Henry FordHenry Ford (1863-1947) was the American industrialist who revolutionized factory production with his assembly-line methods. Ford spent most of his life making headlines, good, bad, but never indifferent. Celebrated as both a technological genius and a folk hero, Ford was the creative force behind an industry of unprecedented size and wealth that in only a few decades permanently changed the economic and social character of the United States. When young Ford left his father's farm in 1879 for Detroit, only two out of eight Americans lived in cities; when he died at age 83, the proportion was five out of eight. Once Ford realized the tremendous part he and his Model T automobile had played in bringing about this change, he wanted nothing more than to reverse it, or at least to recapture the rural values of his boyhood. Henry Ford, then, is an apt symbol of the transition from an agricultural to an industrial America. […] “I will build a motor car for the great multitude,” Ford proclaimed in announcing the birth of the Model T in October 1908. In the 19 years of the Model T's existence, he sold 15,500,000 of the cars in the United States, almost 1,000,000 more in Canada, and 250,000 in Great Britain, a production total amounting to half the auto output of the world. The motor age arrived owing mostly to Ford's vision of the car as the ordinary man's utility rather than as the rich man's luxury. Once only the rich had travelled freely around the country; now millions could go wherever they pleased. The Model T was the chief instrument of one of the greatest and most rapid changes in the lives of the common people in history, and it effected this change in less than two decades. Farmers were no longer isolated on remote farms. The horse disappeared so rapidly that the transfer of acreage from hay to other crops caused an agricultural revolution. The automobile became the main prop of the American economy and a stimulant to urbanization—cities spread outward, creating suburbs and housing developments—and to the building of the finest highway system in the world. The remarkable birth rate of Model T's was made possible by the most advanced production technology yet conceived. After much experimentation by Ford and his engineers, the system that had evolved by 1913–14 in Ford's new plant in Highland Park, Michigan, was able to deliver parts, subassemblies, and assemblies (themselves built on subsidiary assembly lines) with precise timing to a constantly moving main assembly line, where a complete chassis was turned out every 93 minutes, an enormous improvement over the 728 minutes formerly required. The minute subdivision of labour and the coordination of a multitude of operations produced huge gains in productivity. In 1914 the Ford Motor Company announced that it would henceforth pay eligible workers a minimum wage of $5 a day (compared to an average of $2.34 for the industry) and would reduce the work day from nine hours to eight, thereby converting the factory to a three-shift day. Overnight Ford became a worldwide celebrity. People either praised him as a great humanitarian or excoriated him as a mad socialist. Ford said humanitarianism had nothing to do with it. Previously profit had been based on paying wages as low as workers would take and pricing cars as high as the traffic would bear. Ford, on the other hand, stressed low pricing (the Model T cost $950 in 1908 and $290 in 1927) in order to capture the widest possible market and then met the price by volume and efficiency. Ford's success in making the automobile a basic necessity turned out to be but a prelude to a more widespread revolution. The development of mass-production techniques, which enabled the company eventually to turn out a Model T every 24 seconds; the frequent reductions in the price of the car made possible by economies of scale; and the payment of a living wage that raised workers above subsistence and made them potential customers for, among other things, automobiles—these innovations changed the very structure of society. […] The unprecedented scale of that success, together with Ford's personal success in gaining absolute control of the firm and driving out subordinates with contrary opinions, set the stage for decline. Trusting in what he believed was an unerring instinct for the market, Ford refused to follow other automobile manufacturers in offering such innovative features as conventional gearshifts (he held out for his own planetary gear transmission), hydraulic brakes (rather than mechanical ones), six- and eight-cylinder engines (the Model T had a four), and choice of colour (from 1914 every Model T was painted black). When he was finally convinced that the marketplace had changed and was demanding more than a purely utilitarian vehicle, he shut down his plants for five months to retool. In December 1927 he introduced the Model A. The new model enjoyed solid but not spectacular success. Ford's stubbornness had cost him his leadership position in the industry; the Model A was outsold by General Motors' Chevrolet and Chrysler's Plymouth and was discontinued in 1931. Despite the introduction of the Ford V-8 in 1932, by 