Thread regarding Ford layoffs

I am. Been at Ford for over 20 years at this point. Just got back from a week's vacation today. I so dread working anymore that I actually took a sick day than come back on a Monday from my vacation - just have a hard time summoning up the drive to deal with all the cr-p each and everyday.

So yes, after having a week off (and a very long drive back home), I have decided for the first time since 2008 to seriously look for a job other than Ford (have always had soft looks, but in 2008 actually did serious job search and got another job offer - turned it down and decided to stay with Ford, which at the time was a good decision as it was a local Ann Arbor boutique web shop that went out of business two years later) . Will it be outside the auto industry? It could, maybe even likely since I no longer live in Michigan, but not necessarily since remote work is a thing nowadays. Yes, the auto industry seems to be more impacted by business cycle , but overall I don't think the auto industry is bad, just depends on the company.

I never said anything about the mechanic should write like an engineer. Simply write what they did, and why they are billing Ford.
Why is that so difficult? Billions of dollars spent, and Ford is looking for cost savings.

It’s a circular loop. The root cause needs to be addressed (hint it is not the dealership)

• defect rolling off the line,
• frustrated customers bringing vehicle back to dealership,
• frustrated dealership (first trying to get Ford to acknowledge the problem, and then fixing the same thing over and over again, often knowing full well that the “fix” also has a defect and the customer will be blaming them),
• frustrated people reading warrantee claims that were designed to ensure both the writer and reader are wasting their time,
• incorrect conclusions drawn because of faulty data,
• root cause not fixed due to either faulty conclusions or the desire of management to cover up the defect.

I have a BIL who is a mechanic at a dealership. If the forms were easy and not time consuming to fill out, you would get better data. Let’s just say feedback on the forms is not complimentary. They need to be designed by a mechanic not by a engineering management committee. Also think about how you would feel “fixing” something according to Ford procedures that you know will fail all day long. And then getting blamed for the failure. Now after a few years how much effort are you going to put into filling out forms? Many at first wrote specific concrete feedback about exactly what was wrong with a part’s design and what caused the failure. Seeing no results they began to write things like - caused by weather on every single form.

4xim,

Work in warranty and then tell me. Claims stating stating the failure was caused due a collision, claims that are blank, or just total gibberish. There is no way to track quality issues.

Correction $2B. The is the cost of poor quality, which blaming dealerships is not going to fix.

3ubd, You must be joking. $2M cannot be blamed on dealers. The cars came in with a fault to begin with. Go ahead and blame dealers and customers for the junk you design and build. You and others like you are the problem.

3pzu,

I've worked both as a DRE and in warranty. By your post "Blaming the dealership is a copout" shows you have no idea what you're talking about. Ford has over $2 billion in claims, and most warranty claims are written in gibberish, the dealerships get paid good money. Of course management, needs to put a foot down and start rejecting payment on the claims.

Talent is way over-rated at Ford. For the last decade at Ford chasing and hiring "talent" has been the shiny object, the great Holy Grail, and it is causing the company to implode. I will take experienced automotive gray hairs or no hairs any day, add real leadership to that and the company could control nearly any segment it wanted to. Real leaders would broom out the driftwood quickly and the moocher cows out to pasture.

Blaming dealers for bogus or poorly written warranty claims is just a cop out. We design and build garbage, and then make it even worse with d-mb TVM actions that backfire all to meet some B.S. objective. Don't let it come into the dealer service department in the first place (except for maintenance) and problem solved.

1whe+1fUhnrwC. You should do stand up! Those people that worked on the "F-Series" which btw makes 90+% of the company profits is what gives you a job at Ford. Not your Fantasy Island bs. So, take off your little white suit and stop kissing BF bu-t. Product is King. No BUCKs No Buck Rogers!

@2xjz your post is spot on. The ironic part is that back in 2003 I was sitting in the launch trailer by a young chief engineer named Kumar. All he could talk about was how our 5 year product pipeline would put Ford back on track. I figured that either I was really stupid or he was smoking crack. Many years later Ford still isn’t back on track and Kumar is still talking ****

@1whe it’s all a lot of tosh built on pie in the sky thinking.
First we have the facts:

• Fords market share has been in a decades long slide and will at best be 8% in 2027.
• Fords has willingly ceded the market in every vehicle category but one to the competition
• The competition is projected to take that last market from Ford in 2024. RAM is the #1 vehicle for consumers who need a reliable truck (rural consumers). Historically this consumer group signals the way the rest of this market share will follow, as their purchases are informed by safety, reliability and affordability not trying to be “trendy”/ keeping up with the Jones.

So explain how Fords will make money on data and analytics? Are you suggesting the competitors will allow Ford to deploy apps and data collection on vehicles they manufacture ? Ford leadership’s pipe dreams displays analytical skills of a toddler at best.

@OP is on track when he says he should get out of automotive.
It is best to leave in a good job market. When the dust settles, if you find you want to go back to automotive there will be opportunities with the surviving auto companies.

If you are in your 40s and hired in under the pension plan, you might want to give serious thought to a job search. If you have 8 or 9 years to getting a pension, what do you think the odds are of making it? You definitely can't count on any decent retiree health benefit. Even if you think you have someone in management looking out for you, how long will they be around?

@1whe+1fUhnrwC Since Mobility is losing above a billion dollars annually in those workers with the skills in software, data, and analytics, and have no profit whatsoever to show for, while more than 90% of the profits of the company come from the F-150 ICE (best selling truck in America for 40 years, and best selling vehicle in America for 30 years), it is easy to see (for those that have something more than the company's Kool Aid slush between their ears) that Ford should keep around those "old school automotive" guys.

If you're equating 'grey hairs' to workers who do not have skills with software, data, and analytics, then you are correct. The direction of the company going forward is to no longer invest in that and instead to wind down those ranks.

