Of the People, By the People

OF THE PEOPLE, BY THE PEOPLE

Tackling the “impossibles” happens only when you are able to tap people’s talents and deepest aspirations. I never cease to be amazed how steadfast master learning practitioners are in their conviction that this is always possible, even in very difficult circumstances.

In 1986, Roger Saillant became the first plant manager for a startup electronic-components plant in Chihuahua, Mexico, the first state-of-the-art facility of its kind for Ford in the country. It was not an assignment many of his peers in the company would have sought. According to business writer Ann Graham, “few at (Ford) headquarters believed a plant in a developing country could meet a tightly timed launch and sustain quality production.”

But Saillant quickly discovered that people there “cared a lot about their community and had never been given the chance to take real responsibility for an operation like this.” He also discovered traditional power dynamics that would make his task difficult. A year after he arrived, and only two months before their launch date, a group of senior technicians tried to put their own appointee into a key position. This directly challenged a set of values and an open promotion system Saillant had worked to establish collaboratively. When one of the Mexican managers came to him and told him this was happening, “I knew that he really didn’t expect me to do anything about it. Ford managers had been told for years that we had to work with this sort of thing if we wanted to have a smooth relationship with local political leaders.”

Instead Saillant asked the entire technician group to leave when they admitted what they were doing. “I will never forget standing outside the plant as they left. Many of the other employees were watching, probably wondering what would happen now. And the truth is, I had no idea.” He also knew he would “get a lot of crap immediately from my bosses, but the new personnel policies would not mean a thing if the old boy network continued.

“I knew that something had shifted about two months later when we were preparing for a visit from Dearborn [Ford’s corporate headquarters] for the grand opening of the plant. There was a forecast for a big storm the evening before the site tour. I was lying in bed at two in the morning and started to hear the rain falling. It was pouring. All I could think about was the roofing work that was not quite done. Finally, I just got out of bed and headed down to the plant. I went inside and it was dark but I could hear this drip, drip, drip—not slow, mind you. I started walking around looking for the leaks and then I saw someone moving. To the end of my days, I will never forget seeing Alfego Torres positioning these huge leafy plants we had gotten for the opening ceremonies under the leaks to soak up the water. I almost started to cry. He was one of the hourly workers who had been promoted through our new personnel system, someone the old bosses would never have promoted. I knew in that moment that the community of people in this facility had turned the corner. It was now their plant.”

The next day, the weather cleared for the big visit. The visit went fine, although the Ford execs were at first taken aback when they saw the finished plant. It was painted blue and pink, colors that the Mexicans love and that the team had picked, along with lots of other architectural and decorative features native to the country. (There were also many features that had never been included in similar plants, things like an outdoor family activity center, a local school, and family health facilities.) “This isn’t a Ford plant,” one of the execs complained to Saillant. “No,” he said, “It’s the Chihuahua Ford plant.”

Saillant continues, “On their walking tour, one of the hourly assembly workers went up to the executive VP, who I had known for many years, and asked him to put out his cigarette. Charlie was a chain smoker, and I doubt anyone had ever told him that he couldn’t smoke in one of his own plants. But here was this small Mexican woman looking up at this six-foot-three Ford executive, and asking him to either stop smoking or go outside. What could he do? We had all agreed that one of our ground rules, part of our commitment to a healthy and clean working environment for everyone, was no smoking, and she was just doing what we had all agreed we would do. After that, my bosses didn’t harass me much, especially since we launched six weeks early and the plant eventually became the number-one of its type in the world.” In 1994, the plant received a presidential award as Mexico’s most outstanding business.