both were Titaniums.

 

They're not considering the impact on customer perception and customer satisfaction and that has a direct impact on future sales and profit margin.  It’s short sighted and assumes buyers don’t care.

[coupe3w]

So the title of this thread said things will change. After reading what iamweasel and fuzzmoomoo said I don't see anything changing. Like I said before its all blah, blah, blah......

[rperez817]

22 minutes ago, coupe3w said:

So the title of this thread said things will change. After reading what iamweasel and fuzzmoomoo said I don't see anything changing. Like I said before its all blah, blah, blah......

 

I thought the same thing coupe3w after reading the info iamweasel and fuzzymoomoo shared in this thread. I thought that Jim Hackett's and Jim Farley's efforts to get Ford "fit" would chip away at the culture within the company that tolerates making the same mistakes over and over, but it sounds like culture change is not occurring as fast or as extensively as it should.

Edited July 12, 2022 by rperez817

[fuzzymoomoo]

31 minutes ago, coupe3w said:

So the title of this thread said things will change. After reading what iamweasel and fuzzmoomoo said I don't see anything changing. Like I said before its all blah, blah, blah......

I could very easily get myself in trouble in this thread..... All I can say is I do my part by giving feedback on what can be improved. Any member of management I've ever talked to could confirm that I'm not afraid to be blunt with them whenever they ask my opinion. What happens with that info from there is far beyond my control. 

Edited July 12, 2022 by fuzzymoomoo

[akirby]

25 minutes ago, rperez817 said:

 

I thought the same thing coupe3w after reading the info iamweasel and fuzzymoomoo shared in this thread. I thought that Jim Hackett's and Jim Farley's efforts to get Ford "fit" would chip away at the culture within the company that tolerates making the same mistakes over and over, but it sounds like culture change is not occurring as fast or as extensively as it should.

It remains to be seen what process changes happen in the Model E division.  It will be easier to make big changes there as opposed to Blue.

[iamweasel]

54 minutes ago, rperez817 said:

 

I thought the same thing coupe3w after reading the info iamweasel and fuzzymoomoo shared in this thread. I thought that Jim Hackett's and Jim Farley's efforts to get Ford "fit" would chip away at the culture within the company that tolerates making the same mistakes over and over, but it sounds like culture change is not occurring as fast or as extensively as it should.

 

Now I didn't address whether meaningful change is occurring right now or not.  That is still possible,  as there have been some things in the works but I'd classify them as minor changes.  We'll see what else gets done in the coming months.....

 

I'd still argue that changing policies is not the biggest issue.  In fact, some stability and simply sticking to whatever policies are currently in-place is probably a more effective route IMO.  As one of the previous posters mentioned, stop moving the goalposts all the time!    

[jcartwright99]

1 hour ago, fuzzymoomoo said:

I could very easily get myself in trouble in this thread..... All I can say is I do my part by giving feedback on what can be improved. Any member of management I've ever talked to could confirm that I'm not afraid to be blunt with them whenever they ask my opinion. What happens with that info from there is far beyond my control. 

 

That's all you can do, Fuzzy. It's up to management if they want to listen and/or react. The thing to remember about management, they don't want to make too much noise and rock the boat too much. If they do, they will have a target on their back.

[rperez817]

2 hours ago, akirby said:

It remains to be seen what process changes happen in the Model E division.  It will be easier to make big changes there as opposed to Blue.

 

Good point akirby. Acknowledging what others have shared in this thread about organizational change management, supplier relations, quality, etc., it makes Jim Farley's decision to create the separate Model E and Blue divisions even more brilliant.

[coupe3w]

39 minutes ago, rperez817 said:

 

Good point akirby. Acknowledging what others have shared in this thread about organizational change management, supplier relations, quality, etc., it makes Jim Farley's decision to create the separate Model E and Blue divisions even more brilliant.

 

I don't know about brilliant. The Mach-E has been recalled too don't forget.

[fuzzymoomoo]

36 minutes ago, coupe3w said:

 

I don't know about brilliant. The Mach-E has been recalled too don't forget.

That was also engineered and launched before the business unit split