The only thing worse than losing your job is having to sit around and wait to lose your job. Ask Ford's white collar workers. The Blue Oval Boyz have already announced plans to cut the salaried workforce by 15 percent; in some areas like product development it's as high as 20 percent. With the bulk of the cuts coming in late July, morale and productivity are lower than the chances that CEO Alan Mulally will earn less than $20m in any given year. The Detroit News reports "work has ground to a near-halt in some offices as workers fret about their futures and spend time browsing job postings on the Internet." (Hi guys!) Even those who aren't scheduled for layoffs are looking elsewhere for employment, not knowing if they may be shit-canned in the next round of cut-backs. Does it make sense to cut product developers and engineers while struggling to get new products to market? Oh… wait. They'll just import designs from Europe three years too late or let Mazda handle it. In fact, it looks like they'll do anything they can to save a buck as long as it doesn't interfere with executives' mega-salaries, perks and golden parachutes.
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“…in some areas like product development it’s as high as 20 percent.”
Shouldn’t they be adding jobs in product development? You know, The Way Forward…
This means they are going ot cut some executive positions and give themt he pink slip. You have to right size the company through all departments including the top. I know it’s not going to happen, but it should.
I’m sure all the quality employees will have left before they get canned and leave behind a half assed workforce of leftovers. And I thought Ford was starting to do things right.
I think I read an article not long ago about one of the 2.8, GM I think, whining about not being able to find top grads to work for them.
Mulally, for one, HAS to know this is a toxic situation.
More short sighted HR management! Must be a disease that infects most corporations. With the baby-bust Gen-Xers coming along to fill the jobs the Baby Boomers are starting to leave due to retirement, the companies with such poor practices will have little success attracting workers when things do turn around. I’ve seen it suggested they turn to retiring Boomers to fill these jobs on some basis (full or part time), but who wants to go back into the same snake pit that treated you wrong the first time around? Not me for sure. Gen Y might bail them out if they are still around long enough for it to happen.
I’ve said it before (and I’m sure many other people have said it, as well) but how can ANY of the big 2.801 expect their rank and file to “make sacrifices for the company) whilst at the same time pocketing money hand over fist, flying in the company jet and negotiating bankruptcy proof pensions for themselves?
Then when unions get more militant than General Schwarzkopf, they brand them “unreasonable” because they are fighting to keep their jobs; just like these execs fought for an outrageous pay package!
I wouldn’t mind if these execs were actually doing a good job (Alan Mullaly is the best example I can think of. Whilst his salary is huge, he IS making progress at Ford) but Detroit is in such bad shape, the generally accepted that 2 will fall and 1 will survive…..just!
This is unacceptable to the tens of thousands of people who will go out of work, whilst people like Bob Lutz, Rick Wagoner, Robert Nardelli (to a lesser extent), Tom LaSorda, Juergen Schrempp, Mark Fields, Mark LaNeve and Fritz Henderson, live life without a care in the world.
Then, people ask me who I would never buy a Detroit car……
P.S Stay away from me, readers….I may have contracted a very virulent strain of rabies! I’m foaming at the mouth as we speak!
More short sighted HR management!
I don’t know if I would assume that Ford isn’t overstaffed. There is probably quite a bit of redundancy, thanks to the staffing that they needed back when they were selling more trucks.
If anything, this should make enthusiasts happier, because we should see more “world cars” out of this effort. They won’t need as many people on the payroll if the cars don’t vary so much from market to market.
There is a reason why the high volume automakers have built a lot of US-specific models, while the smaller ones have not — because it takes money to do that. With less cash, Ford is going to have be smarter. Whether they will be is another matter.
Pch101 very valid point, sounds like Mark Fields job should be axed also. What exactly will he be heading if he is not screwing up cars for the NA market.
“The only thing worse than losing your job is having to sit around and wait to lose your job.”
Been there.
If you are sitting and waiting you are a fool. You can always be proactive on your options.
Bunter
Shouldn’t they be adding jobs in product development? You know, The Way Forward…
Ford has the second largest R&D budget of any company in the world, behind only Pfizer.
PCH101 is right. When you loose market share, you are a shrinking company. So the company has to also shrink its overhead to match the company size.
The cuts in PD are 13% not 20%. Research cuts are 10%
There are so many new vehicles with poor MPG, that anything that doesn’t get above average is doomed, so I can see why their cutting PD to some degree as that is probably the gas guzzlers to start with.
One would have to be almost crazy to buy a new gas guzzler today. If you just look at the used gas guzzler market right now, their prices are way low compared to what they sold for new even just a year or two ago, which means the original owner received little for their trade.
Bunter,
They may be sitting because the package they will get will be more pay than if they took another job. (assuming they can’t sign a contract with another company without losing their severance package).
I was told I was going to be laid off in a few weeks, don’t bother coming to work, just check in by phone every now and then. 5 months later, while I collected near full pay, they finally gave me another 4 months pay. It would have been better had they done it as planned, but the time off was nice.
The thing about deep layoffs is that after losing productivity waiting for the axe to fall, there is an extended time afterward where productivity continues to be in the dumps. People are in shock as they learn friends are gone. Institutional knowledge gets lost. You find things that no one knows how to do because the one guy that always handled it no longer works there. People resist taking on new responsibilities because they think their plate is already full. A general malaise sets in. Months of potential work is lost.
Ford Flex and what else do they have? Sales go down, down, down and they can’t turn them around.
Ford Edge? Too expensive. Ford Flex? Too expensive. What else do they have? A 20 year old design Focus(no one forgot about the wheels falling off) and a Fusion with no reputation. Any ex- Ford Taurus driver is too scared to touch it. No ones buying trucks or SUVs. The new has worn off that big 1970’s looking Mustang. It would would sell more if it was electric. V6 and V8? A model that gets good range(economy model), and a high performance model. On board charger with adapter plugs for 110 or 220.
http://www.driveev.com/jeepev/photos/pg12pics/cordset/cordset1.png
If the battery is an issue, sell them in 50/100/200/300/400/500 mile range models. How much range do you need?
There are some lower cost batteries out there, but these auto companies are too scared of change.
http://zeva.com.au/tech/LiFePO4.php
They are piloting the Titanic through the night with white knuckles straight into the ice berg.
Qwerty :
The thing about deep layoffs is that after losing productivity waiting for the axe to fall, there is an extended time afterward where productivity continues to be in the dumps. People are in shock as they learn friends are gone. Institutional knowledge gets lost. You find things that no one knows how to do because the one guy that always handled it no longer works there. People resist taking on new responsibilities because they think their plate is already full. A general malaise sets in. Months of potential work is lost.
All of that is true, but it’s even worse than that. The ones who are left have a sort of “survivor’s guilt,” however short-lived until the second (and third) round of cuts. Until those cuts, they are constantly looking over their shoulders, waiting, waiting, waiting.
In the 80’s, it started with the famous “days off without pay” that so many companies forced people to take. Then a couple months later, bam! The real layoffs hit.
I knew somebody who got laid off by way of a letter that was faxed to her. Her boss was on the same floor…not in a distant city or something! Cold, yes. Indicative of management incompetence, ABSOLUTELY. But in the long run, maybe it was just as well, because the damage had already been done for years leading up to the layoffs.
How about some new slogans?
“Job None”
Now that the new(ish) F150 is done (though waiting in the wings), they can dismiss the workers who developed that product/.
Thanks for everything, fellas!