LEGEND
Henry Ford
“ When everything seems to be going against you , remember that the airplane takes off against the wind , not with it ”
Motor magnate Henry Ford revolutionised the way the world moves in the truest sense . Though he will be remembered for the Model T , an icon of American industrialism and the mass adoption of the motor car in the early 20th century , his real innovation was the assembly line . Its impact on supply chain - a term which will not come into use for decades after his death in April 1947 - is undeniable , and transformed manufacturing and supply chain forever .
His vision of the assembly line , the first of which began rolling in 1913 at the original Ford plant in Michigan , is the embodiment of modern supply chain philosophy : that the value chain in its entirety is far more than the sum of its disparate parts . When each segment works in tandem towards a common goal , the result is limited only by the imagination .
Ford ’ s supply chain , which relied on hard working , but well-paid men , tied from dusk til dawn to the production line , has been supplanted by robots and other automation systems , the digital transformation of which will continue to evolve more rapidly in the coming years . But the process remains largely the same : raw material input , a chain of processes and systems to refine and shape them , and the finished product ready for the end user . He was a global visionary and one of the first to believe consumerism was the way towards greater equality and access to the latest goods , from the scions to a noble house all the way down to the most unfortunate of the hoi polloi .
His mantra , “ Businesses that grow by development and improvement do not die ,” is the fundamental driving force behind modern capitalism , and is as true for today ’ s modern supply chain as it was more than a century ago . If Ford were around today , no doubt he would embrace the advance towards innovation and pioneering supply chain intelligent automation , digital transformation and ESG fundamentals that drive today ’ s leading organisations . There is much of his DNA in the supply chain leaders of today
18 March 2021