Business Week grades Mulally's first year
Alan Mulally took over as Ford's CEO one year ago this month, and some of you may be wondering how he's doing. Business Week magazine says he's doing pretty good, actually, despite a 16% decline in sales last month, a stock price less than the cost of a used CD and the piecemeal selloff of PAG. BW says Mulally gets an "A" in Profit and Loss for helping Ford earn a $750 million profit in the second quarter, even though the company expects a loss for the this year and next as well.
In Restructuring, Mulally slips to a "B," mostly because BW's author questions the decision to sell Volvo, and speculates that Ford's newish CEO wants badly to shut down the Mercury division. The article says that would be an expensive move that wouldn't be much of a gain for Ford.
As for Product, Mulally earns another "A" for better sharing of platforms and the work Ford is doing with its Australian arm on rear-wheel-drive cars.
Overall, Mulally gets an "A-" average, with his worst grade coming in Personnel, an area where BW says the CEO should at least consider bringing in some high-profile outside talent to round out his management team. We suppose Chrysler would get an "A" in that class.
[Source: Business Week]
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
TriShield 6:39PM (9/07/2007)
He'll shutter Mercury one way or another.
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iQuack 8:09PM (9/07/2007)
Mercury is already dead.
All Mulally needs to do is bury the corpse.
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jw 8:15PM (9/07/2007)
ford has the weakest management team of the top 7 or 8 manufactures..they need new execs to take this co. to a sustainable level. then to a 20% share..they can't do it with what they have now....allen should have taken chrysler's approach!!! time for some new blood...
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Robert 8:51PM (9/07/2007)
What the executive team needed was a kick in the pants. It looks like Mulally came in to change things, and if execs didn't want to change, they were free (asked) to leave. There have been some changes, but most of the people in place like Don Leclair (possibly the best CFO in the industry) and Mark Fields (who for all the crap he gets has done an extremely good job realigning FoE and setting into motion the alignment of FNA and FoE). George Pipas might need a little tweaking and certainly a new head of marketing is needed, but the team isn't bad - they were just poorly managed by one, Bill Ford.
For all the good that Mulally has done in his first year, I would hope that we could trust him enough to oust the deadweight and keep the knowledgeable and good. Clearly, if the execs are still there, they have done something right and are buying into, if not executing soundly, his vision of a leaner Ford. Now, there may be some dead-weight still sitting at the lower management rungs, but the culture will take even more time to crack than the upper-management culture that was killing Ford not so softly. However, there are decades of industry knowledge there, something you cannot throw away too frivilously.
I agree with BW's overall assessment, though. I think the real results will be revealed after the UAW negotiations finish.
Barney 10:05AM (9/08/2007)
"I agree with BW's overall assessment, though. I think the real results will be revealed after the UAW negotiations finish."
Good point, Robert. The largest operating costs has to be under control before the company can give a proper assessment. The UAW has to give a FIRM commitment prior to any forecast of stability.
Doug 5:27PM (9/08/2007)
He's doing great with the exception of Volvo and Mercury.
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fordgeek 11:50AM (9/21/2007)
As a former Ford employee, I was extremely disappointed that more wasn't done to retain the higher talent people in the middle manager and engineering ranks. Virtually, no effort was made to keep any of the really good talent in the ranks at Ford. If someone fit inside a particular category, they were allowed--even encouraged to leave the company for the sake of saving a few dollars up front. This, I believe will come back to haunt Ford in a huge way......
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