Customer Reviews

Car: A Drama of the American Workplace

5 star:		(16)
4 star:		(10)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(4)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

The appeal of this book goes beyond an interest in the auto industry or an interest in cars. If you work in any kind of development process, from software to hardware, this book is both an entertaining and instructive read. It seems we're all fighting the same battles: Designers and engineers constantly at loggerheads, testers finding bugs at the last minute, division presidents saying outlandish things to the press and the sales people looking for the spin. If you don't want to read yet another boring book on how to improve the software development process, try this.

I am a graduating mechanical engineer, and I've read this book every year I've been at school. Every time I read it I get more excited about entering this volatile world of automotobile development, as a cast member of the "drama of the American workplace."

Other reviews for this book penalize Mary Walton for selecting the Taurus, but what most people forget to realize is that the family sedan is probably the most difficult car to engineer. You have to satisfy a much wider range of people than if you were building, say a C5 corvette where all you have to do is make it go fast and burn corners. I found the Taurus examination much more fulfilling.

I agree with several reviewers: no special interest in the car industry is required to enjoy this book. Mary Walton's story is a fascinating look at the human drama that is part of developing any complex product and bringing it to market, on time and on budget, despite impossible constraints

Walton had Ford's permission to shadow the team tasked to bring a new Ford Taurus to market, and then write about her experience.

There are many warring factions and few genuinely trusted parties from among the various teams responsible for the new Taurus. The story is the interaction of various engineering teams, engineers from the plant ("factory rats") where the car is to be made, design groups (they pick the colors), executive leadership and finance that makes the real decision to go ahead and build the car, and most fascinating part: many suppliers told just enough to do their job and maybe, if they are clever, earn a profit.

The two main and very colorful players, and self-described "pros" are Dick Landgraff and George Bell, his right-hand man. Their quotes are peppered throughout the book and by themselves make the book a worthy read. Here are few samples:

George Bell, Landgraff's trusted chief engineer, had a "to make sure no one does anything stupid." Decisions that cost too much or upset the timetable are something stupid.

"Any set of objectives that can be immediately met is probably not aggressive enough." George Bell

Dick Landgraff believed that you should simply "find people you can trust and then empower them to do things. If they screw up, get rid of them."

Some Georgisms: After looking at the engine compartment, "This looks like a dog's breakfast." And "Let's stop lashing ourselves with barbed wire."

"The only thing that really counts is `Did I make the objectives?' I'm not being graded on, `Did I make everyone go away feeling good?'" Landgraff on not caring if he wasn't Mr. Nice Guy.

"You had to feel sorry for these amateurs from electronics. All they did was set themselves up for another slam-dunk. They were up against an pro."

"Ford offered too many distractions...going to meeting, being mentors to people...It's more important to pay attention to the car. Every time you don't, something goes wrong. People get caught up with all of this other, what I call frivolous stuff. Like, going to seminars to hear about what's going on with the 1998 steering column, and going to luncheon meeting to find out what truck operations is doing on some other thing. People lose their focus, they lose their ability to remember what it is they're supposed to go do, so they dissipate their efforts in a lot of interesting and perhaps even valuable sorts of things, but they're not critical to what they're really trying to accomplish." Landgraff

"Suppliers...we have to take away all the excuses."

Landgraff letter to Lear Seat president: "You've got to get a guy with real responsibility for the success of the business, you've got to make is clear you're unhappy, and then you've got to follow up."

"Unfortunately, we've hammered on Lear Seat so much, they've grown an asbestos ass." Landgraff

"The problem with these PR guys is, it's amateur night at the movies. Their time horizon's about thirty minutes." Landgraff

Body and Assembly acted as if the plant was "eighteenth-century France. A big castle with a moat around it...I don't pay attention to that stuff." Landgraff.

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In the end, Ford was unhappy with Mary Walton's manuscript and cut off further contact with Ford people. Makes you wonder what Ford was thinking or expecting. I thoroughly enjoyed this book and recommend it all the time as an alterative to just another faddish management book

The reviews done by the readers are quite split into two - excellent, good to worse. A marketing expert once said that getting radical reviews was the sign of a successful product. And it seems.

Though Mary Walton is not a car-mania or does'nt seem to have much knowledge of cars before she wrote this book, her basic knowledge of it gives the reader an easy to read, comprehensive report on one of the key players in the industry which still effects the most on the global economy, the car industry.

As I try reading other books that took simular approaches to GM - 'All Corevette are Red'- and Chrysler -'The Critical Path' - written by car experts, the tone of it were like hearing an engineering lecture. I still fall asleep while trying to go over a few pages of it...And I am a student of engineering! I never did that when I read 'CAR'. Must be like one of those lectures at Harvard - The author's alma mater - that's so good the students rise and applause at the last class.

Written like a movie scenario, sometimes painful for those concerned, but refreshing for those who wants the 'Veritas', the truth of what is going about in the massive car industries, one will surely feel from the first page to the closing moment as walking through the highly restricted design studios to the heat emitting machines of the factory to the fancy lights of motor shows, and finally the showroom.

This book has it all, unless you are a high ranking person of a car company.

So if you are wondering what book to read on cars, just get 'CAR'.

As someone who is neither in the auto industry nor in the business field what-so-ever, I found Walton's book to be engaging yet lacking.

