Audiobook14 hours
American Icon: Alan Mulally and the Fight to Save Ford Motor Company
Written by Bryce G. Hoffman
Narrated by Pete Larkin
Rating: 4.5 out of 5 stars
4.5/5
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About this audiobook
At the end of 2008, Ford 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. Under the leadership of charismatic CEO Alan Mulally, Ford had already put together a bold plan to unify its divided global operations, transform its lackluster product lineup, and overcome a dys-functional culture of infighting, backstabbing, and excuses. It was an extraordinary risk, but it was the only way the Ford family-America's last great industrial dynasty-could hold on to their company.nbsp;Mulally and his team pulled off one of the great-est comebacks in business history. As the rest of Detroit collapsed, Ford went from the brink of bankruptcy to being the most profitable automaker in the world.nbsp;American Icon is the compelling, behind-the-scenes account of that epic turnaround. On the verge of collapse, Ford went outside the auto industry and recruited Mulally-the man who had already saved Boeing from the deathblow of 9/11-to lead a sweeping restructuring of a company that had been unable to overcome decades of mismanage-ment and denial. Mulally applied the principles he developed at Boeing to streamline Ford's inefficient operations, force its fractious executives to work together as a team, and spark a product renaissance in Dearborn. He also convinced the United Auto Workers to join his fight for the soul of American manufacturing.nbsp;Bryce Hoffman reveals the untold story of the covert meetings with UAW leaders that led to a game-changing contract, Bill Ford's battle to hold the Ford family together when many were ready to cash in their stock and write off the company, and the secret alliance with Toyota and Honda that helped prop up the Amer-ican automotive supply base.nbsp;In one of the great management narratives of our time, Hoffman puts the reader inside the boardroom as Mulally uses his celebrated Business Plan Review meet-ings to drive change and force Ford to deal with the painful realities of the American auto industry.nbsp;Hoffman was granted unprecedented access to Ford's top executives and top-secret company documents. He spent countless hours with Alan Mulally, Bill Ford, the Ford family, former executives, labor leaders, and company directors. In the bestselling tradition of Too Big to Fail and The Big Short, American Icon is narrative nonfiction at its vivid and colorful best.
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Reviews for American Icon
Rating: 4.3947368561403515 out of 5 stars
4.5/5
57 ratings7 reviews
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Very interesting! It left me wanting more, "the rest of the story" if you will, as this is a bit older and much has happened since this was made.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5From beginning to transformation, it’s a business, teamwork must read.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5A captivating recounting of the turn around of Ford Motor Company. Fascinating read.
Team work, honesty, and facing the facts ate the keys to a successful business. - Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5This suffers from the usual one-sidedness of business books. Everyone kisses up to their boss. You can easily tell who talked to the author, and who didn't. Hoffman brings zero skepticism to his reporting, even accepting at face value Ford's ridiculous assertions about the cost of Mulally's private jets. If you can read past this, though, it is an interesting story; and despite the usual flaws it is above average for the genre. > Mulally piled in with his press aide, Karen Hampton; Ford Americas group controller Bob Shanks; and John Kostiuk, the head of Ford’s motor pool. Bodyguards traveled in two other vehicles ahead and behind Mulally’s Escape. The inconspicuous motorcade spent ten hours on the road, stopping only for bathroom breaks. … Given the security escort the trip required, it probably would have been cheaper to take the Gulfstream. But Ford had learned the hard way that appearance counted for more than reality inside the Beltway. That morning, the automaker announced that it was selling all of its corporate jets.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5American Icon provides a recap of the history of Ford Motor Company before focusing on the company's recent history including it's near bankruptcy, the decision to bring Alan Mullally in as CEO, and the decisive steps that were taken, betting everything on a final plan to pull the company back from the brink, re-structuring the company, introduce new lines of products, and working to change consumer perception of one of America's oldest automotive companies.
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5The return of Ford Motors to national prominence and relative health. The most interesting thing to me here is how workers/unions appear as burdens to be shed. That left the hagiographic account of Ford’s CEO with a little of the flavor of “the operation was a success, but the patient died.” It was also funny to read how Ford negotiated its way out of a lot of its retiree health care promises, then Ford executives got huffy that the other big two carmakers were getting federal money they wouldn’t have to pay back—they saw the promises they broke as completely justified, but others were egregious ne’er-do-wells.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5wonderful story. well written. i like the journalistic style. Lots of details but in this case they are interesting. well worth a detour.