From: Ford Employees
To: Ford Leadership
Dear Ford Leadership:
We write with respect to Ford Motor Company's quality standards and manufacturing processes. For months, Ford customers and employees have watched with concern as quality issues have eroded the trust and reputation our company spent over a century building. After years of escalating problems with certain product lines, customer satisfaction scores continue to decline while warranty costs spiral upward. Ford vehicles cannot continue to disappoint customers while using resources that should be invested in engineering excellence and manufacturing precision. Our customers rightfully expect their company to take action to restore Ford's reputation for quality and ensure no more loyalty is lost. It is critical that we come together to impose common sense reforms and accountability measures that our customers, dealers, and employees are demanding.
We believe Ford needs to enact the following guardrails:
- Targeted Quality Control – No vehicle leaves the assembly line without comprehensive inspection. End "ship and fix later" practices and improve validation procedures and standards. Require verification that every vehicle meets quality specifications before delivery to dealers.
- Transparent Problem Identification – Prohibit concealment of known quality issues from engineers, technicians, and customers. Require immediate escalation of recurring defects.
- Employee Accountability and Authority – enable employees to display ownership of their systems and be accessible for quality concerns. Empower them to stop production when critical defects are identified, without fear of retaliation.
- Protect Critical Development Time – Prohibit funds from being diverted away from proper engineering development cycles. Ensure adequate testing time for new platforms, powertrains, and major components before launch.
- Stop Cost-Cutting That Compromises Quality – Prohibit purchasing decisions based solely on lowest cost when quality, durability, or safety could be compromised. Require engineering sign-off on all supplier changes.
- Uphold Manufacturing Standards – Place into policy a reasonable and consistent manufacturing standard across all plants. Expand quality training and require certification of assembly workers. In the case of a quality escape, production must pause until root cause is identified and corrected.
- Ensure Cross-Functional Coordination and Oversight – Preserve the ability of engineering, manufacturing, and quality teams to investigate and address potential defects. Require that quality data is preserved and shared across departments. Require consent of engineering leadership before accelerating production timelines.
- Build Safeguards Into the System – Make clear that all vehicles sold must meet the same basic quality standards regardless of plant, supplier, or production pressure. Allow dealerships and customers clear channels to report quality concerns directly to engineering. Reverse limitations on employee access to warranty data and customer complaints.
- Data Collection for Improvement, Not Blame – Require comprehensive collection of quality metrics, warranty data, and customer feedback. Mandate transparent sharing of this information with employee teams. Prohibit retaliation against employees who identify quality problems.
- No Shortcuts in Development – Regulate and standardize the development and validation processes to ensure adequate testing time, appropriate safety margins, and thorough documentation across all product lines.
These reforms should apply to all Ford products, whether passenger vehicles, trucks, commercial vehicles, or any future platforms.
Furthermore, there are steps that Ford leadership has the power to take right now to show good faith, including:
Fully addressing known quality issues in current production vehicles before launching new models
Reinstating adequate engineering development timelines that were shortened for cost or speed
Empowering employees to halt production when critical defects are discovered
Investing warranty savings back into prevention rather than treating quality failures as acceptable cost of business.
These are common sense solutions that protect Ford's reputation, ensure customer satisfaction, and honor the legacy of quality that generations of Ford employees built. Our customers deserve vehicles they can trust. Our dealers deserve products they can confidently sell. Our employees deserve to take pride in the vehicles we design and build.
We built the Model T, the Mustang, and the Ford Tempo. We survived a century of challenges through innovation and quality. We can restore that standard, but only if leadership commits to these fundamental reforms.
The employees who produce Ford vehicles are ready to deliver world-class quality. We need leadership's commitment to give us the resources to do so. If they lack the will, we may need to commandeer this vessel so that "we are the captain now".
Respectfully submitted,
Ford Employees