1936 Ford Motor Company was third in sales in the industry. A similar pattern of authoritarian control and stubbornness marked Ford's attitude toward his workers. The $5 day that brought him so much attention in 1914 carried with it, for workers, the price of often overbearing paternalism. It was, moreover, no guarantee for the future; in 1929 Ford instituted a $7 day, but in 1932, as part of the fiscal stringency imposed by falling sales and the Great Depression, that was cut to $4, below prevailing industry wages. Ford freely employed company police, labour spies, and violence in a protracted effort to prevent unionization and continued to do so even after General Motors and Chrysler had come to terms with the United Automobile Workers. When the UAW finally succeeded in organizing Ford workers in 1941, he considered shutting down before he was persuaded to sign a union contract. […] Henry Ford was a complex personality. […] He was a man who baffled even those who had the opportunity to observe him close at hand, all except James Couzens, Ford's business manager from the founding of the company until his resignation in 1915, who always said, “You cannot analyze genius and Ford is a genius.” Exercise 15. Answer the following questions in pairs. 1. Why was Henry Ford celebrated as both a technological genius and a folk hero? 2. What did his figure symbolize? 3. What was Ford's vision of the car? 4. Why did the Ford Motor Company succeed in building a motor car for the great multitude? 5. Was Ford a great humanitarian? 6. What factors brought about the decline of the company? Exercise 16. Draw a table like the one below. Read the text again and write out the characteristic features of Henry Ford's Leadership style.
Exercise 17. Speak about Henry Ford as a leader using your table.
Exercise 18. After you read the text about Henry Ford, think about how difficult it was for you. Think about: unknown words, grammar structures, style, and the reading task. Develop your strategy to improve your skills. Exercise 19. Work in pairs. Discuss if your friends can be efficient leaders. Use the model and list of words below. Model. A: What is Peter like? Can he lead people B: He has a strong character. He is bossy. He will be a tough leader, I think. What about Ann? Strong, tough, bossy, self-confident, friendly, kind, mild, hard-working, lazy, clever, stupid, a natural leader, creative, capable, communicative, sociable, honest.
Exercise 20. Speak about the leadership style of the officials you know. Change roles. Use the model and list of words below. Model. A: What can you say of your friend's boss? B: I think he is intelligent and tactful. His leadership style is democratic. An efficient leader, a poor leader, a tyrant, intelligent, tactful, an educated person, demanding, just, polite, impolite, authoritarian, democratic.
Exercise 21. Write about the accepted leadership style in an organization you know. 4.3. Inefficient Leaders Exercise 1. Focus on the topical vocabulary. to destroy [dIs'trOI] v разрушать, разбивать; ломать, портить destroyer [dIs'trOIq] n разрушитель inbetween ["InbI'twJn] n посредник; промежуток; промежуточное звено между одним и вторым fault [fLlt] n недостаток, дефект to find fault with smb придираться к кому-л. fault-finder ['fLlt "faIndq] n придирчивый человек, придира to evaluate [I'vxljueIt] v оценивать evaluation [I"vxlju'eISqn] n оценка schedule ['SedjHl], амер. ['skedjHl] n расписание, таблица, график minutiae [maI'njHSIJ] n pl лат. мелочи stubborn ['stAbqn] а упрямый faith [feIT] n вера, доверие to consider [kqn'sIdq] v рассматривать, обсуждать; полагать, считать to convince [kqn'vIns] v убедить, уверить; заставить осознать (ошибку) to arise (arose, arisen) [q'raIz, q'rqVz, q'rIzn] v возникать, появляться to call a meeting ['kLl…'mJtIN] созывать совещание outline ['autlaIn] n набросок, эскиз, очерк; v обрисовать, наметить в общих чертах to suggest a solution [sq'Gest…sq'lHSqn] предложить решение to implement ideas ['ImplIment aI'dIqz] осуществлять идеи bully ['bulI] n громила, задира emotionally instable [I'mqVSqnlI In'steIbl] эмоционально неустойчивый rough [rAf] а грубый to move out of smb's path ['mHv 'aut…'pRT] = to get out of smb's way уйти с дороги a caged lion ['laIqn] лев, посаженный в клетку to threaten to fire people ['Tretn] угрожать людям увольнением smoothy ['smHDI] a (пренебр.) галантный кавалер, ловкач, льстец statesman ['steItsmqn] n государственный деятель, политический деятель appearance [q'pIqrqns] n внешность trendy ['trendI] а модный integrity [In'tegrItI] a полнота, целостность; честность, прямота high-ranking ['haI "rxNkIN] a высокопоставленный
Exercise 2. Try to understand the meaning of the derivatives. Between, in-between; destroy, destroyer, destruction; value, evaluate, evaluation; explain, explanation; spell, spelling; purpose, purposely; obvious, obviously; err, error; sign, signature; capable, capability; repeat, repetition; consider, consideration, considerable; solve, solving, problem-solving, solution; emotion, emotional, emotionally; threat, threaten, threatening; rank, high-ranking; assist, assistant; fortune, fortunate, fortunately, unfortunately.
