Ford's management of supply chain?

[MillerAndCheeto]

Supply chain issues are real, but so is incompetence. Labor issues are real, and those issues have impacted supply chain. My work environment is much simpler, and my lead times have gone from 2 weeks to 16 weeks. I will order 1200 widgets, and 200 will arrive. Vendors don't get the goods to create the widget I need.

In my simple world, supply chain and inventory has gone from a monthly and weekly conversations to a daily or hourly management issue.

Ford seems to have mismanaged very significant problems. These mistakes would be hidden during normal times, but are magnified today. A group of 100,000 staring at you while you make your mistakes, that makes it more obvious as well. If it were some random Ford Edge issue, nobody would care, the mistakes wouldn't be noticed by anybody outside Ford.

This is a good example of what has likely happened at Ford. Long lead times. In my industry, we order big ass valves that can take 26 weeks to deliver after purchasing (the manufacturers and suppliers are lean - they don't carry the valves on the shelf). Well now that 26 weeks is a dream - 52 week minimum, more likely 78 week delivery times. We are putting in tens of millions of dollars in orders for a product we don't expect to see until mid 2023, it's crazy.

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