Summary
Mulally has spent over a year now getting his bearings and taking inventory of where he is and where he needs to be, consolidating his inner circle of managers who share his vision…. and learning to be a car guy! Anyone who thinks otherwise has not been paying attention to the masterful way he has set the stage for the UAW to see things his way. Energized by successes in these talks will give him the window of opportunity and credibility to raise his sword in the air and order his men to "take that hill" with some expectation that when he turns around they will all be there with him. These talks are extremely important for him to gain the ability (credibility) to have the impact he needs to have going forward.
Analysis
He has spent a year studying the lay of the land and
formulating his thoughts and sounding out his managers and he is now prepared
to 'charge that hill" and lead FMC back from dead. Anyone who has watched
the way he has been dealing with the UAW should be able to tell that this man
is a bridge builder who is conducting this dance with the charm talent and
grace of a symphony conductor ....right down to the great photo ops of him
hugging UAW leaders and touring plants with his arm around some of them. Just
looking at the pictures, and listening to the toned down rhetoric of these
talks compared to the other two, leaves even the casual observer with the
impression that these talks are no where near as adversarial and that a
partnership is being forged for the greater good of Ford.
Living in the NW and watching Mulally bring Boeing out of the dirt, and
uncertainty of 9-11 back to the top in 2005 as Chairman of Commercial
Airplanes, I developed a strong respect for this mans charisma and sales ability.
He was criticized when he was hired for not being a 'car guy' well I have news
for his distracters, this man is a car guy's... car guy! ...he's just spent his
career selling ‘high line’ vehicles costing 100's of millions of dollars and
not Ford Focuses for $10,000.00 What makes all of this charm even more
remarkable is his background as an engineer... generally not the breeding
ground of too many top level salespeople who don't have the passion and purpose
of a vision, to provide them with the drive it takes to put up the sales
numbers he and his team did at Boeing.
He brought new product lines to the market and phased out old lines ...he built up the brand, and he did it with innovative, technologically advanced, very high quality, new aircraft. He even had planes rolling down the line (versus not rolling) in Everett forcing suppliers to do it better and cheaper and cleaner with the net result being the guarantee of good high paying jobs building airliners in Washington State for along long time. I have rarely read or heard him interviewed where he didn't make a point of saying how much fun he was having doing whatever it was he was doing. He is a very hard man not to like and while the UAW has seen it's share of charismatic automakers throughout the years, these are new times and hopefully they will see that the best thing they can do to get the job security they say they want and need is to jump on board today and get behind the guy who wants the thankless job of resurrecting the best parts of a FMC that has been spread all over the board through their outdated parts strategy, miserable rental car programs, dull and lifeless advertising campaigns and some ego boosting acquisitions of his predecessors, and help build that security for the themselves. I am a believer that in order to gain the credibility to lead that charge and make the changes that need to be made he will need to have everyone on board, and that includes his friends and partners at the UAW. That journey starts this week and I predict the first round will go to Mulally - FMC and in the long run all parties will emerge with a win just like they did up the street at Boeing Field .
