Introduction
The Ford Company is a US based multinational automotive corporation with various outlets among the major towns such as New York and Detroit among many other cities. Since its inception in 1903, the company has gone global with stakes in UK and Japan. This internal scan of the company provides among other things the aspects of the organizational structure; Corporate Governance, key members of management, structural type, and the organizational culture. Also, the organization’s resources are described to best highlight its internal environment.
Discussion
The Board of Directors of the Company is elected by and responsible to the shareholders. The Company’s board members as at 2011 are Allan Mullay (President and CEO), Bill Ford (Executive Chairman), Richard A. Gephardt, William Clay Ford, Sr. (Director Emeritus), Lewis Booth (Chairman, Ford of Europe). Other Board members are Ellen Marram, Stephen Butler, Irvine Hockaday Jr., and John L. Thornton.
However, main corporate officers include Mark Fields who is the Executive Vice President and President of The Americas, Mark A. Schulz serving as Executive Vice President and President of International Operations, Michael E. Bannister who is the Group Vice President; Chairman and CEO Ford Motor Credit, and Donat Leclair who serves as the Executive Vice President and CFO. Also, Paul Mascarenas serves as the Vice President of Engineering, The Americas Product Development.
Ford Motor Company with their seventeen levels is typical of a hierarchical organizational structure. Basically, the company has a divisional organizational structure. Divisional organizational structure is consistent with the company’s production strategies. The structure is in line with the company’s strategy on decentralized policy implementation and centralized strategic leadership, control, stability, internal focus and integration. The structure values control, standardization and clarity of authority. All these correlate to the company’s strategy of control and decentralized policy implementation.
The company organizes every organizational function into divisions. Every division is bestowed with functions as well as with resources. Ford Motor Company’s divisions are categorized on geographical basis. For instance, there is a US division, Europe Division, Asia and Africa and the Middle East. Its divisional organizational structure is also based on the type of its product. For example, its Africa division majorly sells trucks. In other divisions like Asia, subcompact cars and SUVs are sold. Every Ford Motor company’s division has its own engineering, sales and marketing departments. This ensures value, control and standardization which are the company’s production bottom lines.
Organizational Culture
Ford Motor Company’s organizational culture is hierarchical. It has a control organizational culture. In essence, besides integration an internal focus, the company is defined by control and stability. It values control, standardization, as well as a clear outlined structure of decision making and authority. From the information in the case, the driving theme behind what Ford Motor Company does innovation. Since the company implemented its “Quality Is Job One" philosophy, the company has made radical changes to its organization. It believes that employees should be involved in and show commitment to their jobs for quality products to be produced. Also, the company believes in and values team-based work. It believes that team work produces the commitment to job performance. Therefore, it has a culture of proliferating teams in the entire organization.
Apart from improving quality, the company believes that teams basically facilitate innovation. It does this by hiring experts with different bases of knowledge and perspectives and by offering a creative thinking environment. This has made the company boast of its assembly manufacturing culture. Ford Motor Company’s philosophy of “Quality Is Job One” thus simply stands for innovation. Ford has continued to invest in fuel efficient technologies as well as the development of the Ford Fusion hybrid. Also, Ford retail sales believe in operating under a dealership model, where dealerships sign exclusive contracts with the company to sell Ford vehicles. These form the company’s culture of operation.
Organization’s Resources
Ford Motor Company’s competitive strategies revolve around its decentralized control, defined market concept, quicker technological innovations and convenient control of finance. To attain these strategies, the company boasts of the following competitive advantages over its industry peers.
i. Marketing
Ford Motor Company has extensively continued to market its vehicles. The company has of late taken advantage of the consumers who are unease with the legitimacy of the warrantees of the competitors. Extensive marketing has made the company record a significant increase in the US market share. This has made the company realize a decrease in total cost for every vehicle. Also, the company holds agreements with Chang’an Automotive of China; through their joint venture Chang’an Ford the companies manufacture the Mondeo, Fiesta, and Ford Focus lines. Basically, this makes the company have a competitive advantage in the market over its competitors. However, the company has minimal penetration of market within India and China.
ii. Financial resources
Ford Motor Company has sound financial resources when compared to its competitors. It is the most financially healthy American car manufacturer. It is the only company with considerable amount of cash in hand to help finance its operations. Besides, it does not need to source for government funding as its financial base fixed assets is promising. Nevertheless, even though the company has better financial resources, it has continued to operate on poor profitability. The company has continued to lose money on vehicle lines, especially in the US.
iii. Human resources
The company has world recognized management team led by its long time experienced father of Boeing 777 airliner, Alan Mulally as the company’s chief executive officer. Alan Mulally was voted 2010 man of the year by Automobile Magazine. The management team has as well continued to hire high performing employees who basically believe in and values team-based work. Its workforce has continually shown commitment to job performance. This has resulted in a culture of proliferating teams in the entire organization.
Works cited.
DeMatio, J. 2010 Man of the Year: Alan Mulally, CEO Ford Motor Company. 2009. Web. 2nd March, 2012.
Dornbach-Bender, R., Slade, B., and Thorpe, J. Strategic Report for Ford Motor Company. 2009. Web. 2nd March, 2012.
< http://economics-files.pomona.edu/jlikens/SeniorSeminars/oasis/reports/F.pdf>
Tharp, B.M. Four Organizational Culture Types. 2009. Web. 2nd March, 2012.
.
