As Ford's Mobility Chief Heads Out the Door, Hackett's Top Deputies Take on New Roles

by Steph Willems

Published: April 10th, 2019

as ford s mobility chief heads out the door hackett s top deputies take on new roles

Ford Motor Company veteran Marcy Klevorn is set to retire come October, leaving her position as head of mobility in need of filling. No need for new blood in Ford’s C-suite, however, as there’s apparently room on Jim Farley’s plate.

Farley, Ford’s head of global markets, will add a new hat to his wardrobe even before Klevorn, 59, leaves the Glass House. Klevorn, whose tenure at Ford spans 36 years, will move to a (brief) new role after Farley dons the title of president of businesses, technology and strategy. There’s new responsibilities and a new title for global operations head Joe Hinrichs, too.

Effective May 1st, Farley will become responsible for Ford Smart Mobility, the company’s autonomous vehicle arm, research and advanced engineering, corporate partnerships, and global data insight and analytics.

Hinrichs, appointed president of automotive, will oversee product development, purchasing, manufacturing, and marketing and sales, also effective May 1st. He’ll also oversee Ford’s global business units in North America, South America, Europe, China, and other international markets, plus the Ford and Lincoln brands. Ford’s expectation of Hinrichs? Reaching a pre-tax global margin of 8 percent.

Between May and October, Klevorn will serve as chief transformation officer, reporting to CEO Jim Hackett. Klevorn took on the role of mobility chief in June 2017, immediately after Hackett’s arrival at Ford.

“In the past two years, we have made tangible progress in improving the fitness of our business, overhauled our regional strategies, created a winning product portfolio, and are working to transform Ford to succeed in an era of profound change and disruption,” Hackett said in a statement. “With this strong foundation in place for our auto and mobility businesses, we can now accelerate our transformation.”

Business matters aside, the elevation of Farley and Hinrichs has some envisioning what a post-Hackett world might look like.

“This sets up the horse race for who will replace Hackett,” Michelle Krebs, executive analyst at Autotrader, told Bloomberg. “Joe gets the job of producing today’s vehicles that make the money and Jim gets the job of creating the vehicles of the future that are not making money.”

[Image: Ford]

#AutoExecutives #ExecutiveShuffle #Ford #JimFarley #JoeHinrichs #MarcyKlevorn

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Hummer on Apr 10, 2019

What a massive waste of money this boondoggle has been. Think of the cars that could have been made from this money.

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- JimZ on Apr 10, 2019
  
  yeah, and think of how much money they'd still have lost selling those cars!
  
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- Hummer on Apr 10, 2019
  
  @JimZ At least they could have lost money on cool cars instead of fiestas and fusions.
  
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- JimZ on Apr 10, 2019
  
  @Hummer Ladies and gentlemen, I give you the Clueless Internet Car Person. Companies exist to make money selling things profitably to people who actually buy stuff. They’re not obligated to lose money making things just so you can argue about them on the Internet.
  
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- Hummer on Apr 10, 2019
  
  @JimZ So selling 150k cheap clown cars at a loss is worse than selling 50k next gen Crown Vic’s at a loss. Despite the latter actually improving corporate image among consumers. You lost money on 100k more cars and your worse off for it outside of simply losing money. Regardless you still lost money on driverless tech that now has consumers and stockholders wondering why the company is being run by high school dropouts on crack.
  
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- 28-Cars-Later on Apr 10, 2019
  
  @JimZ "They’re not obligated to lose money making things just so you can argue about them on the Internet." Um they kind of are, why else was FCA losing $14,000 on every 500e sold? https://www.reuters.com/article/chrsyelr-ceo-evs/fiat-chrysler-ceo-please-dont-buy-fiat-500e-electric-car-idUSL1N0O71MS20140521
  
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- ToolGuy on Apr 10, 2019
  
  JimZ said "Companies exist to make money selling things profitably to people who actually buy stuff." OK. So the Ford Motor Company should have closed down in 2006, or 2007, or 2008. If not earlier. (Would you like to introduce a little more subtlety to your argument? Cause, you know, you're the only one who's not clueless.)
  
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- Sportyaccordy on Apr 11, 2019
  
  @JimZ "So selling 150k cheap clown cars at a loss is worse than selling 50k next gen Crown Vic’s at a loss. Despite the latter actually improving corporate image among consumers. You lost money on 100k more cars and your worse off for it outside of simply losing money." Yes, absolutely. Those 150k clown cars were old. A "next gen" Crown Vic would also add development costs to its losses. And the notion that a new Crown Vic would "improve corporate image among consumers" is a pipe dream. Ford has spent the last 50 years teaching Americans that it makes cheap crap and is barely solvent. It's gonna take another 50 years of good carS and business.... not a new Crown Vic literally nobody wants.... to turn that around. The clock is ticking....
  
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- Hummer on Apr 11, 2019
  
  @JimZ Sporty, True about focus and fusion already built elsewhere. Though an executive car like a new Crown Vic would certainly look better than hundreds of people owning FiSTs pretending they’re boy racers with annoying exhausts that we now find ourselves in. It will take Ford decades to recover from that.
  
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ToolGuy on Apr 10, 2019

Survey: What are Ford's real objectives? (Try to look past all the flailing around.)

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