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The Savage Factory

Executive Summary

The book, The Savage Factory, written by Robert J. Dewar, is stuffed with graphic

legends confirming author’s disbelief at the approaches in which the United Auto Workers Labor

Union and Ford Management warred with each other over apparently production goals (Dewar

1). Dewar organized his art in themed chapters by reporting on the horrific nature of the Ford

Corporation based on its inner operations and management. The management in the company

operated in a manner likely to suggest that they wanted to cause trouble to the company. The

Savage Factory is the factual chronicle depicted from the plant floor of the massive automobile

company losing the large-scale automobile war to less and weak skilled foreign opponents that

positively competed with the automotive company. Dewar is a creative author who gives

chronicle events that led to the collapse of a giant company. Dewar’s book depicts at an

incompetent management that is at conflict with the work forces that shaped the eminence

nightmare causing loss of faith and trust by the car buying public in the American cars.

The excerpt paper depicts the outlook of The Savage Factory and the key forces that led

to the appearance of the company. The paper is divided into sections for easy understanding. The

introduction of the paper suggests the purpose of the paper with a summary of the situation of the

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firm. The introduction section of the paper is followed by the organizational problems that are

evident in the factory as evident in the book written by Dewar. Theoretical solutions to the

problems are also discussed so as to understand how various management problems can be

solved by different stakeholders in different collapsing organizations. The paper concludes by

revealing the key aspects that are essential to the success of an organization.

Introduction

The Savage Factory is s true narration by Dewar. The narration is about the inner

operations of the Ford’s biggest automotive transmission firm. According to the book, machines

and people never end their wars between labor and management that led to the production of

low-quality cars (Bender et al. 2009). Also, the low-quality cars open a door for the overseas

competitors to fill the state and take over the automotive customers. Dewar provides a real-life

exemplar of the battleground like situations in the automobile firms that led family breakdown,

drug addiction, alcoholism, and sexual harassment. Dewar later asserts that the automotive

company would have gone insolvent had the Federal Government not played an essential role in

intervening the situation of the firm. Understanding the organizational problems experienced by

the automotive firm will help us comprehend how various management problems can be solved

based on The Savage Factory case study.

Organizational problems as depicted in the book The Savage Factory

The book depicts various themes that were the key factors contributing to the collapse of

the Ford Automotive Company. The following are some of the key organizational problems as

depicted in the book: sexual harassment, mismanagement, discrimination, and retaliation. The

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problems were violating the morality of the individuals without observing the code of ethics

(Dewar 2).

i. Sexual harassment

At first, sexual harassment was never observed at the Ford Company. After a certain

period, everything changed. Females at the Ford Auto Company expanded a pending lawsuit

action against the company, claiming that the factory had failed to address the rampant sexual

harassment. An amended grievance was filed in the United States District Court in Chicago

asserting that the sexual harassment evident in the company is not limited to the factory’s

Torrence Avenue Assembly Plant located on the Southern side, but all other branches had the

same problem. According to Dewar, the problem of sexual harassment is broader than as

explained in the first lawsuit. For example, in 2000, a group of female in the Ford Corporation

claimed that they were facing sexual harassment, and they were requesting for an immediate

action to be taken to avoid the problem. The amended a grievance asserted that women in the

firms were facing sexual harassment in different forms, and the women were requesting for

sexual favors, and dealing with the issue was a key factor in the company (Dewar 153).

Despite all the complaints from female workers, nothing was corrected. The women

claimed that the working environment at all the Ford Corporations in the Chicago remained

unchanged. The female employees stated that there are additional women who would join the

lawsuit. However, the additional female employees fear retaliation when they complain about the

working environment of the automotive company. The list of sexually harassed women grew

longer, and many female employees at the factory remained in their views that they were being

harassed by no any action taken by the employers in stopping their concern. Many female

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workers had different experiences with others claiming that they were being asked by their

employers to take pictures of their boobs and forward the pictures to them. All female workers

had same complaints of working in a hostile environment.

