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Ford Confirms Layoffs, Says It Is Cutting About 3,000 Jobs - WSJ


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48 minutes ago, fuzzymoomoo said:


Which means the governmental policy is the reason for it being that prohibitively expensive and therefore the government should be liable. 


Thats like saying the government made it illegal to drive 75 in a 65 so the government should pay my ticket.

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34 minutes ago, fuzzymoomoo said:


That's a great way to create a toxic environment wrought with backstabbing, buck passing, and paranoia. 


That should only be done with those who are performing below standard, not based on some subjective percentage.

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1 hour ago, rperez817 said:

 

Jim Farley, like Jim Hackett before him, is very focused on ensuring Ford has the right talent for the "new world" of the automotive industry, while at the same time getting out of the "old world".

 

It would be nice if Ford brought back Jacques Nasser's policy mandating that every year, the lowest performing 10% of managers be subject to termination. Maybe even increase that number to the bottom 20%. That kind of turnover may help Ford achieve the culture change it desperately needs.

I think there are better ways to motivate people than that.  There are a variety of reasons someone might underperform,   but it doesn’t mean they can’t correct it.  If they consistently underperform, that’s different.  

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4 hours ago, rperez817 said:

 

Jim Farley, like Jim Hackett before him, is very focused on ensuring Ford has the right talent for the "new world" of the automotive industry, while at the same time getting out of the "old world".

 

It would be nice if Ford brought back Jacques Nasser's policy mandating that every year, the lowest performing 10% of managers be subject to termination. Maybe even increase that number to the bottom 20%. That kind of turnover may help Ford achieve the culture change it desperately needs.

Bringing back any of Nasser's policies sounds like a wrong move. Built a "House of Brands" sold off for pennies on the dollar. The new models programs were way behind and uninspired. Also after Nasser's departure during the Great Recession, most Ford Salaried were shocked when General reductions came along. Said they never had that. Only from plants closing or for cause. 

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6 hours ago, akirby said:


They weren’t forced to keep it.  If true it just means it would have been more expensive to replace it.

It gets real messy, Ford had the JV with Getrag for the Powerstroke and the program manager basically convinced himself that problems found in development could be fixed on the fly with software upgrades - that was the big mistake. Ford Europe developed the Powershift for markets that wanted an auto with really good economy but when automatics became more popular in Europe, developed the 6F35 automatic versions for its own Euro and global needs. They knew PS was problematic and I’m surprised that lawyers didn’t  used the post 2015 auto trans existence as strong leverage over Ford dragging its feet with Powerstroke owners….

Edited by jpd80
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7 hours ago, tbone said:

There are a variety of reasons someone might underperform,   but it doesn’t mean they can’t correct it.  If they consistently underperform, that’s different.  

 

I think Jacques Nasser's system targeted the consistent underperformers. In his A-B-C grading system for Ford managers, the 10% that received the lowest mark of C were given a chance to improve. Those that didn't were subject to termination the next year.

 

Numerous HR surveys conducted for businesses and government employers have indicated that one of the most common workplace complaints is an employer's reluctance to get strict with poor performers. For Ford, which is well known for a dysfunctional corporate culture, getting rid of the bad apples is essential to achieving many of the goals Jim Farley spoke about with investors and the press.

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8 hours ago, rperez817 said:

 

Jim Farley, like Jim Hackett before him, is very focused on ensuring Ford has the right talent for the "new world" of the automotive industry, while at the same time getting out of the "old world".

 

It would be nice if Ford brought back Jacques Nasser's policy mandating that every year, the lowest performing 10% of managers be subject to termination. Maybe even increase that number to the bottom 20%. That kind of turnover may help Ford achieve the culture change it desperately needs.

 

This is a highly ineffective management strategy that does not create the cohesive team environment necessary in this type of business. It creates a toxic environment in the management ranks that will trickle down to the shop floor.

 

A much more effective strategy is creating personalised plans and objectives for each manager that are meaningful and challenging, and when combined with other departments, provide positive synergy for the Corporate good.

