OREANDA-NEWS. July 30, 2015. Throughout the year, @Ford Online will highlight winners of the 2014 Global Diversity and Inclusion Award.  Teams and individuals from around the globe are being recognized for demonstrating the Go Further spirit to bring diversity, inclusion and the One Ford commitment to life at Ford Motor Company.  Following is a story from one of the winners.

Aristotle once said, “We are what we repeatedly do.  Excellence then is not an act, but a habit.”  The Ford Asian Indian Association (FAIA) Employee Resource Group has made a habit of routinely “Going Further” in promoting the Ford and Lincoln brands in the community.  FAIA is one of 11 organizations within the Ford Employee Resource Group.

The FAIA Brand Promotion team is recognized as a 2014 Diversity and Inclusion Award Winner in the category of Strengthening External Partnerships.

“It is an honor to receive this prestigious award.  Kudos to the hard work and dedication of the FAIA Brand Promotion team,” said Nand Kochhar, FAIA president.

The team’s objective was to build and promote the awareness of Ford and Lincoln brands among Asian Indians to both internal and external potential customers.  The core Brand Promotion team identified and leveraged the skills and resources of many diverse teams and organizations within the company, including employee volunteers from Ford North America, India, Europe and several Ford departments (Diversity Office, Marketing  Sales and Service) and dealer partners.   

“There is a strong sense of ownership, cohesion and camaraderie in the team and the team did an outstanding job planning, organizing and executing its events with minimal resources and financial assistance,” said Sy Hafeez, FAIA Brand Promotion lead.

Recognizing the business reality of the important Asian-Indian market and reflecting One Ford and One Global Team behaviors, FAIA honed its vision and mission statement to concentrate on a “critical few” priorities for 2014.  With a fresh-eyes approach, several key initiatives were identified along with action plans to help improve the top line, bottom line and Ford’s image in the Asian-Indian community.  

The Brand Promotion team took charge and developed a highly integrated approach with Ford Marketing and Xperience, an external partner, targeting focused marketing towards the mostly untapped affluent Asian-Indian community that has primarily shopped the competition.  The focus was on promoting the Ford and Lincoln brands at key events by showcasing product attributes supplemented by data and facts depending on the customer demography.  Senior leadership at Ford has been very supportive of the team’s efforts, and the metrics report was reviewed and appreciated in Mark Field’s OCM.  

India Day 2014 was the key FAIA event of the year where Ford product exposure reached more than 25,000 people in attendance with more than 1,000 registrants for the Drive One event, which was the most for any other event!  Other targeted FAIA grassroots events generated over 250 X-plan PINs and over 60 potential leads for sales in India. 

“FAIA has been supporting India Day for the past 15 years and it’s good to see the Brand team win the Corporate Diversity Award this year.  It is truly well deserved,” said Sri Ganapathy, FAIA Finance and Communications lead.

Other internal grassroots Brand Promotion initiatives executed included the Design Showroom and the Immersion Center tour, as well as several ride-and-drives.  These efforts helped to increase FAIA members’ awareness of Ford vehicles and also get them excited about products in the pipeline, which made each and every participant an active Ford Brand Ambassador.  

This was exemplified in India Day, where the FAIA volunteers became ambassadors and provided substantial exposure for Ford products to the members of the community including civic dignitaries, government officials and political and community leaders.  Each external Brand Promotion event was executed successfully and included significant public interface, product communication, brand excellence messages and organizing contacts for sales of Ford products in both Ford U.S. and Ford of India.  

FAIA is dedicated to helping Ford become successful in all frontiers.  The FAIA team exhibited exemplary leadership skills and had the unique ability to come together as a team and develop plans and successfully implement them.