As Ford's CEO, Mark Fields pushed for more tech
For Mark Fields, being ousted as CEO of Ford Motor marks the end of what has been a long rise through the ranks at the nation's second-largest automaker.
Fields lost his job Monday as the automaker shifted to a new CEO, Jim Hackett, the former head of office furniture maker Steelcase. Hackett came aboard a year ago to head Ford Smart Mobility, a division that looks at transportation more broadly than just cars.
Ironically, Ford's compensation committee cited Fields' creation of the mobility division in a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission as a key reason that explains why he was given a pay package last year worth $22.1 million.
Fields is known for being smart and tough — an executive who never ducked a fight when he came to making a case for his beliefs. In public, he exuded an easy confidence.
A Rutgers graduate with a Harvard MBA, Fields distinguished himself in foreign postings. He was best known for transforming Japan's Mazda, once a Ford unit, from a money-loser in the early 2000s into a winner. He also served as executive vice president for Ford of Europe.
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In 2002, he moved back from Japan to take several posts, including heading Ford's North and South American operations starting in 2005. He became known for not backing down when he made a decision.
At one point, when former Ford finance chief Don LeClair wanted less spending on a key ad campaign, Fields reportedly shot back: "When you run the f------- business, you can do it...But you don't run it. You're the CFO. So, I'll take your counsel, but that's it," according to the book American Icon, by Bryce G. Hoffman.
When former Ford CEO Alan Mulally created a war room to track the company's progress and encouraged top managers to own up to trouble spots, Fields was the first to show the courage to step forward and warn that a scheduled vehicle launch had fallen behind.
Mulally was apparently impressed. He elevated Fields to chief operating officer and the heir apparent in 2014, pushing him past several other executives who also had racked up enormous accomplishments.
As CEO, Mulally was known for his "One Ford" plan — uniting the company and its products after decades of largely separate business units around the world serving their own markets. But Fields set a different course.
He set out to revive Lincoln, Ford's flailing luxury car unit. He made a huge play to have Ford viewed as a tech company, rather than just as an automaker, by investing in Ford's Silicon Valley research lab and promising tech startups.
In February, for instance, Ford said it would plow $1 billion into a self-driving car startup in Pittsburgh called Argo AI.
He launched the latest versions of some of Ford's most important products, including the Ford F-150 pickup, the nation's best-selling vehicle.
And he attempted to woo President Trump, who had sent out tweets that castigated Ford with the charge — which Ford and the automakers' union roundly denied — it was moving jobs to Mexico. Fields announced would cancel a $1.6-billion plant that it was going to build in Mexico.
Instead, Fields said the company would spend $700 million to add 700 jobs to its Flat Rock, Mich., assembly plant that also will eventually make both electric and self-driving cars.
"Make no mistake about it — Ford is a global automaker but our home is right here in the United States," Fields told reporters at the time.
Over the years: Mark Fields at Ford
1989. Fields joins Ford Motor.
2000. He is named CEO of Mazda in Japan, which was owned by Ford at the time.
2002. He moves to other posts, including executive vice president of Ford of Europe.
2005. Fields is named president of the Americas.
2012. He becomes chief operating officer, positioning him to succeed CEO Alan Mulally.
2014. Mulally departs and Fields takes top job.