In the high-stakes world of American car making, where new ideas compete with old ones, few leaders have led their companies through such rough times with the same passion as a Grand Prix driver. Jim Farley is the CEO of Ford Motor Company. His story of going from a car-obsessed kid in Argentina to the corner office of one of Detroit’s Big Three is like something out of a Hollywood movie. As of today, November 13, 2025, Farley has been in charge for five years. He has not only survived the industry’s big changes, but he has also sped up Ford’s move toward an electric, connected future. What does he say? “Don’t make boring things.” And Ford is anything but boring while he’s in charge.
Roots in the Rouge: A Family Legacy on Wheels
James Duncan Farley Jr. was born in Buenos Aires, Argentina, on June 10, 1962. His father was a banker and his mother was American. When he was young, his family moved to Greenwich, Connecticut, but that didn’t stop him from being interested in cars. That spark? Emmet Tracy, his grandfather, worked at Henry Ford’s River Rouge Plant starting in 1918 and helped put together the famous Model T. Farley was already hooked by the time he was five years old. He wrote “Love is … a 427 Cobra” in his high school yearbook at Portsmouth Abbey School in Rhode Island, a Catholic prep school that taught discipline and a sense of purpose.
Farley worked hard and went to school to get to the C-suite. He graduated from Georgetown University and then got his MBA from UCLA’s Anderson School of Management. He worked for Toyota before joining Ford in 2007. There, he worked his way up to group vice president and general manager of Lexus, where he was in charge of sales, marketing, and customer satisfaction for the luxury brand. He quickly rose through the ranks at Ford, becoming executive vice president of global marketing and sales and then president of Ford of Europe from 2015 to 2017. During this time, he brought the brand back to life in the face of Europe’s economic troubles. As COO in 2018, he was in charge of turning around Ford’s operations around the world.
Ford said on August 4, 2020, that Farley would take over as CEO from Jim Hackett on October 1. Farley took over during the COVID-19 pandemic and a falling stock price, when the company was on the verge of collapse. He later admitted that he had doubts about himself at first and sought advice and did some soul-searching before agreeing. “It’s my honor,” he told graduates at his old school in May 2025. He stressed that being aware of yourself is important for being a leader. Today, he’s not just the CEO and a board member. He’s also the president of Ford Model e, the company’s electric vehicle division, and a board member at Harley-Davidson, where he’s pushing the motorcycle company to go electric.
Five Years of Fire: Leading Ford Through Crisis and Change
Farley’s time in charge started off badly, with problems in the supply chain, a lack of chips, and a shift to electric vehicles that older car companies like Ford weren’t fully ready for. But he has come through. Ford’s market share doubled in his first year. Now, the company competes in 22 racing series around the world, from Le Mans to the Baja 1000, using tracks as “the ultimate form of research” to improve consumer vehicles. He tweeted on November 12, “What we learn by pushing our vehicles to their limits helps shape the cars and trucks you’ll drive tomorrow.”
Cutting costs has been a constant goal. Ford had its first billion-dollar year-over-year cut in 2025 without having to lay off a lot of workers. Farley called this “a big deal,” especially since GM is still ahead of them in terms of efficiency. He’s also dealt with quality problems directly, spending billions on warranties and recalls that set records for the industry this year. What about dealer relations? He has personally visited a third of Ford’s 2,900 U.S. dealerships and approved a new custom-ordering system on the spot—decisions that used to take ten years.
But Farley is used to making tough decisions. He calls himself a workaholic and says he has “no life” outside of Ford. He talks about retirement, but he doesn’t seem to be slowing down. In a recent interview, he said that he might step down only after making sure the next generation is ready, maybe in his mid-60s after launching the Universal EV Platform, a project that needed new talent and kept him up at night.
The EV Wake-Up Call: “Humbled” by Tesla and China
The electric revolution is what really defined Farley’s time. At first, he told people to tear down a Tesla Model 3 and Chinese electric vehicles. He came out “humbled” and “shocked.” Ford’s Mustang Mach-E? It had an extra mile of wiring, which made it 70 pounds heavier and cost $200 more per battery to “haul around the wiring.” The big news: Legacy thinking improved parts, not systems. It led to “brutal” choices, such as making Model e in 2022, a division that loses $5 billion a year but is now coming up with new ideas at a breakneck pace.
Ford promised $5 billion to make electric vehicles in August 2025. To compete on a global scale, it is updating its Kentucky plant and processes. Farley says, “We can’t walk away from EVs.” “Not just for the U.S., but if we want to be a global company, I’m not going to give that to the Chinese.” In 2025, sales of electric vehicles in the U.S. skyrocketed as buyers rushed to take advantage of the federal tax credit before it expired in September. Ford extended lease benefits through the end of the year.
Farley is also interested in how AI can change things. He said in July 2025 that it would “replace literally half of all white-collar workers in the U.S.” and called for a shift toward trade and technical education. He says that mastering the supply chain is the “secret to climbing the corporate ladder,” using Apple’s Tim Cook as an example. Cook’s job combines geopolitics, logistics, and technology in a way that makes it less likely to be automated.
A Racer’s Heart and a Philanthropist’s Drive: Beyond the Boardroom
Farley’s not just about spreadsheets and planning meetings. He is a racer at heart and drives Ford GTs and Mustangs. He channels that adrenaline into products like the F-150 Raptor, which was revealed at the 2025 Raptor Rally in Arizona, where 400 owners came for workshops and hot laps. His X feed (@jimfarley98, 252K followers) is full of off-road stories, like teaming up with Google Maps to map the 5,900-mile TransAmerica Trail using Broncos and Rangers. You can now see it on Street View.
The community runs deep, too. Ford’s “Proud to Honor” concert on Veterans Day 2025, with performances by the Zac Brown Band, Ne-Yo, and Tyler Hubbard, raised money for Blue Star Families and honored 200 veterans at the Bronco Off-Roadeo. Farley and Mike Rowe worked together to call blue-collar jobs the “Essential Economy,” putting the focus on how much skilled trades are needed.
Tech benefits for owners? Based on feedback, he’s releasing new versions of the Ford and Lincoln apps (formerly FordPass/Lincoln Way) and the Home Power Management system for the F-150 Lightning. This will turn trucks into “smart personal power plants” that will lower electricity bills.
The Road Ahead: There Is No Finish Line in Sight
As Ford shows off its new World Headquarters, which is run by a descendant of Rouge workers whose grandparents met on the assembly line, Farley embodies the company’s long-lasting spirit. There are problems on the horizon: tariffs on Chinese goods starting in April 2026, AI’s impact on jobs, and the profitability of electric vehicles. Farley’s motto is clear: “Take on the hardest problems as fast as you can… sometimes in public.”
The racer-CEO, who is 63, doesn’t show any signs of pitting. Ford+ is in charge of Ford’s digital and electric leadership, so he’s not just fixing it; he’s reimagining it. Jim Farley has the wheel, the will, and the knowledge to keep the blue oval moving forward in an industry that doesn’t forgive mistakes. Get ready; the best laps are still to come.
