Personnel
Tom Chackalackal takes over global manufacturing engineering at Ford
Tom Scaria Chackalackal has been promoted at Ford to executive director global manufacturing engineering. In his new role, he is to strengthen technical excellence and align the manufacturing organisation with safety, quality, cost and capital efficiency.
Tom Scaria Chackalackal is taking on the role of executive director global manufacturing engineering at Ford. The executive announced this in a LinkedIn post. In it, he states that he will lead the teams through the strategic action planning process based on Hoshin Kanri principles, further develop technical excellence, and place greater emphasis on operators and the workplace.
At the same time, Chackalackal is stepping down from the material planning and logistics division. He thanked his former colleagues for their joint work on transforming material management and introducing lean, digital tools in a demanding supply chain environment. He wished the team continued success in digitising the value chain and in sharpening its focus on the customer experience.
Chackalackal brings extensive experience in production and factory planning to his new role. In an earlier position at Ford India, he was responsible, among other things, for expanding vehicle production and overseeing new model launches. This hands-on manufacturing experience is likely to be an important factor in his new global role as well.
In terms of content, the appointment suggests that Ford intends to align its manufacturing development even more closely with standardised processes, technical excellence and production‑oriented improvement of workplaces. The fact that Chackalackal highlights safety, quality, costs and capital efficiency equally in his post shows how closely Ford ties its global manufacturing engineering organisation to classic industrial performance indicators.
