Henry Ford is the most famous auto executive in history. He was very good at what he did and innovated in car design and manufacturing. He didn’t invent the car, but he is the originator of the modern assembly line style of mass production (which is no small feat).
He is easily one of the most influential figures of the 20th century.
But where he was great in many operational efficiencies, he was terrible at accounting. Part of this was because he wasn’t a big believer in accounting. He never even audited his company while he was in the prime of his career.
He frequently stacked up money and invoices and weighed them to determine how much money was coming and going. But it was a very inexact science.
Eventually, by the time the company went public in 1956, that had changed. They likely know, down to the penny, how much money is coming and going from that building these days.
He wasn’t a perfect man and had some murky opinions on Judaism and other matters. But he did succeed greatly as an industrialist.
