Alan Mulally’s Restructuring of Ford Motor Company

According to the Nelson & Quick, Manually created one team focusing on ford brand. Ford was accused in the recession time, to keep too many brands under its corporate umbrella so it can't focus on its cash cow â€Å"Ford† Brand. He sold out Jaguar cars, Land Rover brand and Volvo cars to minimize the corporate losses. (wickeder. Com). Following answers focus more on what extent his managerial and structural change decisions helpful to create profitable brand. 1. What are the key structural issues that Alan Manually encountered as incoming president and CEO of Ford? An automobile has about 10,000 moving parts, right?An airplane has two million, and it has to Stay up in the this is the answer Alan Manually provided when he was being asked a question by a journalist â€Å"How are you going to tackle something as complex and unfamiliar as the auto business when we are in such tough financial shape†. It was that tough when Manually came into ford from Boeing. There were sign ificant structural issues were at the Ford. Naming them, financial crisis- while other major car manufacturers filing bankruptcy, according to nelson (2013) â€Å"ford dad to resolve to stand on its own feet and go it alone' (p. 39).Internal culture- when Manually come in ford has a very competitive rivalry culture â€Å"and didn't help much to its profitability. According to Nelson & Quick (2013) ‘those who believe that competitive rivalry brings out the best, others know win lose competition carries costs for everyone involved† (p. 64). Additionally, Ford was famous for world car and mass production people didn't buy ford because it is quality car. Ford is inherently face a challenge in a world of cars to build a culture quality. Nelson & Quick, 2013). Too many brands- when Manually come in, ford is more focusing on other attached brands than ford brand name.At the time ford owned Jaguar, Volvo cars, Mazda, Land Rover and Gaston Martin. Which loss the focus of manag ement towards ford brand. Don't have a right products- Manually saw potential of ford focus as a world car and but they didn't market it as it supposed to be and Ford Taurus Was a successful seller and they already discontinued that product How has Alan Manually addressed structural issues identified in the previous question? When Manually came in 2006, financial crisis was at its peak. He decided not to borrow money from government and stand its own feet.It was a right decision, because, overnight sales went up due to many patriotic Americans decided to switch to ford. He borrowed $24 billion from other parties and Stop dividends to shareholders. He sold all the other brands loosely associated with ford. By selling those brand Manually collected some money to get out of recession. Internal culture- when Manually came in, there was competitive culture. It was not helping the good team. Ford was thinking, by competitive culture best come out and actual result was there are bunch of u nhappy internal customers.So Manually created a culture of applauding openness and problem recognition culture. Quality issue- ford ware coincided by the whole worked as a common car. Manually wanted to create a ford as a quality product what exactly customers looking for. Too many brands so entire ford team work as one. According to Nelson & Quick (2013) ford anticipates consumer needs and delivers outstanding products and services that improve people's lives (p. 315). Loss focus- ford has so many brands under its corporate umbrella those did not help them to focus on ford brand.Manually decided to sell them all to get cash to recover the recession. That was increased attention towards ford brand. Bring back right product- first thing Manually did at the ford was bring back Taurus brand which was discontinues for no reason. Which helped to bring loyal customers back Explain the context that ford strategic goals provide for the design of its organization structure (Figurer : ford mo tor company structure) Ford's strategic goals were 1 . Ford is a global family with a proud heritage passionately committed to providing personal mobility to people around the world (Nelson & Quick, 201 3), 2.Ford anticipates consumer needs and delivering outstanding products and services that improves people's lives. Current ford culture would not help to achieve these targets. Inherently automobile industry is fairly club. According to Nelson & Quick (201 3), â€Å"Ford was known for the feudal infighting about its executives, conflicts consumed time, energy and resources in counterproductive internecine warfare† (p. 349). In order to meet the challenge successfully, ford needs an outstanding team. Eventually Manually able to build the winning team.Nelson & Quick (2013) mentioned that â€Å"Manually became a unifying figure who pulled the entire team together collectively'. Manually introduced large scale system integration in to ford learned from Boeing. Which was challen ging at first at ford. Ford had a linear structure shown above. This kind of system is ideal for manufacturing company. The problem was they didn't use the structure properly. Company culture, and structure wasn't that problem, problem was there are some recesses need to fine tune. Reason given for that was ford never felt a fresh blood so often.Manually had to fine tune corroded systems in general. He created united team, he created open door policy instead of competitive policy, he standardize manufacturing pants, etc†¦ By doing all the repairs for this old system, team was align for their new strategy to conquer the market. Would a network (or lattice) organization be a viable structural alternative for ford? Explain your answer (Figurer: Sample network organization) According to my knowledge, linear organization structure would be better Han network organizational structure for the manufacturing company.