The Detroit News' Daniel Howes reports that FoMoCo is following Chrysler's lead, hoping top Toyota talent can right their sinking ship. James D. Farley, group vice president of Toyota Motor Co.'s Lexus Division, is set to join The Blue Oval Boyz as their first head of global marketing and communications. Howes sings hosannas to Farley's new boss Alan Mulally, sees no downside to the deal and singularly fails to mention the astronomical pay packet involved. "That a rising Toyota star, the head of Lexus and a founder of its Scion youth brand would bolt the Japanese juggernaut for the struggling Blue Oval is a testament to Mulally's leadership, the strength of Ford's current lineup, the promise of its future products and the upside in it all." And once again we feel compelled to point out that Farley, like Chrysler's Jim Press, is the product of a consensus management system, rather than its originator. In other words, one wonders how he fares in the ass-kicking department. Watch this space, and all of Ford's advertising.
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Toyota’s success has often been in spite of their advertising and rarely because of it. When was the last memorable Toyota advertisement?
But hey, he can’t do any worse than the Bold Moves Ford campaign.
This move is totally on strategy for Mulally. He wants to operationalize like Toyota—his engineering background can make this happen. Now with Farley on-board—-Mulally can bring Toyota commercial expertise. Good move.
On a related note—-how do all of these high profile defections hurt (or not) Toyota in North America ?
I doubt Toyota would be as successful as it is without some solid succession planning. I suspect they’ll do fine.
jthorner,
I like the one with the kid’s playing with their cars that ends with one kid explaining that the girl’s car never needs repair because it’s a Toyota.
It works best because the cars are not the stars, and let’s face it, those are mostly homely cars.
Hopefully Mullaly’s started to rein in Ford’s culture so that it won’t chew him up and spit him out, as it’s done so with so many other good people.
Given Mulally’s business prowess, despite uninformed comments to the contrary that float around various sites, I would assume he would not have brought anyone in until he knew the culture was ready.
If you remember back about a month ago, Mulally was talking about why he didn’t bring in outside talent. The answer? People at the company didn’t like it. That’s not how things were done. If he could figure that out and respond to it (by not firing, shuffling and hiring unnecessarily) in his first couple month then he clearly has his finger on the pulse of this company by now.
This just makes me more confident in Mulally and Ford’s future – now… on to the UAW.
RobertSD :
It’s kinda weird to chide others’ “uninformed comments” and then “assume” that Mulally would only bring in Farley when Ford’s corporate culture was ready.
Which begs the question: how do you “prepare” a company for an outsider? You know, other than firing a bunch of people?
You say Mulally didn’t introduce outside talent until now because the people on the inside didn’t want it. Duh. Acquiescing to that type of insularity is NOT a sign of strength. Quite the opposite.
Again, as I suggested for Cerberus, when you seek to reinvigorate a culture– be it a royal court or a multinational automaker– you cut early and cut deep. Big Al doesn’t strike me as the ruthless sort, and his actions speak softer than his words.
Not good.
I don’t know – perhaps it’s just me – but I’d start with getting products out that are easy to market. Usually, that means good cars.
How do you market a MK-I Focus against the new age Civic or the Mazda 3? Even the usual refuges of uninspired marketers (The American flag and beautiful women) can not overcome such a disadvantage.
I have seen a few Toyota TV spots that I consider above average. The mid-life crisis ad for the Camry is rather funny, ditto for the one where the fellow appears to have an FJ in his garage, until the door raises and we see it’s just a mural. On the other hand, Ford’s new “Random Celebrity Guy” campaign leaves me shaking my head.
RF: Mulally is a student of Japanese Management theory and Deming principles. Accordingly, he has taken his first year to look at process first and now he is on to the people eg. Farley (hopefully Field’s head is next). BTW—he took a similar approach at Boeing—-very successfully I might add.
While this may strike you as “soft” and overly methodical—-I think it is strategic and the right way to go for the long term.
I know you may say the “time is now” via your cut early / deep comment—-but Mulally is correct to look beyond the next quarter if he is to save the company.
Net, your slash and burn now suggestion strikes me as more “Chainsaw Al Dunlop”—-what Ford needs now is a “Strategic Al Mulally”.
How sad that sinking, near-bankrupt car companies are driving (!) executive pay inflation, while Toyota may have to reconsider its own pretty low pay system, thus provoking more social conflict in Japan and (eventually) Europe, where executive pay is much lower than in the US.
How much is this guy’s pay package worth?
I’d be curious to see his resume… only then would it make sense to take guesses/potshots/praises at him.
Why is advertising the issue when the product is not top of class? All the focus on beer quality ads won’t mean a thing if they keep turning out 7 year old retread designs.
“BTW—he took a similar approach at Boeing—-very successfully I might add.”
He’s been gone a year and Boeing is having some difficulties already.
Did his departure cause the problems or did he get out just in time?
I do not know.
Andrewg: The only “problem” Boeing is having is getting the 787 to market in time to meet the massive pre-orders it is having. Despite the 787 delay, Boeing stock is trading near its 52 week high and the Boeing strategy (crafted by Mulally and his team) helped cause the implosion at Airbus.
Jeffer :
October 11th, 2007 at 1:44 pm
I have seen a few Toyota TV spots that I consider above average.
I liked the ants crossing the road, only to be run over by a Corolla. One of the ants glares at the ant that was looking for traffic. Lookout ant says something along the lines of:
“What? It was a Corolla!”
Toyota did a good job with the Tacoma ad, especially with the jilted/neglected girlfriend, but the Loch Ness ad is getting a bit tiresome.
I like the Mercury ads, except they spend too much time showing automobiles. :-)
Bruce
I think American companies are just not adapting, they’re still riding the “its patriotic to buy American” system. Its BS! Getting real and having integrity is the only way to appropriately sell cars. I believe it will really show in the cars. Honda does a good job of this IMO.