 

Those that don't meet the objectives should be mentored with the expectation that if they don't turn it around, they will find employment more suited to their skills.

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1 hour ago, rperez817 said:

Numerous HR surveys conducted for businesses and government employers have indicated that one of the most common workplace complaints is an employer's reluctance to get strict with poor performers. For Ford, which is well known for a dysfunctional corporate culture, getting rid of the bad apples is essential to achieving many of the goals Jim Farley spoke about with investors and the press.


Try being union.... there's plenty of people I know personally who probably should have been fired several times over already but the Union always gets their job back for them. 

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1 hour ago, rperez817 said:

 

I think Jacques Nasser's system targeted the consistent underperformers. In his A-B-C grading system for Ford managers, the 10% that received the lowest mark of C were given a chance to improve. Those that didn't were subject to termination the next year.

 

Numerous HR surveys conducted for businesses and government employers have indicated that one of the most common workplace complaints is an employer's reluctance to get strict with poor performers. For Ford, which is well known for a dysfunctional corporate culture, getting rid of the bad apples is essential to achieving many of the goals Jim Farley spoke about with investors and the press.


Thats a ridiculous strategy especially if you’re in an organization that’s already lost a lot of poor performers.  You can have an entire team of good performers,  You rate each person individually and only give a poor rating to those who deserve it without quotas.

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My company does the bottom 10% churn and burn every January. Unless you’ve done something egregious, you will get your bonus, insurance for 6-12 months, and severance  (2 weeks salary per year you’ve been with company).

 

Not entirely clear what the motivation was for the cuts but it’s not uncommon. If you were on the receiving end, time to take a week off/relax, evaluate what you want to do and retool.

 

 

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13 hours ago, fuzzymoomoo said:


Which means the governmental policy is the reason for it being that prohibitively expensive and therefore the government should be liable. 


Government policy does not dictate Ford’s response to government policy.  It sets efficiency targets.  Ford stubbornly chose to stick with DPS6 to allegedly eke out a touch more fuel efficiency.  There are other ways Ford could’ve met the targets.  They weren’t forced to choose this failing technology. 

Edited by j2sys
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12 hours ago, akirby said:

Thats a ridiculous strategy especially if you’re in an organization that’s already lost a lot of poor performers.  You can have an entire team of good performers,  You rate each person individually and only give a poor rating to those who deserve it without quotas.

 

Implemented properly, Nasser's A-B-C performance appraisal system for Ford managers isn't ridiculous at all. It is based on a model called "vitality curve" that applies in many sociological contexts. For managers at Ford, the following descriptions apply.

  • "A" group (20%). Visionary, the most driven, exhibit the 4 "E's" of leadership
  • "B" group (70%). Adequate performance, are vital to the organization because they comprise the majority of managers
  • "C" group (10%). Non producers, consistently fail to deliver on their promises, more likely to enervate than to energize the organization

Nowadays as in the Nasser era, firing managers in the "C" group is essential to make Ford a better company, and for it to survive and thrive amid the ongoing automotive industry revolution.

 

Nasser's mistake regarding his vitality curve based PA system was he made a comment that was fodder for discrimination lawsuits. He said something along the lines of "too many white faces" among Ford managers. The immediately resulted in class action lawsuits against Ford, and Nasser was forced to discontinue the system. 

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13 hours ago, fuzzymoomoo said:


Try being union.... there's plenty of people I know personally who probably should have been fired several times over already but the Union always gets their job back for them. 

...and the irony is that those most critical of worksite poor performers is not managers but their fellow workers. You can't hide poor performance from the people working at your side who end up having to pick up the work the poor performer should have done. Managers are often clueless of who is actually a bad worker, but their fellow workers always know.

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1 hour ago, rperez817 said:

Implemented properly, Nasser's A-B-C performance appraisal system for Ford managers isn't ridiculous at all. It is based on a model called "vitality curve" that applies in many sociological contexts. For managers at Ford, the following descriptions apply.

