WILLIAM CLAY FORD, JR. Executive Chairman Ford Motor Co. Co-Chair, The National Summit

William Clay Ford, Jr., is the executive chairman of Ford Motor Company.

Mr. Ford joined the company in 1979 as a product planning analyst, and subsequently held a variety of positions in manufacturing, sales, marketing, product development and finance.  During the 1982 Ford - United Auto Workers labor talks he served on the company's National Bargaining Team.  In 1983 he began a 12-month course of study as an Alfred P. Sloan fellow at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.  He was elected chairman and managing director of Ford Switzerland in 1987. 

He joined the Board of Directors in 1988 and has been its chairman since January 1999.  He also serves as chairman of the board's Finance Committee and as a member of the Environmental and Public Policy Committee.

He was elected a company vice president and head of the company’s Commercial Truck Vehicle Center in 1994.  He left that position in order to assume the chairmanship of the Board of Directors' Finance Committee in 1995.  He served as chief executive officer of the company from October 2001 until September 2006, when he was named executive chairman.

A lifelong environmentalist, Mr. Ford is committed to increasing shareholder value by developing products that please customers and benefit society.  Under his leadership, in 2000 Ford Motor Company published its first corporate citizenship report outlining the economic, environmental and social impact of company products and operations around the world.  In 2004, the company completed the world’s largest brownfield reclamation project, the restoration of its Ford Rouge Center in metropolitan Detroit.

Mr. Ford’s charitable, volunteer and business efforts are highlighted by his commitment to the city of Detroit.  As vice chairman of the Detroit Lions professional football team, Mr. Ford led efforts to build a new, environmentally friendly stadium in Detroit that was the site of Super Bowl XL.  Through Detroit Lions Charities, he helped develop the Detroit Police Athletic League youth football program into one of the largest in the country.  Mr. Ford is Chairman of the Board of the Detroit Economic Club (DEC) and a co-chair of The National Summit convened by the DEC in June 2009.  He also is a member of the Board of Trustees of The Henry Ford, the Board of Directors of eBay Inc. and Detroit Renaissance, where he also serves as chair of the Executive Committee.

Mr. Ford was born in Detroit in 1957.  He is an avid fly fisherman and car enthusiast, enjoys playing hockey and tennis, and is a black belt in the martial art of Tae Kwon Do.  He holds a bachelor of arts degree from Princeton University and a master of science degree in management from Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).