Also, female workers complained that they were getting their naked photos stuck on their

desks and computers. The naked photos suggested various things and these were understood as

sexual harassment from their employers. The issue was a complaint, but no action was

undertaken to solve the female’s hostile environment. When the male who were responsible for

creating a hostile environment were identified, some of them became tough to the female

employees. For example, when Linda, a female employee at the Ford Auto Company reported

the experience of sexual harassment, the male responsible for the act approached Linda in a

hostile approach. The male employer shouted at Linda, “Who in the Fuck do you think you are?

You went over my head. You went over Larry’s head. You went over Roger’s head. Who in the

hell do you think you are? You are a Gaw damn foreman on the midnight shift” (Dewar 154).

ii. Mismanagement and change of the policies

According to Dewar (2009), Ford Auto Company experienced fall in profits due to the

weak sales that led to the tumbling stock since 1999. The weak sale leading to the tumbling stock

was due to the change in the management of the firm and changes in the policies. Workers at the

Ford Auto Company blamed the company’s downfall on the poor management in decision-

making made by Chairman Mr. Bill Ford and CEO Mr. Jacques Nasser. Also, the

mismanagement of the company was contributed by the slipping productivity and quality of the

Automotives that were being manufactured. To solve the issue, the company undertook huge

spending budget on the marketing of the incentives so as to entice novel customers and to thwart

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old customers from defecting to the other competitors. Unfortunately, the strategy did not

succeed because the company had lost a huge amount of money in the 2001 second quarters.

Also, production inefficiency contributed to the downfall of the Ford Auto Company. For

example, the production cost per value of the company’s car had risen to $1000 during a period

when the automobile market is competitive that they could not afford to hoist the prices to

combat the risen costs. The issue led to fall in the profits in both of the Ford’s overseas

productions in Europe, Latin America, and its operations that were being carried out in the

United States. Nasser took over Lord Trotman in 1998 with the reason to revive the company by

reducing the revenues and repairing any damages caused by the failure of the gross.

Nasser adopted various drastic strategies to cut-down the costs and decreased excess

capacities such as the controversial shutting off the Dagenham Plant (Blitterswijk & Karadzhov

19). Therefore, management of the Ford Auto Company led by Nasser decided to undergo the

plan of restructuring, downsizing, and cost-cutting its overall operations, which in turn led to

5000 white workers laid-off from working. The laying-off of the white-collar workers led to

reduced employee morale since jobs within the company were no longer secured as evident by

different issues that were affecting the company. Nasser hired outside workers so as to realize if

the there will change within the company (Ford Motor Company 4). Besides, investor’s morale

was affected when CEO Mr. Jacques Nasser claimed that the auto company had to cut-down

dividends by 50%. In addition, the morale of investors was reduced when the CEO asserted that

there were no executive bonuses, and these announcements from the CEO dampen the employee

of the employees at the management level. The absence of executive bonuses in 2001 was

because the company was facing a key cash flow issue. The cash flow issue arose because of

poor management decisions that were being made by the CEO. Nasser.

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iii. Discrimination

Discrimination and retaliation are two other key problems that were facing the

success of the Ford Auto Company. Female workers were majorly discriminated and

retaliated from working in the company. The female workers claimed that the company was

discriminative since the system of the company gave the male worker the right to perform

different tasks without considering female workers. The complaints of female workers were

never listened to a level where sexual harassment became evident. Female workers were

considered inferior in performing different tasks and discrimination was considered the best

approach to remove female workers from the workforce.

Theoretical solutions to the problems

Mismanagement, discrimination, and sexual harassment are three key factors that

were contributing to the collapse of the company. Sexual harassment can be prevented in an

organizational setting by observing two key actions that all employers should undertake to

prevent the case of sexual harassment in different companies. For example, sexual

harassment can be prevented in different organizations such as Ford Auto Company by

endorsing, communicating, and developing to all employees the sexual harassment policy

within the working environment. The strategy should be disseminated to all the employees

during the course of recruitment and induction. Besides, Sexual harassment in an

organization can be prevented by taking an appropriate and effective remedial measure if

sexual harassment is evident in the company (Ministry of Manpower and Transmigration 9).