As Jim Farley said, we need talent. Draw from that what you will, but it means Ford does not need the type of talent from Ford of the past with non-connected and ICE vehicles. If old school automotive is your specialty, it's probably best for all involved for you to find employment elsewhere when you can.

@eyh. Prof Moonbeam and BCG had laid out a multi-year strategy for nudging large swaths of grey hairs out . The pandemic messed up the playbook. All that $ spent on open hip office remodels to signal you Grey hairs are not welcome, became ineffectual. The Grey hairs laughed while moving to Florida and working from home.
Now the plan has been adjusted: split the company in half, let Kiersten mess with and then usher all the unwanted out the door. Unwanted=more costly than the average bear / not in the good ole boys club.

@eyh+1fUhnrwC I need subtitles.

If you want to stay working at an automotive OEM, it really appears that Stellantis is the place to go. Just take a look at their comments board here at the layoff. That tells all.

We work at such an unstable clown show of a company that there is a never ending supply of things to discuss here.

Been working at Ford since I graduated from college, started as an FCG and have more than 20 years in and one of the last engineers with a pension, ha ha! I’m going to ride it out (I’m in model e) because I have less than 10 years to go and my spouse (who works at another company) is the primary earner in our house and we save my pay (in various investments). It’s easier for me to stay and ride it as far as I can and not care about all the cr-p going on….but if I were the primary earner in my family I’d be looking….

Ive been at Ford for a little less than 10 years now. It's the same rhetoric every year. They need to cut heads, warranty is abysmal, we need to be more scrappy, we care about our "family", we didn't meet goals, and it's all GSR & LL6s fault for everything. The upper management changes and moves around, but it's the same old Ford. They'll be lucky to make it the next 10 years at this pace and I wouldn't be surprised if VW or someone bought them out for simply the name. I used to be proud to work at Ford, at times I still am, but I feel the same as the poster. Engine Engineering and transmission are already gearing up for SRD 2.0 before involuntary layoffs come. Morale is down, everyone is in survival mode, people are angry and upset.

I say leave if you have an opportunity, especially if you have no pension like me. To those saying to suck it up or just leave if you don't like it, you're part of the problem of the culture here at Ford. We've had people have heart attacks from this added stress, others died because of it, everyone is at and beyond their limits and miserable.

What if the company is planning RIF in upcoming months to control costs from hemorrhaging ICE business and fund the strategy change to EV with more expensive SWE & EV "talent" and is creating a situation that nudges employees to want to leave just ahead of that on their own to avoid massive severance payments.

@tfl & btm,

You guys are missing the point. The company and these losses don't have to be like this.. management just lets the dealerships charge millions in overcharged and outright bogus claims. The leadership lets the union walk all over the company and build junk, no focus in engineering to build quality. The suppliers get away with junk sold to Ford and are not held accountable. Resulting in billions in losses! Who has to pay? The employees who are doing the work but wind up being scapegoat. Most people want Ford to succeed, and do not want massive layoffs. Layoff and cuts only work in the short term, since the root cause for the losses is never addressed.

Maybe just maybe if enough people complain something will change.

I worked for Ford from the point I graduated college in 2001 until I quit in 2007. I was an engineer hired in through the FCG program. The things I read here tell me that nothing has changed over the last 15 years. Literally the same circus with different clowns. I have moved onto a much better company that I have stayed with ever since I left Ford. There has not been one day that I regret leaving. I’m probably worth about $3-4 million more right now than i would be at this point if I had stayed at a Ford and I probably make at least 2-3X what I would be making if I had stayed at Ford. On top of that, my life is a lot more manageable and balanced than it was when I was working for Ford. Added bonus - I managed to get out of Michigan and now I live in a place where it’s 75 degrees and sunny outside in the middle of March.

My point is - if you’re not already too far into your career, quit Ford and never look back. I see absolutely zero indication that anything at Ford will improve over the next 20+ years. Ford is the Detroit Lions of corporate America!

If you want to go, then go. Nobody is forcing you to stay.

www.gd.com/careers

@tfl
Although the last 15 years at Ford has made me a bitter person such that I see only negative in everything first - I actually see a positive in your post.
Good to see a Ford person (probably an HR) actually giving credit to someone else. LOL

Someone said it very well -

"People who want to leave should apply at Amazon. Oh wait! You already did. Not once but multiple times. Got rejected each time. O-Oh. Thats OK. Just accept that Ford is the best trophy you are EVER going to get. Don't sc--w it up. SO.....Head down, work hard. Great times are coming. You know the automotive cycle."

Post credit to : @1whe+1fbV1smO

The grass always looks greener from the other side of the road! Everyone that I know that left Ford came crawling back. They end up losing their vested retirement and start over with the lousy retirement savings plan that Ford offers new hires.

@dcd+1fUhnrwC, yeah keep telling yourself that there, Skippy!

@dcd

Have you ever worked in quality and warranty? Customers are only going to put up with so much. Shareholders are only going to put up with so much.

Also, ICE will be around for awhile, and BEV is not as glorious as it's made out to be.

I cannot believe how much doom gets posted here. Way overblown. The only employees at risk for the new structure at Ford are non covid compliant ones and those not involved with electrification, software, and data/analytics. Otherwise you're fine.

@vyl,

To make matters worse, the warranty claims from the dealerships are written so poorly it takes over year to find the root cause for the quality issue. A big portion of the claims are just bogus claims from the dealerships.

Ford does not have the right talent resources. This is why ford pays $3 billions or more each year for warranty, replacement, recalls, and customer vehicle repairs.

I'm hoping to stick it out a few more years and then retire.

@OP. Not looking for new employment now: the wife is sick these days. Am I going to start looking soon? You bet I will. I will not stay in automotive neither.

Good luck!