Ford to axe 7000 jobs globally: report

ACCORDING to a report from The Associated Press, Ford Motor Company has announced it will be cutting 7000 mostly white-collar jobs from its global operations, representing about 10 per cent of its total workforce.

However, Ford Australia communications and public affairs director Martin Gunsberg said the news would not greatly impact local workers, with the majority of the Australian layoffs already announced in January.

“The redesign of our salaried workforce is a global exercise,” he said. “The majority of separations in Australia were announced back in January.”

The January announcement saw redundancies for 40 salaried, 75 hourly and 90 temporary powertrain engineers, while other workers were redeployed to the chassis department.

Nevertheless, Ford still remains the largest employer in the Australian automotive sector with about 2000 staff, including designers, engineers and specialists.

The global announcement – sent as a memo to employees from CEO Jim Hackett – will see about 2300 job cuts in the US via a mixture of buyouts and layoffs.

The Associated Press reports that about 1500 of the 2300 American employees to be cut have left voluntarily or with buyouts, and 300 have already been laid off.

Starting this week, a further 500 employees will be leaving the company – with severance packages included – most of which are based around the company’s headquarters in Dearborn, Michigan.

The white-collar layoffs will come from across Ford’s various departments, including product development, marketing, engineering, IT, finance and logistics.

The majority of cuts are expected to be completed by May 24.

Blue-collar factory employees have so far been unaffected by these job cuts that follow Ford’s announcement in July 2018 that its corporate restructuring process would cost the company US$7 billion (A$10.1b), while affecting pre-tax earnings by US$11b (A$15.9b).

Writing in the memo to employees, Mr Hackett said the decision was difficult but necessary for success.

“To succeed in our competitive industry, and position Ford to win in a fast-charging future, we must reduce bureaucracy, empower managers, speed decision making and focus on the most valuable work, and cost cuts,” he said.

“Ford is a family company and saying goodbye to colleagues is difficult and emotional.”

In November, General Motors announced a 15 per cent workforce cut totalling 15,000 employees, however Holden and its local design and engineering operations, totalling about 1250 employees, remained safe from the falling axe.