All Things Jeep Blog & Musings

- Sergio Marchionne to Serve as Chief Executive Officer

- Global Brand Structure to Bring Leadership Closer to Employees and Customers

- Commercial, Industrial and Corporate Staffs to Support Brand Organization

AUBURN HILLS, Mich., June 10 /PRNewswire/ -- As Chrysler Group LLC prepares to begin operations, the new company formed in alliance with Fiat announced an organizational restructuring to focus on the Chrysler, Jeep(R), Dodge and Mopar(R) brands. The new leaner, flatter structure is intended to restore brand promise and dealer confidence. All appointments are effective immediately.

"I personally feel privileged to have the opportunity to lead the new Chrysler and to work with senior management to build this company and our great brands into all we know they can and should be," said Sergio Marchionne, who today was named Chief Executive Officer of Chrysler Group LLC. "That effort starts with leadership."

Chrysler Group's new organization is based on a global brand-focused structure comprised of the Chrysler, Jeep, Dodge and Mopar brands, each with full profit and loss accountability. Common Commercial, Industrial and Corporate functions have been put in place to support the development, manufacture, distribution and sale of Chrysler, Jeep and Dodge products and Mopar parts by the brand organizations.

"The new company's leadership structure has been developed to rebuild and grow the four iconic Chrysler brands," said Mr. Marchionne. "With a flattened organization designed to give leaders broad spans of control, we are able to increase the speed of decision-making and improve communication flow, ultimately bringing Chrysler Group management and employees closer to our customers."

To assist the new company in the transition, Jim Press is appointed Deputy CEO and Special Advisor, reporting to Mr. Marchionne. In this position, Mr. Press will be instrumental in the restructuring of the Chrysler Group LLC. Mr. Press served most recently as Chrysler LLC Vice Chairman & President.

Brand and Commercial Organizations

Mr. Marchionne added: "The focus of the Brand organization is to rebuild and grow the company's four brands, beginning with their strong heritage. The structure is designed to focus on external competition, avoiding product overlap while maintaining the highest possible level of industrial optimization. The new company will align its networks with the brand positions, to restore brand promise and dealer confidence."

In support of the Chrysler Group's brand operations, the company announced the following appointments reporting to Mr. Marchionne:

...Michael Manley is appointed President & Chief Executive Officer, Jeep Brand, with full profit and loss responsibility for the Jeep product portfolio. Mr. Manley will also have enterprise-wide responsibility for the Product Planning organization with responsibility for coordinating the product plan and volume requirements of the Chrysler, Jeep and Dodge brand functions. He will work with the other brand Presidents to translate these into operating plans for the product development and manufacturing organizations. Mr. Manley served most recently as Executive Vice President, International Sales & Global Product Planning Operations. ..."

So I did a search on Michael Manley's name and found this bio:

http://www.chryslerllc.com/en/about_us/our_team/?name=mmanley

Two things to note.

1. He had a big job ahead of him

2. He's younger than me.

Good luck to him.