 

Great in theory. Virtually impossible in reality, at least in the world of Ford.

 

An example would be an engineer who didn't communicate with other fellow engineers and refused to account for the latest parameter changes for whatever future vehicle. A couple of years pass by and when the prototypes come in, the person realizes there are so many mismatches. The person will hustle up all the other folks, remind them they have an emergency, and make other people essentially fix up his mistake(s).

Let's also say there was another engineer doing the same job for another vehicle, but that person was diligent and communicative and got through the entire product development without any major drama.

 

In this case, it would only make sense to give the former engineer a 'C' grade or whatever form of accountability, but often times the reality is that person actually gets some award for taking actions to meet the target and the latter folks are more or less unrecognized -- It's a classic case of the squeaky wheel getting the grease and there is no God-like overseer to indicate that this person is the weak link of the team or whatever justice system.

Edited by dlghtjr90
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16 hours ago, fuzzymoomoo said:


Try being union.... there's plenty of people I know personally who probably should have been fired several times over already but the Union always gets their job back for them. 

 

Unfortunately, that is indicative of inefficient managers.

 

I managed in a union environment for 35 yrs with strong marine unions. Both sides had to adhere to the collective agreement, which meant the managers had to follow the rules when dealing with problem employees. We had to show reasonable attempts to mentor the employee, while documenting all meetings/discussions and progressing through each disciplinary step.

 

Yes, it took time and effort, but in most cases, we were successful when eventually going for termination. In my experience, when you remove one of the worst offenders, most employees react positively, as management is finally doing what they are paid for.

 

The ability of managers to effectively apply the collective agreement is a key management metric.

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3 hours ago, Gurgeh said:

...and the irony is that those most critical of worksite poor performers is not managers but their fellow workers. You can't hide poor performance from the people working at your side who end up having to pick up the work the poor performer should have done. Managers are often clueless of who is actually a bad worker, but their fellow workers always know.

 

So true. How can a manager know what is going on when sitting behind a desk most of the day. They have to be walking about.

 

Still remember when DW, who was a Trauma RN had a social worker with zero nursing training or experience, as her Head Nurse - ludicrous!

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8 hours ago, rperez817 said:

 

Implemented properly, Nasser's A-B-C performance appraisal system for Ford managers isn't ridiculous at all. It is based on a model called "vitality curve" that applies in many sociological contexts. For managers at Ford, the following descriptions apply.

  • "A" group (20%). Visionary, the most driven, exhibit the 4 "E's" of leadership
  • "B" group (70%). Adequate performance, are vital to the organization because they comprise the majority of managers
  • "C" group (10%). Non producers, consistently fail to deliver on their promises, more likely to enervate than to energize the organization

Nowadays as in the Nasser era, firing managers in the "C" group is essential to make Ford a better company, and for it to survive and thrive amid the ongoing automotive industry revolution.

 

Nasser's mistake regarding his vitality curve based PA system was he made a comment that was fodder for discrimination lawsuits. He said something along the lines of "too many white faces" among Ford managers. The immediately resulted in class action lawsuits against Ford, and Nasser was forced to discontinue the system. 


Firing 10% of your staff every year means in 5 years you have 50% turnover.  You cannot run a business that way.  Morale will go to hell and people will throw others under the bus to stay off the hit list.  And I’ve worked in many orgs where the bottom 10% were still productive employees especially after you’ve done a few layoffs.  It’s a stupid process,

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On 8/23/2022 at 6:56 PM, Rangers09 said:

 

This is a highly ineffective management strategy that does not create the cohesive team environment necessary in this type of business. It creates a toxic environment in the management ranks that will trickle down to the shop floor.

 

A much more effective strategy is creating personalised plans and objectives for each manager that are meaningful and challenging, and when combined with other departments, provide positive synergy for the Corporate good.

 

Those that don't meet the objectives should be mentored with the expectation that if they don't turn it around, they will find employment more suited to their skills.

It was a stupid program. Say you have 20 people reporting to you.  What if they are all high performers?  Which ones do you put into the crap category?  

