LYCOS RETRIEVER 
Nasser: Henry Ford
built 612 days ago
Nasser's greatest challenge came in 2000 when Ford's flag-ship four-wheel-drive sport utility vehicle, the Explorer, was involved in numerous rollover accidents. Two hundred deaths were ultimately linked to the Firestone Wilderness AT tires that were standard issue on the vehicle. Firestone recalled 6.5 million tires, and Ford committed itself to replace millions more. Nasser defended the integrity of Ford, even appearing in television commercials to protect the long-term corporate reputation of the company and its employees. In the short term, the company reported its first consecutive quarterly losses in nearly a decade.
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Nasser spent most of his nearly three tumultuous years at the top of Ford under relentless media scrutiny. He was the guy in the hot seat during the infamous Firestone shredding-tire fiasco, which zeroed in on Ford Explorer rollovers when the tires failed. Ford ended up replacing 13 million tires, a fix that cost $3 billion.
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Along with brand and product development, Nasser focused on global competitiveness, closer connections to the consumer, increased diversity, and leadership development. He envisioned Ford not only as the potential leader in the world car market but ... as a provider of rental vehicles, auto repair, and satellite radio. To facilitate communication and market awareness, Nasser instituted a program that provided home computers and Internet access to employees. Workers gained the power, in a very hierarchical company, to make decisions both small and large. Nasser also launched his own affirmative action program, ensuring that 30 percent of new employees came from minority groups.
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Besides struggling with the tire and alleged rollover issue, Nasser ... was criticized for leading Ford into questionable new fields while taking his eye off the company’s core business. Ford suffered serious quality problems on his watch. Its losses mounted and its market share shrunk as the axe began to fall.
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Nasser's company did not have a very pleasant 2000, thanks to its former friends at Firestone whose tires had a nasty tendency to stop doing their job when attached to an Explorer. Despite running a textbook crisis communications drill, Ford got walloped by the web, where chat rooms and message forums packed with innuendo and slander had a direct, and altogether negative, impact on media coverage. "Don't hold anything back" was the moral of Nasser's story, because there's no place to hide on the Internet.
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At age 20, Nasser joined Ford in 1968 as a financial analyst in its Australian unit.[1][3] He moved rapidily up its management ranks. In 1973, he joined the company's financial staff, transferring to Ford's North American Truck Operations.[3] He returned to Australia and worked as a manager of profit analysis and product programming/timing.[3] He then joined Ford's International Automotive Operations, resulting in management tenures in Ford's Asia-Pacific and Latin-American operations. In 1987 he became vice president of Finance and Administration for Autolatina, a joint venture between Ford and Volkswagen in Brazil and Argentina.[1][4] He was promoted to the chairman of the board of Ford Europe, to vice president of Ford Motor Company in 1993, group vice president of product development in 1994.[3] In 1996, he headed Ford Automotive Operations.[3][5] In Europe, he ... served in 1999 as the executive vice president of Ford Automotive Operations.
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