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Case 1: Unilever
Company Facts and Figures
Industry: Packaged Consumer Goods
Scope of Services and Products: A global producer and supplier of fast-moving consumer goods in the Food and Home & Personal Care categories; Major brands include: Lipton, Breyers, Magnum, Q-Tips, Dove, Hellmann’s, Skippy and Mentadent
Estimated Number of Employees: 265,000
Year e-Learning Introduced: 1997
Offices and Locations: Dual headquarters in Rotterdam, Netherlands (Unilever NV) and London, UK (Unilever PLC)
2001 Revenues: Worldwide turnover in 2001 was €52 206 million
Web Site: www.unilever.com
Number of e-Learning Programs in Entire Curriculum: Specific number of e-learning courses not available, but e-learning utilized throughout global enterprise on variety of topics and issues
Introduction
Unilever is a global company headquartered in two European countries. Employing 265,000 people, Unilever has two parent companies—Unilever NV and Unilever PLC— which, despite being separate businesses, operate as a single unit with the same board of directors. Following the announcement of a new strategic direction in 2000, Unilever was restructured into two global divisions, Foods and Home & Personal Care.Over the past 20 years, Unilever operated in distinct and separate units, departmentalizing their work, thinking, and processes. This worked well in the past, but it became apparent that many smaller brands were competing successfully against Unilever in important markets, chipping away growth and share value. The new strategy launched in 2000, called the Path to Growth, embraced a new organizational structure focused on building an enterprise culture. The cross-boundary structure allowed for improved focus on foods and home and personal care activities at both the regional and global levels. This structure also supported faster decision-making and strengthened Unilever’s capacity for innovation by more effectively integrating research into the divisional structure. The regions (with the operating companies) are the driving force behind Unilever. They are the key interface with customers and consumers, providing quick response to the needs of local markets.
Why e-Learning?
Unilever has been using e-learning approaches since 1997.They have:
Accumulated experiences and best practices
Supported initiatives and built capability through investments at the global level
Fostered organization-wide change initiatives such as the launch of a new leader- ship competency model, delivered through an online training program so that global content could be:
Blended with local workshops or best practices
Localized with languages and examples
Supported by online content from Harvard Business School
With this strategy, organization, and culture, Unilever could leverage its global operations specifically to support its major brands. This demanded an entrepreneurial and innovative style of lead- ership and new perspectives from Unilever’s top team.
The challenge was posed to the Learning Center of Excellence for Unilever Global to build an innovative and sustainable way to both empower Unilever leaders and to support the behaviors demanded by the new business strategy. In addition, the new leadership behaviors had to be embedded through experiences and applied by the leaders to real work and projects to ensure measurable impact on the business goals.The result is the Leaders into Action program, a five-month leadership development journey. Delivered in a blended model that balances online work with face-to-face classroom sessions and coaching, each of five modules is driven by a headline activity to keep the participants focused and engaged. The program combines the following three critical aspects of the leader role:
Personal leadership development
Individual projects, in both personal growth and business improvement
Business projects working in teams
How Was the Program Aligned with the Business?
Unilever had recently launched a new leadership competency model aligned with the five-year Path to Growth business strategy. The most important focus for senior leaders at Unilever was the goal of leading a deep and broad organizational change, transforming Unilever to embrace an innovation-driven enterprise culture. The Learning Center of Excellence for Unilever Global realized that developing this new global leadership style and business capability required creating a learning program that would engage the learners to:
Gain a deep self-awareness on personal leadership competencies and areas for growth and development
Investigate insights, knowledge, and opportunities and then reflect on these leadership capabilities outside the normal limitations of business life
Get individual coaching for support to change and grow
Connect with internal Unilever senior management coaches, so that there would be direct relevance to Unilever goals and challenges
Experience working in virtual, global teams
Do real work on innovative and growth- and opportunity-oriented business projects
Present new business proposals to sponsors who “can sign the check” and fund the proposed initiatives to grow the business
Key Business Drivers
Unilever was determined to innovate and grow, and leverage across brand, geographic, and company boundaries. Their new strategy was named Path to Growth and embraced six key strategic elements:
Build an enterprise culture
Pioneer new distribution channels
Develop a world-class supply chain
Reconnect with consumers
Focus on brands
Simplify
How Was the Program Designed?