First the engaging part. I have always been a gearhead but one with an eye towards what makes the industry as a whole tick. This book did a lot in helping me understand just what goes on in the creation of an automobile. I have a higher respect, and some empathy, for all those involved - officer, managemener, engineer, assembler, and seller. I also can draw parallels with what each of these groups tried to shoot for and had to settle for. As a member of the US military, I am quite experienced in the "aim high then accept mediocre" way of doing business.

However, with that said, this book left a lot of questions. Walton's examples were sometimes weak and begged deeper explanation, especially when it came to technical matters. And her coverage of the dealer/sales end of the story seemed hurried and somewhat unfinished.

All in all, this was a well done book that treated everyone fairly and told a rich, involving story (I don't know why Ford would want to squelch anything in it). But in telling such a story, it left me feeling like it wasn't quite finished.

I recommend this book to anyone with an interest in technology, engineering, manufacturing, design, etc. Or, for the non- technical, if you are considering working for a mammoth-sized company such as Ford, or simply have an interest in the automotive industry, this book provides tremendous insight. It is truly fascinating to learn of the scale on which things get done to make a car. It also becomes apparent why Ford, and perhaps other domestic auto companies, seem to fall behind in what the market demands. The DN101 team focused on, and aspired to beat a 1992 Toyota in their 1996 model year car. There are huge lessons in this book for anyone in business. While some have accused Mary Walton of focusing on the controversy, I think she portrayed the reality of such an undertaking, good and bad.

I left Ford in 1981 as an Assistant plant manager of a Assembly plant to join a Japanese Car Company. It appears that the times haven't changed much, the belittling shown in the book was a fact of life in many instances. However, I was fortunate to have had bosses like Ken Reuther and Pete George who always had the CUSTOMER first, not a boss. These two also took the time to let a greenhorn--a nerd--from Plant Engineering get the experience of building first a Pilot Plant tryout unit and then the real thing in an Assembly Plant. One thing I did not read was the "Back to Back" launch concepts that Ford did in the mid to late 70's and the launching of a vehicle at line speed as Pete George did. He helped us find our tooling and manufacturing (Plant) problems quickly as we actually achieved accelerations in advance of production schedules because the workers did not have to relearn the operation with every speed increase and we did not require constant rebalancing of work. During my time with Pete George, we beat every launch budget. Both Ken and Pete were taskmasters but great people promoters who stood up to every boss when they had to and defended their people in public and critized only in private. Regarding Atlanta personnel, I was a Yankee who felt that I had died and gone to Heaven when I went to Atlanta. Most people, both men and women, at Atlanta were kind, considerate and dedicated to their job. Maybe, because Pete knew everyone and took the time to introduce me and let me make mistakes which the staff corrected did they consider me human and help me as they so often did.. I think Pete was "Japanese Before His Time", He believed in QUALITY not Quantity and took the lumps each time the plant was shy by more than 10 units to the daily production schedule. I thoroughly enjoyed the book, and for a writer to have gained all the insight in 3 years was significant, it took me 22 years to learn the Politics at Ford was more important than good business and manufacturing practices --but then, I'm a Nerd--a slow learner. You might wonder why so many engineers, asst. plant managers and sales personnel left the Company? They didn't leave for the money and if more were like Ken and Pete, none would have left.

Reading Mary Walton's "Car" was like deja vu, because the picture she paints of the design process at Ford is incredibly accurate. As a former CPM Vehicle Office engineer at Ford, I saw identical issues and many of the same characters in our own car program (which was also famous for its collocated "skunkworks" team). Moreover, the cultural idiosyncrasies of Ford that Walton describes in detail are ones that can only be perceived after an extended period of immersion in that environment. I do not doubt that divisional friction exists in all large corporations; however, I am convinced that until it is mitigated, the customer will never be satisfied with the product of such an arduous and complicated process that leads to countless and unfortunate compromises. People who criticize this book are the same closed-minded people at Ford who keep the company from moving forward. A good example is the way in which Ford employees who drive foreign cars are treated. They should be embraced and be asked to attend focus groups to describe (with engineering details) what characteristics they perceive to be superior in their own cars. Instead, they are shunned, and their cars are eventually peppered with door dings and key marks. Ford has incredible resources and potential, but these must be harnessed and managed in an inclusive and progressive way. Middle managers must be willing to risk their careers (and 2nd homes Up North) and take a stand for what they think is right. Too many times has a top executive walked into a clay studio or engineering review and made an off-hand comment that literally brings the design process to a grinding halt because no one is sure what is going to happen next. No engineer wants to waste time (or be passionate about) working on a design that is going to be arbitrarily thrown out and changed based on some executive's personal opinion. Changes to designs after the designs have been frozen are the main reason for the lengthy design process at Ford. Top managers must resist the temptation to put their mark on a project and remain faithful to the needs and wants of the customer.

I picked this book up and couldn't put it down, I'm not even really interested in the process of designing and producing an automobile. The writing style is fun, and while a bit simple it is highly engaging. A nice departure from the facts, figures and bone dry writing I would have expected.

Kristina Osborn
Acquisitions
Columbus College of Art and Design, Packard Library

Car. A wonderfully detailed account of the development of an American car. The book captures the drama of the people involved in the styling, design, production, marketing, and sale of America's best selling car. Mary Walton did an excellent job of capturing a behind the scenes chronological portrayal of how Ford Motor Co. brings a car to market. Details such as how Ford vice-presidents intervened and decide where to locate the outside rear view mirrors on the Taurus are included. From organizational restructuring to lavish parties and media events, it's all here. This book is mandatory reading for anyone interested in the automobile industry.