He started his career in Australia, but Jacques Nasser, left, is as recognizable in Detroit as William Clay Ford Jr., center, and Mayor Dennis Archer, right.

Bold Ford CEO leads a cultural revolution

Nasser’s hard-driving style draws praise, criticism

Photos by Charles V. Tines / The Detroit News Ford Motor Co. CEO Jacques Nasser casts a large shadow on all aspects of the world’s No. 2 automaker. He’s dynamic and driven, as is evident in public appearances such as this year’s Detroit Auto Show in January, above.

By Mark Truby and Bill Vlasic / The Detroit News

    DEARBORN — His eyes narrowed as Jacques A. Nasser sized up the row of sport-utility vehicles in Ford Motor Co.’s top-secret product development center.

    From the compact Escape to the hulking Navigator, the lineup represented the future of Ford’s high-profit truck fleet. But Nasser, Ford’s hard-charging chief executive officer, wasn’t entirely satisfied.

    The blue oval badge on the Explorer “doesn’t seem large enough.” The headlights on the Escape, he said, should be rounder. But when the 5-foot-6 Nasser slid into the future Navigator, he gushed over the sleek interior trimmed in brushed steel and polished walnut.

    The look was a dramatic departure from the current Navigator, one of Ford’s hottest products. Why change, Nasser was asked, a formula that has worked so well?

    “The biggest risk,” he shot back, “is doing nothing at all.”

    Born in Lebanon, raised in Australia and a veteran of Ford postings all over the globe, Jac Nasser has shaken the world’s No. 2 automaker to its roots. He’s become its engine of change. And change is more than a motto at Nasser’s Ford. It’s closer to a crusade.

    Since becoming CEO, Nasser, 52, has driven Ford from a plodding, hidebound bureaucracy into a nimble, technology-driven company with a consumer focus. His influence is everywhere.

    In Ford leadership classes, trainees warm up by shouting “Revolution!” But revolution can be bloody. Some employees feel passed over in favor of high-profile outsiders recruited by Nasser from DaimlerChrysler, BMW, Volkswagen, and even nonautomotive companies such as General Electric.

    Today’s Ford is an unsettling, stressful and inspiring place to work. And there can be no argument with Nasser’s results.

    Ford has posted record operating profits in the first half of 2000. In the scramble for global expansion, Nasser has gobbled up premier European brands in Volvo and Land Rover, and has the inside track to buy Daewoo of South Korea. Nasser seems everywhere -- giving computers to every employee, pledging to vastly improve SUV fuel-economy, directing the crisis over the Firestone tires linked to dozens of deaths in Ford Explorers.

    Above all, Nasser has brought a gutsy, charismatic personality to the automotive scene reminiscent of former Chrysler leaders Bob Lutz and Lee Iacocca.

    Of course, Ford isn’t Chrysler. Inside the company’s Glass House headquarters, the question is whether Nasser can truly remake a company steeped in tradition and ultimately controlled by the descendants of Henry Ford.

Robin Buckson / The Detroit News Jacques Nasser drives an Aston Martin DB7 with a 12-cylinder engine to work every day. He tested it at the Ford Proving Grounds recently. Nasser drives Ford products regularly, reporting his thoughts back to his staff.

Climb to the top

    Nasser was elevated to CEO on Jan. 1, 1999, coinciding with the crowning of William Clay Ford Jr., 43, as the company’s new chairman.

    Their paths to the top could not have been more different. Ford, the great-grandson of Henry Ford, grew up in tony, cloistered Grosse Pointe. After completing degrees at Princeton and MIT, the young blueblood took on a series of Ford jobs that groomed him for leadership.

    A world away, Nasser came of age in modest, often intolerant surroundings as a Lebanese-born immigrant in Anglo-dominated Australia. Barely 20, he accepted a job as a financial analyst with Ford of Australia, eager to see the world.

    Nasser jumped at international assignments others avoided, working in places like Thailand, the Philippines, Venezuela and Argentina.

    “I liked the small-team thinking, the agility,” Nasser said recently from his austere 12th-floor office at Ford’s headquarters in Dearborn.

    He gained a wealth of ground-level operational experience and was pegged as a rising star by Ford brass. While working at Ford’s Asia-Pacific operation, Nasser was ahead of his time — encouraging suppliers to cooperate and piece parts together into modules before shipping them to Ford assembly plants.

    “It was a pioneering effort and very controversial at the time,” said Lutz, a superior of Nasser’s at Ford before he left for Chrysler in 1986.

    In 1985 while in Argentina, Nasser was held hostage for three days when a Ford plant was seized during a political uprising. He eventually collapsed from exhaustion.

    Nasser returned to his homeland in 1990 to head Ford of Australia. Instead of the profitable, well-respected company he left in 1975, Nasser found an operation hemorrhaging money and market share. Over the next three years, Nasser sliced Ford of Australia’s 15,000-person work force in half and improved productivity by 40 percent.

    “They were pretty tough times,” said David Murphy, Ford’s vice-president of human resources, who worked for Nasser in Australia. “It tested Jac’s leadership.”

