Alan Mulally and the Fight to Save Ford Motor Company Free

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Look Inside. At the end ofFord Motor Company was just months away from running out of cash. With the auto industry careening toward ruin, Congress offered American Icon: Alan Mulally and the Fight to Save Ford Motor Company three Detroit automakers a bailout. General Motors and Chrysler grabbed the taxpayer lifeline, but Ford decided to save itself. As the rest of Detroit collapsed, Ford went from the brink of bankruptcy to being the most profitable automaker in the world. American Icon is the compelling, behind-the-scenes account of that epic turnaround. He spent countless American Icon: Alan Mulally and the Fight to Save Ford Motor Company with Alan Mulally, Bill Ford, the Ford family, former executives, labor leaders, and American Icon: Alan Mulally and the Fight to Save Ford Motor Company directors. HOFFMAN is a bestselling author, speaker and consultant who helps companies around the world plan better and leaders around the world lead better by applying innovative systems from the worlds of business and the military. Before launching his… More about Bryce G. American Icon is a story of leadership that offers valuable lessons for organizations of all sizes. Highly recommend! It features the transformation from a top-down style of leadership to that of a coach led by CEO Alan Mulally whose focus is the team, the team, the team. A great story. I thought I was disciplined until I read how Mulally worked. Bryce is a gifted writer, and American Icon is both educational and entertaining. Most telling of all — I learned from reading this book. Almost certainly one of the best business books of the year. When you buy a book, we donate a book. Sign in. Halloween Books for Kids. Read An Excerpt. Hoffman By Bryce G. Hoffman Best Seller. Category: Business Category: Business. Feb 05, ISBN Add to Cart. Also available from:. Mar 13, ISBN Available from:. Paperback —. Also by Bryce G. See all books by Bryce G. About Bryce G. Product Details. Inspired by Your Browsing History. The Score Takes Care of Itself. Anything You Want. Derek Sivers. The Servant Leader. James A. The Greatest Trade Ever. Gregory Zuckerman. King of Capital. John E. Morris and David Carey. Creating Magic. Lee Cockerell. David Heinemeier Hansson and Jason Fried. Chris Yeh and Reid Hoffman. Side Hustle. Chris Guillebeau. Profit First. Mike Michalowicz. The Buy Side. How to Get Rich. Felix Dennis. Start Something That Matters. Blake Mycoskie. The Lean Startup. Team Rodent. Carl Hiaasen. Be Obsessed or Be Average. Grant Cardone. Rule 1. Steve Mariotti. Your Stand Is Your Brand. Patrick Gentempo. The Only Game in Town. Mohamed A. Leadership Is an Art. Tap Dancing to Work. Carol J. Monica Langley and Marc Benioff. Alpha Girls. Julian Guthrie. More Money Than God. Sebastian Mallaby. When Genius Failed. Roger Lowenstein. Randy Street and Geoff Smart. Only the Paranoid Survive. Andrew S. Humble Leadership. Edgar H. Schein and Peter A. Lori Greiner. Measure What Matters. Finding My Virginity. Richard Branson. Related Articles. Looking for More Great Reads? Download Hi Res. LitFlash The eBooks you want at the lowest prices. Read it Forward Read it first. Pass it on! Stay in Touch Sign up. We are experiencing technical difficulties. Please try again later. Become a Member Start earning points for buying books! American Icon by Bryce G. Hoffman: | : Books

Uh-oh, it looks like your Internet Explorer is out of date. For a better shopping experience, please upgrade now. Javascript is not enabled in your American Icon: Alan Mulally and the Fight to Save Ford Motor Company. Enabling JavaScript in your browser will allow you to experience all the features of our site. Learn how to enable JavaScript on your browser. NOOK Book. At the end ofFord Motor Company was just months away from running out of cash. With the auto industry careening toward ruin, Congress offered all three Detroit automakers a bailout. General Motors and Chrysler grabbed the taxpayer lifeline, but Ford decided to save itself. As the rest of Detroit collapsed, Ford went from the brink of bankruptcy to being the most profitable automaker in the world. American Icon is the compelling, behind-the-scenes account of that epic turnaround. He spent countless hours with Alan Mulally, Bill Ford, the Ford family, former executives, labor leaders, and company directors. That beat gave him a front-row seat for many of the events chronicled in American Icon. He lives in Grand Blanc, Michigan. One sees them all about-men who do not know that yesterday is past, and who woke up this morning with their last year's ideas. Ford's woes had not begun with the arrival of the Japanese in the s or the oil crises of the s. The company had been struggling with itself since Henry Ford started it on June 16, It invested massively in game-changing products, and then did nothing to keep them competitive. It allowed cults of personality to form around large-than-life leaders, but drove away the talent needed to support them. And it allowed a caustic corporate culture to eat away at the company from the inside. These were birth defects that could be traced back to the automaker's earliest days. Henry Ford liked to boast that he had created the modern world. In many ways, he had. But he also created a company that was its own worst enemy. Henry Ford began that company with a simple vision: "I will build a car for the great multitude. It will be large enough for the family, but small enough for the individual to run and care for. It will be constructed of the best materials, by the best men to be hired, after the