Exercise 3. Guess what these international words mean. Business career; total; a sociologist, sociology, sociological, a pseudosociological method; leaders; a method; classes; normal; organizations; central controls; documents; standards; to correct; a date; details; experts; to collect information; to start the company; a brilliant engineer; a master of management; a management course; ideas; a problem; a meeting; emotionally instable; a tornado; the basic method; subordinates; complete; an assistant to a corporate officer; groups; characteristics.
Exercise 4. Read the words with the prefix pseudo- ['sjHdqV] (ложно-, псевдо-) and say what they mean. Model: pseudo-scientific псевдонаучный Pseudo-religion; pseudo-science, pseudo-scientific, pseudo-scientist; pseudosociological; pseudo-classic(al); pseudonym ['sjHdqnIm].
Exercise 5. Find synonyms in List A and В, С and D. Model 1: to fire – to sack – to discharge – to dismiss A. To consider, to go up; to start a company, to be rough, to fire, to move out of somebody's path, to implement ideas, to be stubborn, to find, to shout, to be a master in dealing with people, to treat people. B. To be obstinate, to get along with people, to discover, to put ideas into practice, to be rude, to cry, to set up a company, to realize ideas, to handle people, to think, to build a company, to rise, to increase; to found a company, to dismiss, to sack, to get out of somebody's way, to discharge. Model 2: satisfaction – content C. Equipment, an entrepreneur, a bully, a team, a master, satisfaction, a subordinate, the boss, appearance, staff, lack, an officer, high-ranking people, an assistant. D. Content, a group of like-minded people, machinery, a skilled worker, a qualified worker, an inferior, looks, high-level people, personnel, an official, a businessman, a hooligan, the head, a helper, a superior, deficiency. Exercise 6. Read the following word combinations and give their Russian equivalents. Difficult bosses; to find fault with people, a fault-finder, fault-finding; a multiplant organization; a nervous man; time standards; job evaluations; schedule changes; to seem never satisfied; to develop a theory; to make errors; to find errors; a spelling error; a date error; an obvious error; to correct errors; to leave out a bit of information; as soon as; to sign documents; to sign papers; a capable and experienced executive; to make a decision; to buy a particular piece of equipment, to call for further information; minutiae; to collect additional information; the price of the equipment, the price for the equipment; to go up; a brilliant scientist, to have little faith in people; no matter how, no matter what, no matter where; to read a book on management; to take a management course; to give an idea, to have an idea, to implement an idea; to convince somebody of something, to convince somebody that; to outline a problem, to solve a problem; to call a meeting, to suggest a solution; a bully; be rough; to go through a plant; with the force of a tornado; to walk back and forth like a caged lion; to threaten to fire people; to be on a team; to deal with people; to tailor a suit; to wear beautifully tailored suits; trendy ties; to polish shoes, highly polished shoes; a complete lack of integrity; high-level supporters; poor bosses.
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