    Similar magic was expected in 1993 when Nasser arrived at Warley, Essex, England, to begin his chairmanship of Ford of Europe. Nasser’s finest moment in Europe may have been introduction of the Ka, a quirky bubble-shaped hatchback that became a hit. But Nasser was unable to engineer a complete turnaround, and Ford’s European operations remain a weak link within Ford.

    When Nasser became Ford’s head of automotive operations in 1996, he quickly honed his “Jac the Knife” reputation as a ruthless cost cutter.

    Nasser shipped Lincoln-Mercury to southern California and helped Ford slash costs by $3 billion, in part by killing weak vehicles like the Aspire, Aerostar and Thunderbird.

    Even before becoming CEO, Nasser rankled Ford veterans by hiring outsiders in key positions. He used buyouts to flush out poor performers and expendable workers.

    “He violates all the nicey, touchy stuff they teach you in graduate school,” said Gerald Meyers, former head of American Motors Corp. and now a University of Michigan business professor. “I don’t think he gives a damn about being popular or being thought of as a nice guy.”

Charles V. Tines / The Detroit News Nasser and his wife, Jennifer, underwent a highly publicized separation but have since announced that they are reconciling. Nasser’s every move is carefully scrutinized.

    Sparking the most vehement backlash, Nasser installed a new performance evaluation system last year that requires managers to give at least 10 percent of their subordinates C grades. Two consecutive years with a C evaluation is grounds for termination.

    Still, the initial fears of mass job cuts have dissipated somewhat and a more three-dimensional portrait of Nasser has emerged — one of an audacious, fast-acting leader with an ambitious vision for Ford’s future.

    In an era of vanilla U.S. automobile executives, Nasser cuts a dashing figure in Detroit. Not since Iacocca was running Chrysler has a Detroit auto executive seemed able thrust his company to another level by sheer force of will and personality.

    And like Iacocca, Nasser is a polarizing figure who is both loved and hated, but rarely ignored. It was front-page news in March when Nasser’s wife, Jennifer, filed for divorce. The two have since said publicly that they are reconciling.

    Then there are the diehard tales of bad blood between Nasser and Ford Jr.

    “Clearly, the fact that we have made some people uncomfortable has manifested itself in a good cop, bad cop, type of thing,” Ford Jr. said recently. “It was wishful thinking on some people’s part that maybe there was this rift, that Jac and I were duking it out in the hallways.”

A grand vision

    Not only is their the relationship amicable, Ford Jr says it’s strong enough to insulate Nasser from the vagaries of dealing with the Ford family and the company’s board of directors.

Robin Buckson / The Detroit News Nasser, born in Lebanon, started his career with Ford in Australia at age 20.

    “He doesn’t have to be looking over his shoulder at any kind of corporate politics,” Ford Jr. said. “I think that will will give him the ability to focus 100 percent on the business.”

    With Ford Jr.’s backing, Nasser has made it his mission to make Ford “the world’s leading consumer company providing automotive products and services.”

    Talking about the consumer is not revolutionary in the auto industry, but Nasser’s singular intensity and drive is making believers both inside and outside of Ford.

    Nasser wants to abandon traditional “Detroit-think” that says design and build a quality vehicle, ship it to a dealer and, hopefully, not see the customer again until they buy another car.

    “That was nirvana in the automotive industry,” Nasser said.

    To Nasser’s thinking, Ford has limited itself to a maximum of 25 percent of the money customers spend on their automotive needs. Under a consumer-focused model, Ford would not only build and finance the car, but provide the customer with a host of services such as car rental, after-market customization, satellite radio and Internet access.

    In the quest to connect with consumers, Nasser leads top executives on three-day market emersions in different parts of the world. On a recent trip to Miami, Nasser and his team hung out with young Hispanics, eating at local restaurants and shopping at stores the teen-agers considered hip.

    “Inevitably we got around to talking about cars,” said Richard Parry-Jones, Ford’s group vice-president for product development.

    Wall Street has remained on the fence during this transformation. Ford’s stock trades at a dismal seven times its earnings, compared with price-to-earnings ratios of 50 or 60 for many technology stocks. Some investors fear a down cycle; others say Ford is about as lean as it can get.

    “Ford has done such a good job of cost cutting that it’s a Catch-22,” said David Healy, an analyst with Burnham Securities.

    To improve Ford’s stock performance, Nasser believes he must not only imbue Ford with a consumer focus, but develop leaders at every level, diversify his workforce and embrace the Internet. Ford inked e-commerce deals with companies such as Oracle, Yahoo! and Microsoft Carpoint in an effort to integrate the Internet into nearly every aspect of Ford’s business.

    Nasser’s vision is grand. He wants to build made-to-order vehicles ordered over the Internet, and deliver them within days instead of weeks.

    “What is unique about Jac is his ability to think uniquely and differently, even though he has been with the company his whole life,” said Brian Kelley, the 39-year-old executive Nasser recruited from GE to head Ford’s e-commerce initiatives.