simplest designs that modern engineering can devise. But it will be so low in price that no man making a good salary will be unable to own one-and enjoy with his family the blessing of hours of pleasure in God's great open spaces. When the Model T went on sale on October 1,most cars cost a small fortune. But Ford did not stop there. As demand for these Tin Lizzies grew, the pioneering manufacturer began building them on the world's first moving assembly lines. This cut the average time it took to produce a Ford from thirteen American Icon: Alan Mulally and the Fight to Save Ford Motor Company to just ninety minutes. But workers got bored on Ford's assembly lines, and turnover was high. It was America's first minimum wage, and it was more than twice what most other laborers made at the time. As news spread, tens of thousands of men-particularly in the underdeveloped South-threw down their picks and hoes and headed for Detroit. As Henry Ford would later boast, it also made his workers as reliable as his machines. Mass production allowed Ford to cut costs and boost efficiency. He passed the savings on to consumers and made his money on the added volume. Henry Ford claimed that every dollar he shaved off the price of his car bought him a thousand new customers. It was an impressive figure for the time, but it was nearlyless than the company was making just two years before. Despite the massive price cuts, sales of the Model T were slumping. So was Ford's share of the market, which peaked in at Other automakers, like General Motors, were regularly introducing new models-each one an improvement over its predecessor. The Model T had seen few updates. It was old technology, yet Henry Ford stubbornly refused to begin work on a replacement. He thought it was all the automobile the average person needed. When his engineers began work on a new prototype anyway, Ford destroyed it with a sledgehammer. But Ford's dealers were clamoring for something new. So was his son, Edsel. By the time Ford finally began work on his new Model A indemand had fallen so dramatically that he was forced to close his factories and lay off 60, workers. As Ford retooled, General Motors passed it to become the largest automaker in the world. Many thought Ford was finished. But on November 28,people all over America waited in line for hours outside dealerships for a glimpse of the first new Ford in twenty years. It did not seem to matter that the only thing inside most of the stores was a cardboard cutout. By the end of the day, more than 10 million people percent of the U. It combined the Model T's practicality with something entirely new to Ford customers: style. Thousands placed orders on the spot. Ford's factories surged back to life, unable to keep up with the unprecedented demand for its new car. Within two years, the company had sold more than 2 million Model A's and its share of the domestic market doubled. Yet once again, Henry Ford rested on the laurels of his phenomenal success as his competitors continued to improve their offerings. The next new Ford would not arrive in showrooms until By then, other manufacturers were introducing new models every year, and Ford was losing money. Fortunately for the Dearborn automaker, its new flathead V-8 motor was another innovative hit. But Ford would not really begin to diversify American Icon: Alan Mulally and the Fight to Save Ford Motor Company product lineup until after American Icon: Alan Mulally and the Fight to Save Ford Motor Company War II, and even then it would continue to make the same mistake with products like the Thunderbird and the Mustang. By the s, Ford was fighting for its life once again-this time against new competitors from Japan. Ford and the other Detroit automakers had been ceding sales to the import brands for a decade, and many doubted whether the Big Three would be able to mount American Icon: Alan Mulally and the Fight to Save Ford Motor Company counterattack. Then Ford stunned the automotive world with the most radical new design in years. Init unveiled the Ford Taurus, a streamlined sedan with rounded corners that featured the tighter suspension and precise steering more typical of European automobiles. Critics said it looked like a jellybean, but it was a hit with consumers and pushed Ford's profits past GM's. The Taurus was so successful that General Motors and Chrysler were soon copying Ford's aerodynamic design, as were the Japanese. For a while, it seemed like Ford might finally have learned its lesson. It introduced an upgraded version of the Taurus in that was even better than the original. The Taurus became the bestselling car in America, seizing that title from the Honda Accord. But Ford's investment in the popular sedan soon petered out. InToyota's Camry claimed its crown, and the Taurus was soon relegated to rental car fleets. When production finally stopped infew even noticed. Ford's overreliance on a single product was surpassed only by its overreliance on a single man. In the beginning, that man was Henry Ford. Instead of leading a team of managers, Ford preferred to rule his industrial empire like a potentate. He had a good eye for talent and initially tried to fill his court with able executives, but he often drove them away once they began to exert significant influence over his organization. Ford was even unwilling to share power with his own son. Edsel Ford replaced his father as the company's president after the family bought out the other investors inand American Icon: Alan Mulally and the Fight to Save Ford Motor Company held that position until his death in But Henry Ford still made all the decisions, large and small, often countermanding