Ford Announcement: Fields COO, Farley to head Lincoln

This morning, Bill Ford Jr. and Alan Mulally announced that Mark Fields was going to be promoted to Chief Operating Officer, reporting to Mulally. The heads of Ford's various organizations would report to Fields, but the heads of HR, and Finance would report to Mulally.  

I have met Mark Fields once, at an industry event, a few years ago, during his "Bold Moves" effort.  I only spoke to him very briefly, but from his demeanor I got the impression that he is a very bright guy, very driven, and a bit cocky.  I also have the sense that he has an aggressive, competitive edge to him, more of a "hard charger" than you see from Alan Mulally.  

I think Mark Fields will serve Ford well.  He was partly responsible for the Ford Fusion, which helped save the company, product-wise, in the late 2000's.  

I was surprised to see that Farley was put in charge of Lincoln as well as Marketing and Sales.  It seems like a really big job--both global marketing for Ford and running the Lincoln brand are huge jobs.  I hope he can pull it off, because Lincoln really needs help.