Ford is now terrified they will have so many walking out the door enmass to retire that some areas have requested to provide bonuses to some key people not to retire. They are now worried all their experience will walk out the door all at once and collapse the company. Strange... hasn't JF told us current employees don't have the right skills? So which is it JF? Just WoW, the stupidity does not end.
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Even with retention bonus (to fool people) it is not worth staying with this company. Take the lump sum and leave.
You can always take your retirement now and come back as a contractor (IF you are considered critical). Make them give you your FULL lump sum and then pay you to come back. I know people who are doing this. Make it happen on YOUR terms NOT theirs!
@atz, this is not true.
"The only time this has happened previously in the past 35 years was back when Fields became CEO. The bonuses went to about a dozen people reporting to him, period."
My husband was offered a retention bonus after the 2009 layoffs. He was an LL6.
@1glv the LL4 and HR were informed all that happened was the mandatory monthly meetings were switched to potluck (instead of forced pay to LL5). If you have been around Ford long enough you know they protect the leaders. Same LL5 shook down the suppliers for freebies and gifts. And yes those above her known it was going on.
Not going to happen.
Friend who is LL4 and retiring was offered a retention bonus. Problem is, it was in Ford Stock and would not vest for 3 years. If he got SIRP'd, he'd lost the stock. Complete clown show.
The bonus will have to be greater than the 23% decrease in pension the retirees will lose. Think about that $ amount folks. Staggering! Maybe they should have thought about this before firing those 2000 people in August. Who is running this company? Captain Smith?!! Ready-Fire-Aim
@gta Why didn’t you all take her to security? That is theft. If you have more than one person go she would of been punished no doubt.
Ford has said you must be a loser to get paid off. Remember and aspire to that
The reeks of fake news. We all know how Ford HR operates under the direction of Bill Ford.
Ford only pays off slackers, that is confirmed.
Ford leadership is a joke
The whole game is to dream up ways to line their own pockets.
When we were in the office our LL5 required all the team to monetarily contribute for the privilege of attending her monthly mandatory team lunch. Then she also submitted a expense form for the lunch. She pocketed all the money the team contributed. She always claimed that she ended up having to pay more than her fair share to shame people into giving her even more money. This went on for two years before someone found a paid expense form on the printer and copied it and dropped a copy on everyone’s desk. After that the monthly lunches were potluck and the LL5 brought things like one bag of Corn chips. I don’t remember the exact sum the manager had scammed her team out of, but it was thousands of dollars. She also made us give her money (minimum of $25) that she supposedly used to buy Christmas presents for underprivileged children, no pics so she undoubtedly pocketed that money as well. I remember her saying she had purchased 10K of presents one year.
And yes the LL5 is still @ Ford, and is on track for a promotion.
End of year will be fun
Ford awarded retention bonuses to four or five upper execs per this WSJ article in May 2017
https://www.wsj.com/articles/ford-awards-several-top-executives-one-time-retention-bonuses-1495230168
And HD salary band was invented because we took on 300 BlackBerry employees that were working on SYNC when they went under. They were paid so much they would have all been LL5/4 so they had invented a new salary grade.
That's also what they did to attract people in Palo Alto.
The only time this has happened previously in the past 35 years was back when Fields became CEO. The bonuses went to about a dozen people reporting to him, period.
No way the rank and file will see these. Ford has known for 10 years that half their management was going to be retirement eligible and started succession planning and asking us to identify future leaders (beginning with FCGs) then. Haven't you noticed all sorts of promotions for younger, less experienced employees that make you scratch your head? And JF only values outside expertise since that's his claim to fame.
Maybe next they’ll be recruiting with signing bonuses those key people with critical skills they cut back in April and August.
Oops!
Hilarious!
Another way for managers to give their buddies a bonus cuz you know its not going to the truly deserving. The HTHD designations in our department went to cronies whose skillset definitely did not include technical skills. The exact same people got a bonus last year. Rest assured they will get another.
Remember.. one year ago, we were told “inflation is only transitory”…
Individuals are urged to do their own math and Protect the lump
In fact we were urged this in an email in september
So if they offer you a retention bonus it means the won’t SIRP you next year and give you 9 mos salary/health care/severance
It means you,re stuck.
If you’re pensionable, take a small retention bonus, and stay past Nov 30, you have the risk of lump sum further deteriorating next year if rates keep rising.
They need to offer several months salary as retention bonus.
In terms of strings attached to retention bonus, how long are they requiring you to stay?
Unless it's a significant amount, I hope those folk say thanks but no thanks. You are only needed on their terms. Any loyalty will be quickly forgotten at the next round of cuts.
So what would be a tempting retention bonus amount…
The amount to offset the lump sum cut?
Help us understand the math.
Those leaving have 23-30+ yrs service.
Lump sum cut is 1.2x - 1.4x gross salary.
So a fair retention bonus would be….. 1.2x gross salary?
Ha ha! Now that’s funny!
Make no mistake, these retention bonuses were always part of that plan. When you lay off thousands, target a voluntary to low achievers only, you pi-s off a lot of employees you want to keep. Thus, retention bonuses. But make no mistake, this will not prevent further layoffs. Just more of the Friends and Family plan!
True. Our area requesting too.
OP here....at the retention strategy meeting....
Yeah, right . What’s the source
I got a rock.
I got a retention raise out of the blue about this time last year. 18 year employee in PD /model e