any orders his son tried to give. He even rehired men Edsel had fired. James Couzens, the company's first general manager, played the prudent businessman to his mad inventor-at least until he resigned in Couzens said that, while he was willing to work with Mr. Ford, he could no longer work for him," wrote another early Ford executive, Charles Sorensen. There he became head of Chevrolet, leading it past Ford in factory output by Knudsen was too strong for me to handle," Henry Ford later conceded. I built it, and as long as I live, I propose to run it the way I want it run. Bennett was quickly promoted to chief of the Ford Service Department, which under his leadership grew into the largest private police force in the world. Men like Bennett fostered an enduring culture of intrigue and backstabbing among Ford's senior leadership. Employees lived in fear of being fired by capricious managers and thought carefully before answering questions to make sure they gave the expected response, even if it was wrong. By the s, Ford had become "a dark, almost American Icon: Alan Mulally and the Fight to Save Ford Motor Company place, with a shadowy administration, activities shrouded in mystery, and a roster of dubious characters running rampant on the premises," in the words of historian Douglas Brinkley, who also noted the American Icon: Alan Mulally and the Fight to Save Ford Motor Company of any real corporate structure at the company. The only way anyone in Dearborn knew how much cash the company had was by looking at its bank statements. Ford actually figured out how much money to set aside for accounts payable each month by weighing its bills on a scale. That might have worked for an automotive start-up, but it had long since become a liability-one the U. Washington seriously considered taking over the company after Edsel, whom most outsiders viewed as the lone voice of reason inside Ford, died in The elder Ford initially tried to prevent his grandson from exercising any real authority, just as he had done with Edsel. NPR Choice page

Goodreads helps you keep track of books you want to read. Want to Read saving…. Want to Read Currently Reading Read. Other editions. Enlarge cover. Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Open Preview See a Problem? Details if other :. Thanks for telling us about the problem. Return to Book American Icon: Alan Mulally and the Fight to Save Ford Motor Company. Preview — American Icon by Bryce G. At the end ofFord Motor Company was just months away from running out of cash. With the auto industry careening toward ruin, Congress offered all three Detroit automakers a bailout. General Motors and Chrysler grabbed the taxpayer lifeline, but Ford decided to save itself. As the rest of Detroit collapsed, Ford went from the brink of bankruptcy to being the most profitable automaker in the world. American Icon is the compelling, behind-the-scenes account of that epic turnaround. He also convinced the United Auto Workers to join his fight for the soul of American manufacturing. He spent countless hours with Alan Mulally, Bill Ford, the Ford family, former executives, labor leaders, and company American Icon: Alan Mulally and the Fight to Save Ford Motor Company. Get A Copy. Hardcoverpages. Published March 13th by Crown Business first published January 1st More Details Original Title. Other Editions 9. Friend Reviews. To see what your friends thought of this book, please sign up. To ask other readers questions about American Iconplease sign up. Can I read this now on my tablet? See 1 question about American Icon…. Lists with This Book. Community Reviews. Showing Average rating 4. Rating details. More filters. Sort order. Mar 14, Danielle rated it it was amazing. I had to read this book for one of my MBA classes and was not expecting to like it much given my total lack of interest in the auto industry, Ford, Detroit, etc. As it turned out, this is American Icon: Alan Mulally and the Fight to Save Ford Motor Company one of the most inspiring books I've ever read, and I found it to be both incredibly compelling and very fast-paced to read. I've never wanted to be a CEO okay I still don'tbut after reading about what Alan Mulally did at Ford I kinda sorta wanted to be one for a hot second. This is a remarkable st I had to read this book for one of my MBA classes and was not expecting to like it much given my total lack of interest in the auto industry, Ford, Detroit, etc. This is a remarkable story of leadership and massive cultural change throughout a huge organization. It was also really interesting to learn the whole back story of what Ford had done to put itself in the position of being the only one of the Big 3 to avoid bankruptcy and a government bail-out during the financial crisis. Bryce Hoffman is a fantastic writer, and I was super impressed by his organization of the narrative and his prose. Highly recommended. View 2 comments. Apr 07, Jean rated it it was amazing. I don't know if the author intended this book to be a solid piece of propaganda for Ford, but it worked! I listened to the book on Audiobook and enjoyed every minute. The story is well-told and Alan Mulally quickly becomes a likable hero to the reader. I related to Mulally's approach to people and his humility and genuineness is that a word? Hearing about his tendency to laugh and joke amongst his employees who didn't even realize who he was helped me identify one of my favorite characteristi I don't know if the author intended this book to be a solid piece of propaganda for Ford, but it worked! Hearing about his tendency to laugh and joke amongst his employees who didn't even realize who he was helped me American