Firestone's reputation crisis and product recalls

Firestone: A Reputation Blowout

In the course of conducting business, there will be those issues that arise that must be dealt with swiftly and decisively. In 2000 Ford and Firestone, would face severe consequences for the flaws in the tires on the Ford Explorer. What happened was, a number of incidents were brought to the attention of the National Highway Transportation and Safety Administration (NHTSA).Who began requesting information, on a large number of rollovers involving a blown Firestone tires, with the Ford Explorer. This was because the agency was receiving reports about an increasing number of fatalities involving these incidents. As a result, they began to actively investigate what was occurring. (Ferrell, 2008) to fully understand the overall scope of the incident and the ethics surrounding the case requires that you examine how: both companies would analyze for various safety issues, the mistakes that were made during the crisis, the effects of accepting responsibility and how Firestone could improve its safety standards. Together, these different elements will provide the greatest insights as to the how the incident unfolded and what ethical issues were discovered.

To what extent do companies need to make a proactive effort to collect and analyze data concerning possible safety issues?

In this case of both Ford and Firestone, they knew that there was problem with three types of tires to include: the Firestone ATX, ATX II and Wilderness tires. What happened was the tire would come apart, while the vehicle was in motion. Where, tread of the tire would separate when the vehicle was going at speeds in excess of 50 miles per hour. What the incident shows, is that both companies need to improve their quality control and safety standards, during the manufacturing / design process. In the case of Ford, the fact that their vehicles would rollover when the tire was separating; highlights that the Explorer has stability and design problems. Ford has acknowledged these problems and admits that sometimes they don't know how to fix it. This shows that Ford needs to improve the overall quality and safety standards, during the design / manufacturing process. The fact that the Explorer is: so unstable and the company does not how to repair the problem, highlights this issue. In the case of Firestone, they were aware of the issue with their tires dating back as far as the mid-1990's. However, the failure rate of the tire was 241 for every 1 million tires. This is such a small defect rate; that managers and designers overlooked the effects it would cause to a vehicles going at high speed. In this aspect, Firestone needs to improve the quality control process and the overall amounts of safety analysis during manufacturing / design process. (Ferrell, 2008)

What mistakes did Ford, Firestone, and NHTSA each make in their early attempts to handle the crisis?

Ford wanted to announce the recall jointly with Firestone. Where, both companies would have an open press conference that will answer questions and improve the overall amounts of transparency. The idea with this strategy was to answer as many questions as possible and move into the lead of dealing with the issue. Firestone did not want to answer any questions and wanted to only respond to any inquiries when they were forced to. Their basic strategy was to deny that this was a major defect that contributed to the rollovers. The NHTSA handled the situation gently at first, by only requesting information. The minute that they seen there was a safety issue, they should have forced both companies to engage in mandatory recalls. Their strategy was to not to overreact to the situation based on initial reports. (Ferrell, 2008)

What are the possible ethical implications of accepting responsibility vs. blaming others?

The biggest ethical implications of accepting responsibility would be: the negative publicity, the potential lawsuits, possible regulatory action and large potential losses for both companies because of the incident. When you are blaming others for the problem, you can deny any wrong doing and hide behind various laws to protect the officers / the company. This strategy will cause many regulators, the press and the general public to believe that the company / management have something to hide. For if the incident had been an honest oversight and the company wanted to fix the problem, they would be actively working with everyone to rectify the situation, instead of blaming others. (Ferrell, 2008)

Suggest measures that Firestone could take to improve tire quality in the future.

Firestone could design and implement a test that will examine the effects of their tires, at speeds exceeding 100 miles per hour. This is nearly double the speed limit in most states and it will allow the company, to see how their tires react under extreme conditions. You would then repeat the test throughout the design and manufacturing process, to identify any kind of defects. If at any point, the tire begins to show major issues similar to what happened with the Firestone ATX, ATX II and Wilderness tires on the Explorer, then engineers need to fix the problem. This will ensure that any tire that Firestone sells to the general public; is up to the quality and safety standards that they demand. (Ferrell, 2008)