Employers in the organization are required to refrain from committing any act that

relates to sexual harassment. Taking of naked photos of their female workers and sticking the

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photos on their desks without assaulting should be avoided by the employers so as to prevent

sexual harassment in the workplace. Also, the employers are obligated to contribute to

creating and maintaining a hostile-free environment from sexual harassment by coming up

with policies to eliminate any form of sexual harassment of the female workers. Employers

are required to ensure that all the third parties such as job applicants and customers are not

subjected to any form of the hostile environment such as sexual harassment by the employees

or employers. All the employers should, therefore, take proper steps in preventing sexual

harassment in different organizations. This means that all the employers in different

organizations are required to actively implement policies to minimize the occurrence of

sexual harassment in their different workplaces (Ministry of Manpower and Transmigration

9-10).

Besides, the consequences of discrimination in the workplace can extend beyond the

lack of access to informal and formal resources by women. Many employers think that

female workers have not enough experiences in different fields, thus leading to their

discrimination in different organizations. Discrimination of the people in the workplace can

be prevented by holding managers responsible for making bias-free decisions in the

workplace and creating a formal process of building relationships with men and female.

Also, discrimination in the workplace can be prevented by creating explicit links between

performance and diversity programs (Welle & Heilman 33-34).

Mismanagement of organizations can be prevented by various organizations by

adopting the efficient use of funds through effective decision-making. Also, mismanagement

of an organization can be prevented by creating a compliant environment and educating the

responsible parties on the consequences and opportunities of fraud. Putting in place the Anti-

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Fraud Policy and reviewing and maintaining precise records and books can play an essential

role in preventing mismanagements in an organization (Alcott 74-75).

Conclusion

The Savage Factory is an essential book, especially to the managers of various organizations.

Dewar provides various factors that led to the downfall of the Ford Auto Company. The

downfalls evident in the Ford case study are also evident in other companies, thus making the

book essential for any manager who is interested in understanding the reasons for the downfall of

many organizations in the world. Therefore, the book is recommended for various employers so

that they can understand ways of approaching to different hostile environments such as sexual

harassment, mismanagement, and discrimination in an organization as evident in the Ford Auto

Company.

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WORKS CITED

Bender, R. Slade, S., & Thorpe, J. Strategic Report for Ford Motor Company. Oasis Consulting.

2009. Print. http://economics-files.pomona.edu/jlikens/SeniorSeminars/oasis/reports/F.pdf

Blitterswijk, M & Karadzhov, R. Financial and Strategic Analysis of Ford Motor Company and

Tata Motors. TATA. 2009. Print.

http://studenttheses.cbs.dk/bitstream/handle/10417/708/miel_van_blitterswijk_og_rosen_

karadzhov.pdf?sequence=1

Dewar, R. J. A Savage Factory: An Eyewitness Account of the Auto Industry’s Self-Destruction.

Biography and Autobiography. Author House. 2009.

https://books.google.co.ke/books?id=l94CQkq3xwQC&pg=PA153&dq=the+savage+fact

ory++by+dewar+sexual+harrassment&hl=en&sa=X&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q=the%2

0savage%20factory%20%20by%20dewar%20sexual%20harrassment&f=false

Dewar, R. J. A Savage Factory: An Eyewitness Account of the Auto Industry’s Self-Destruction.

Will Ford Blow It by Repeating the Mistake of 1976? 2010.

https://asavagefactory.wordpress.com/

Dewar, R. J. A Savage Factory: An Eyewitness Account of the Auto Industry’s Self-Destruction.

2009. http://www.lacar.com/?p=2020

Ford Motor Company: The Way Forward. Strategic Management and Leadership. 1994. Print.

http://www.staffs.ac.uk/schools/business/resits/level6/FORDMOTORCOMPANYCASE

STUDY.pdf

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Ministry of Manpower and Transmigration. Guidelines on Sexual Harassment Prevention in the

Workplace. Indonesia. 2011. Print. http://www.ilo.org/wcmsp5/groups/public/---asia/---

ro-bangkok/---ilo-jakarta/documents/publication/wcms_171329.pdf

Well, B. & Heilman, M. E. Formal and Informal Discrimination Against Women at Work: The

Role of Gender Stereotypes. Center for Public Leadership. 2005. Print.

http://dspace.mit.edu/bitstream/handle/1721.1/55933/CPL_WP_05_02_HeilmanWelle.pd

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