Icon: Alan Mulally and the Fight to Save Ford Motor Company one of my favorite characteristics of a good leader - sincerity and authenticity. The leadership lessons I pulled included the importance of transparency from the top down, the importance American Icon: Alan Mulally and the Fight to Save Ford Motor Company a clear mission statement with strategy, tactics, and metrics tied directly into one another, and honesty when measuring oneself against those metrics. I thought it was important that Mulally didn't punish execs when they honestly revealed their units weren't meeting standard, rather he rallied to their side to figure out how the rest of the team could help them come up to standard. This example is important - people should be free to fail, but then we must help them identify why they have failed and guide them to success. Hearing all of the changes Ford implemented before the other automakers were even acknowledging they were in trouble gave me a great deal of respect for the Ford Corporation. I have started taking note of their commercials and their cars on the road again, after previously discounting them. On that count, the propaganda worked! Congratulations to Alan Mulally on a historic turnaround and to the Ford Corporation for their diligence in pursuing excellence. This was a worthwhile and recommended read. Feb 17, James Korsmo rated it it was amazing Shelves: American Icon: Alan Mulally and the Fight to Save Ford Motor Company. Simply put, this book is a page-turner. And that's not what you'd normally expect from a business book. But there's a great story here, well told, that excites the mind. There hasn't really been a bigger story in the last half-decade than the economy, and along with the banking and housing sectors, America's "big three" automotive manufacturers have been key players in that story. But amid an economy in decline and two cross-town rivals falling toward default, Ford managed to plot a different cou Simply put, this book is a page-turner. But amid an economy in decline and two cross-town rivals falling toward default, Ford managed to plot a different course. This book is the story of that startling rebirth. It briefly chronicles the history of Ford, appraising its ups and downs and the resulting corporate culture its history had created. And it looks at the trouble it was facing along with the rest of the American Icon: Alan Mulally and the Fight to Save Ford Motor Company industry in the mid s. But things took a decisive change for Ford when Bill Ford Jr. And the person he tapped for that responsibility was Alan Mullaly, a top executive who had just led a resurgence at Boeing. American Icon is really three books in one: It is an interesting piece of modern American history, chronicling the inside workings of a key economic player in the midst of historic economic troubles throughout the country and the world. It is also a business book, with thoughtful and inspiring ideas for rethinking corporate culture, business workflows, and entrenched mindsets with cross-functional teams, openness, responsibility, and a carefully focused but always updating plan. And third, it is an interesting biography of both Bill Ford Jr. Mulally's ideas of emphasizing simplicity, comporting vision with reality, and demanding open collaboration and communication among team members worked wonders at Ford. He paints a compelling picture of how a corporate structure at whatever level could work constructively and agilely to effect productive change and breed success. I often had to put the book down so I could jot down ideas for making some of his principles work in my own workplace. This business book almost pulls new ideas out of you by stimulating your thinking; at least, it did for me. I loved this book, and am happy to enthusiastically recommend it. It's a fascinating case study in successful business coupled with compelling modern history told as a fast-moving story. You will not be bored; in fact, you'll be pulled in to Mulally's vision as you see it unfold before you. Aug 12, Patrick Eckhardt rated it liked it. Very well written and engaging, but ultimately it's a love letter to unfettered capitalism, unbalanced corporate executives, and the poor plight of independently wealthy individuals who stock isn't worth quite as much as it once was. In the moment, it's an empathetic struggle to save something important. When I take a step back, it's sort of just the story of people getting paid millions and millions of dollars to solve the problems created by other multi-millionaires. Definitely some worthwhile Very well written and engaging, but ultimately it's a love letter to unfettered capitalism, unbalanced corporate executives, and the poor plight of independently wealthy individuals who stock isn't worth quite as much as it once was. Definitely some worthwhile leadership takeaways, but probably not a page book for all that. May 21, Tania rated it it was amazing. Excellent book about the Ford Motor Company, and Alan Mulally's success in bringing the company to profitability. It is especially interesting to me since I have spent most of my adult life either working for or working with this company. It is quite something to have them discussing meetings in the 'glass house' just as you are driving by there on the highway Jan 25, John Elliott rated it really liked it. A fascinating behind-the-scenes look at how Mulally and his team saved Ford Motor Company. There were numerous tactical moves involved, but at the end of the day, the turnaround hinged on three basic elements: 1. Having a clear point of view about the future of Ford. Having a clear plan for getting to that future reality.