    In February, Ford made national headlines when it announced it would give computers, printers and Internet service to its 350,000 employees for a nominal fee. The decision, like many of Nasser’s initiatives, was made with breathtaking speed — not in weeks or months, but after just one meeting.

    “If you come to him with an idea, you better be sure you want to run with it,” said Murphy. “He’s likely to say on the basis of a quick sketch, ‘Do it!’ ”

    The approach isn’t an exact science. But the alternative is reverting to the plodding company of the past, and perhaps being left behind.

Freakish energy level

    Nasser’s passion for change has led some observers question whether he is attempting too much, too fast, and will ultimately burn out his employees or cross swords with the Ford family.

    “There is risk involved,” said David Cole, director of the University of Michigan’s Office for the Study of Automotive Transportation. “If you are strong personality dealing with the people whose name is on the building, you have a ready-made recipe for conflict.”

    Ford Jr. said he is comfortable with Nasser’s peddle-to-the-metal leadership style.

    “I think change is exhilarating,” Ford Jr. said. “We certainly need to be sensitive to the fact that the organization at times does hit the overload point. But one of Jac’s greatest virtues is the ability to make the decision and execute it with speed.”

    Nasser sets a furious pace and those around him are expected to keep up. Executives who routinely work 70 hours a week marvel at Nasser’s freakish energy level.

    Staffers tell stories about calling Nasser’s office at 3 a.m. to leave a message on his voice mail, only to have him pick up the phone. Nasser will step off a plane after a transatlantic flight at 5 p.m. on a Saturday and head to the office for a few hours of work. When U.S. holidays shut down operations in Detroit, he often rounds up executives to go work overseas.

    “There is no clock at Ford Motor Co.,” said Ken Kohrs, who retired last year as vice-president in charge of large and luxury car development. “When you would travel with Jac for product reviews, it’s dawn ‘til dusk. I have probably been to every country in Europe and Asia, Australia — everywhere — and I never had a chance to dip my toe in the pool.”

    If Nasser has turned up the pressure, at least he has reduced some of the office politics and intrigue so pervasive at Ford in years past. For good or bad, Ford executives say they know where they stand with Nasser.

    Ford Credit CEO Don Winkler, a Nasser recruit who has severe dyslexia, recalls giving a poor presentation to Ford’s board of directors and returning to his office later to find Nasser waiting.

    “ ‘Let me give you some feedback,’ ” Winkler said Nasser launched in immediately. “He told me what I did that was good and what I did that should have been better.”

    Winkler said he was relieved to know what Nasser was thinking.

    “Most executives would pat you on the back and go have a few drinks with the guys and say, ‘Wasn’t he terrible,’ ” Winkler said.

    Such descriptions, though they mostly come from Nasser loyalists, challenge the common characterization of Nasser as a bloodless cost-cutter. Ford executives say Nasser is a very good listener who can recall precise details from conversations held months earlier.

    For someone of Nasser’s self-confidence, he has a disarming ability to poke fun at himself. During a lull in a news conference at the New York Auto Show this year, he broke up the the crowd by wondering aloud whether he could fit his bantam-sized frame into a child safety seat.

    “Jac can be the most charming, benevolent, openly gregarious person in the world,” Kohrs said. “But when he wants something done, he can be on the point of being mean-spirited about it.”

Passion for cars

    Nowhere is Nasser’s passionate and demanding personality more evident than in the development of new cars and trucks.

    While other executives are chauffeured into work, Nasser commutes every day in his dark-green, 12-cylinder Aston Martin DB7 Vantage convertible. Before that, he drove a Ford Focus for several months.

    “He notices little craftsmanship details like the fit of moldings, things that many people overlook,” said product chief Parry-Jones.

    Nasser’s strategy is to move away from low-margin vehicles and concentrate on stylish new cars and trucks that can be built efficiently for high profits. And he pushes top executives relentlessly toward these goals.

    On vehicles like the Lincoln LS, Jaguar S-type and new Thunderbird, which debuts next year, Nasser will typically order up a list of expensive features and materials while insisting the product team not go over budget.

    The pressure to deliver often leads to tension between the various teams working on a vehicle.

    “At times, it was a extremely enjoyable to work for Jac because the sense of accomplishment you felt,” Kohrs said. “But the creative tension got a little bit carried away.”

    The culmination of Nasser’s unrelenting nature and passion for the car business is displayed at Ford’s product development center here.

    Amid the clay models and scent of epoxy, Nasser and J Mays, Ford’s design chief, size up Ford’s future SUVs. Using the lexicon of car design, they discuss proportions and stance and brand DNA.

    A few nitpicks aside, Nasser appears satisfied with the finished products and the direction in which Ford is headed.

    Dressed in a natty dark-gray suit with ultra-thin green pinstripes, Nasser pauses for a moment to talk about his vision for Ford and the importance of striving ever harder for success.

    “This isn’t about lying back relaxing in the sunshine,” he says. “Because our competitors won’t allow that, our customers won’t tolerate it and our shareholders and investors wouldn’t support it. The choices are pretty stark.”