 

I remember a young manager who had to place one of his employees in the "C" category.  He selected a manager who was about to retire. He told the employee that he thought the employee was a great performer, but since he was leaving anyways he would not mind being placed in that category.  The employee, needless to say was livid; he had stellar reviews up until then and that last bad evaluation would hamper him from getting other opportunities outside Ford should he seek them.

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12 hours ago, Footballfan said:

The employee, needless to say was livid; he had stellar reviews up until then and that last bad evaluation would hamper him from getting other opportunities outside Ford should he seek them.

 

Actually that isn't the case (normally) all an employer can do is confirm that a former employee worked there. If not, they are opening up a can of worms with a defamation lawsuit 

Just as an example-I had a former person that worked for me, I work in the government and we have contracted positions that are filled by an outside company (I actually worked for them before going government and they have a very good reputation with hires) and this guy had a friend who worked for us also (zero issues/good employee) so he seemed like a good fit. Long story short it was a complete disaster. I got his resume later from coworker later on and this guy had multiple short term jobs...ranging from 6-18 months, which raised red flags in my book. If this guy had multiple jobs with 9 months or less on them without explaining them, I know that companies wouldn't have hired him if they found out what his work performance was or why he was let go. 

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21 hours ago, akirby said:


Firing 10% of your staff every year means in 5 years you have 50% turnover.  You cannot run a business that way.  Morale will go to hell and people will throw others under the bus to stay off the hit list.  And I’ve worked in many orgs where the bottom 10% were still productive employees especially after you’ve done a few layoffs.  It’s a stupid process,

 

These repeated rounds of "layoffs" with threats for more already have at least certain managers looking for who they can throw under the bus.  Instead of retraining ICE talent for EVs.  Preventing a dedicated employee from moving to a chosen role once the current projects dried up, despite their supervisor recommending they start applying internally.  Why?  So their manager could be pawn them off on another team during the last round of layoffs, then show them the door entirely this round.  That's just one example, but reflective of a culture that already has people watching their back, no matter how well their performance reviews have gone etc.  And one wonders why quality is suffering lately...

 

Not seeing the strategy here.

Edited by j2sys
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2 hours ago, silvrsvt said:

 

Actually that isn't the case (normally) all an employer can do is confirm that a former employee worked there. If not, they are opening up a can of worms with a defamation lawsuit 


Ive had several employers call me about a former coworker they were looking to hire and I gave them an honest assessment which in some cases wasn’t completely positive. Maybe it depends on whether they’re listed as a reference.

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1 hour ago, akirby said:


Ive had several employers call me about a former coworker they were looking to hire and I gave them an honest assessment which in some cases wasn’t completely positive. Maybe it depends on whether they’re listed as a reference.

I believe there was a case where a person sued his former employer for giving a prospective employer a negative review, and that person won.

 

The person must obviously prove that the negative review was the reason that he or she was not hired. If pressed, the prospective employer can simply say that there were other candidates who were more qualified, for any number of reasons. 

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25 minutes ago, grbeck said:

I believe there was a case where a person sued his former employer for giving a prospective employer a negative review, and that person won.

 

The person must obviously prove that the negative review was the reason that he or she was not hired. If pressed, the prospective employer can simply say that there were other candidates who were more qualified, for any number of reasons. 

 

Regardless of the likelihood of not being held liable by a court, many, many HR departments these days would err on the side of caution, doing the bare minimum of confirming the start and end dates of employment, not even answering if the former employee is eligible for rehire.  Endorsing a former employee doesn't really benefit your business after all...

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1 hour ago, j2sys said:

 

Regardless of the likelihood of not being held liable by a court, many, many HR departments these days would err on the side of caution, doing the bare minimum of confirming the start and end dates of employment, not even answering if the former employee is eligible for rehire.  Endorsing a former employee doesn't really benefit your business after all...

 

 I worked for a telecommunications company in the 1990s. That was the policy of the company's Human Resources Department. It would only confirm the person's name, last position held at the company, and dates of employment. 

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