Culture Lens

Culture lens Ford went through a hard time, not just because of the outside gloomy economics, but also the pressure of a dysfunctional, often defeatist culture. In Ford’s long business history, culture is not constant; it evolves, the business culture had been changed generation by generation in the economic progress and globalization. Both of essence and dross has been passed down in a grown bureaucracy, where people lost their innovation and structure is messy. The new chief executive of Ford Motor Co. , Alan R. Mulally was taking a culture revolution in this giant machine in order to pull it out of the deep mud.
Organization values •Pioneered modern management techniques Period 1: Ford is the birthplace of the assembly line and home of the celebrated Whiz Kids, which highly increase the efficiency in the production and copied by the other companies. Period 2: After 1960s, Ford fell into a reverse way and has degenerated into a symbol of inefficiency. Right now, it has four parallel operating units and the company has more than 30 engineering platforms worldwide, each with its own costly bureaucracy, factories, and product development staff.
Period 3: Mulally took a big step and would like to reduce the level of complexity. He wants to get that number down to five or six platforms, similar to Honda. More importantly, Ford tries to eliminate all of its unnecessary duplication. •Cooperation and efficiency Period 1: After assembly line been introduced to the world, Ford impressed all of their competitors by their highly cooperated work and their efficiency, employees worked together and impede the flaws passing to the next connection. Until the mid-’60s, Ford was considered a management shrine.

Period 2: The bureaucracy at Ford grew, and managers took refuge in the structure when things got tough rather than innovate or try new ideas that seemed risky. Personal ties became important in Ford, ambitious managers focused increasingly on kissing the right rings instead of racking up results, which discouraged collaboration. Period 3: With Mulally’s idea, moving job tenures to a long tenure, collaboration would become more important in the future production and management. He has made it a top priority to encourage his team to admit mistakes, to share more information, and to cooperate across divisions •Customer focus
Period 1: Ford focused on customer needs, developed scientific consumer research techniques, which was one of the first auto companies to create products that were based on hard data rather than the personal tastes of executives. Period 2: Employees consider more about their logics than customers’ needs. The tendency of employees is to rationalize mistakes instead of fixing them. Period 3: Mulally wants managers to think more about customers than their own careers. Shared assumptions •Rationalize problem instead of fixing problems
In the example, it is easy to tell that employees’ logic with problems, rationalizing mistakes instead of fixing them and focusing on customers’ needs. •Royal hierarchy Within almost half century’s development, Ford has been fallen into a costly bureaucracy structure. People in the organization have their own status, and it is not allowed to share information freely, manager focus on their rings more than their jobs. •Mediocrity is acceptable Weary corporate lifers have become all too comfortable with the idea of losing money.
They do not think about to fix problems or try new ideas that seemed risk but took refuge in the structure when things got tough. •Resist with outsiders Ford is a place that’s notorious for destroying auto industry outsiders–and Mulally is admittedly no car guy. Despite Bill Ford’s strong backing, employees are looks arrogant and resist the revolution from outside. Symbols •blue oval logo Ford’s logo is highly impressive by their customers, even in the economic crisis, Ford still can pledge their icon to finance enough money from banks and bondholders to turnaround. Assembly line This new product line created quite a stir when it had been introduced to product line; it changed the way manufacturing factory to run their business. What’s more, it is still significantly influence the world and operated in almost all of the manufacturing business. •Henry Ford Henry Ford obviously is an outstanding personage in business area, he invented auto business and changed the way people assemble their products. Even right now, when people talk about Ford, we still cannot ignore his impact in the auto area. •Bureaucratic organization
There are no other companies like Ford, has a high level of complexity within their organization structure. There are four parallel operating units and more than 30 engineering platforms worldwide. On the other side, duplication was common in the company; no two vehicles in Ford’s lineup share the same mirrors, headlamps, or even such mundane pieces as the springs and hinges for the hood. Changes in culture system can be slow and painful for an organization, especially in the high developed bureaucracy. However, the importance to take the revolution is obviously, with regard to globalization and fierce competition.