Ford on Ford: 'We're looking at radical changes'

Ford is the king of pickups. But your passenger car lineup is thin. How did it get that way?

We underinvested in cars in the '90s. We know more about the truck market than anyone else. Our product plan, when we roll it out, won't be a situation when we launch a car and then abandon it, as we have done in the past.

Even if we had a good launch, we took way too long to change and upgrade the product. And we let it die on the vine. [Vehicles like the Focus, Freestar minivan, Taurus, and Lincoln Continental are all examples.] That's not going to happen any more.

The truth about the auto business is that it takes years to bring new product to market, and there's little you can do to move the ball financially in the short term. Is the revised restructuring plan mostly meant to convey action—that you are digging deeper and faster to really change the company?

There's a large element to that. People need to see that we're attacking what we can attack. It's not just costs. It's also product. Most people focus on that we are too big and our costs are too high. It's about cutting costs. But it's very much a product-focused plan. We had already begun to diversify away from large SUVs and trucks well before the oil price spike. But we have to see how my product programs can accelerate and pull forward.

Have you lost time and opportunity in five years because of changing people too often? You've had three product heads and three or four North American chiefs, depending on how you define jobs. Could you be bringing the Fairlane crossover faster? A small car faster? Settled on a Lincoln rear-drive or front-drive strategy faster?

You're right. We have had three COOs including me now. When I came in, we had a management team that wasn't functioning well together. And it has taken time to get the right combination together.

I feel good about the current team—Mark Fields in North America, Mark Schultz in Europe. The turnover is why I took over as COO. I wanted to dive in and didn't want any filters getting in the way of hastening the streamlining of our global operations. Getting our manufacturing footprint, labor relations, product development, and supplier base all in alignment with the new plan, that's how I've been spending my time. I've gotten very close to the operations. Do I wish I had this group in place all along? Yes, in a perfect world.

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