Four Acres, Unilever’s Senior Management Training Center, realized that the traditional approach to leadership development—where participants would engage briefly in a leadership development event rather than a developmental journey—would not adequately meet the leadership requirements posed by the new strategy. To impact and basically change a leader’s perspective and embedded way of doing things required a learning experience that extended over time and one which required skilled application of the learning to their work. It was determined that a continuum of leadership development was needed, a journey that combined individual growth and team-based business projects. AsiaWorks was selected as an external partner to assist in the design of the overall blended model and to facilitate the coaching that would be integral to the five-month learning continuum. AsiaWorks has worked with over 100 organizations in areas such as teambuilding, leadership, change management, vision and strategy development, core value definition, creativity, customer service, interpersonal skills, and personal motivation.It was recognized in the beginning of the design phase that there would be great value in starting the experiential learning and community dialogue before the participants came to the residential program. Also, the need to support virtual work in the intersessions between the face-to-face events required a medium that could support learning over a five-month timeframe. Initially, this online module was supported by an internal Web site, which posed technical and staffing challenges for the organization. For example, the scope of program offerings expanded immediately after the successful pilot delivery from a proposed three programs per year to ten.Thus, the Learning Center sought a partner who could manage and support a learning community. Communispace was selected to provide a Web-enabled learning community tool which fosters the learning journey that begins with a virtual, experiential module, continues in the support of virtual teamwork during the program, and encourages the graduates to engage in learning beyond the program itself.
How Was the Program Deployed?
Thirty participants are selected to attend each program. The selection process is intense and competitive. The first communication is a welcome registration e-mail that directs the participant to the online learning community with their first assignment. A tutor team consisting of a program manager and internal coaches are involved from the beginning to the end of all program modules. Senior Unilever managers, who act as internal coaches, are graduates of the Leaders into Action program and are required to attend an intensive coach training.
Media and Tools
Teleconferencing
Web-enabled forums
Web-based learning community
Online assessments
Leaders into Action Program
Module 1 (see Figure 15-1) supports immediate immersion into learning. The purpose of the module is to have the participants look outside-the-box, to give the freedom to explore, and to build the community of leadership learning.
Figure 15-1: Overview of Leaders into Action Program Modules
There is no concept of pre-work in the look and feel of this module—the work begins with registration e-mail and it contains the first assignment. Every week there are new assignments, termed “blind corner” assignments, as they are never easily anticipated by the participants what direction might be taken. The assignments direct them outside their normal work and life to do research, analysis, and reflection on various issues. Some examples of assignments for Module 1 include:
Interview a graduate of the program about their experiences and post your findings.
Watch the Dead Poets Society and post what you observe about leadership and which leadership model you prefer and why.
Define the individual business project you want to work on during the Leaders into Action program.
Interview a futurologist, your children, or a politician about the future, and post findings.
Participants post their findings and comment on each other’s postings in the community to create natural conversations that are very powerful. Coaches observe and collect data and impressions to use during Module 2.Module 2 is a residential program that focuses on rigorous leadership development, combining self-awareness, self-assessment, coaching, and classroom sessions. In addition, each participant defines two individual projects, one focused on personal development, and one focused on business improvement. Also, each participant is assigned to work with a team on a business proposal.Module supports continued learning and application to real work, keeping the participants engaged and in action on personal and team project deliverables. Virtual supports, such as teleconferencing, online meetings, and e-mail, in addition to other virtual team supports are utilized.
Harvard Business School materials on virtual work techniques are available online, and the coaches are actively involved, assigned to a team and to individuals for virtual coaching throughout this module.The highlight of Module 4 is Panel Day, when top level board members, who have the authority to fund the business projects and proposals of the teams, hear team presentations for innovative approaches to enter new markets and launch new business processes.Module 5 supports the virtual learning continuum, keeping the graduates engaged. The circle of leadership context and development is fostered with new materials and insights.
What Was the Business Impact of the Program?
The success of the Leaders into Action program in supporting the execution of the new business strategy is evident in the demand to increase the number of offerings for the program. It has changed from the annual plan to deliver the program three times for 30 participants each time to an annual plan of delivering a total of 12 program offerings in FY ‘03, ultimately engaging 360 senior managers from around the globe.In addition, 100 percent of those enrolled to date have completed the entire five-month learning journey of Leaders into Action. Finally, a new participant group has requested to engage teams from discrete business units, such as a global brand leadership team and a Board of Directors. They recognize the value of dedicated time to grow as leaders while working on a selected high priority project that will improve and grow the business.
The impact of the Leaders into Action program in founding a leadership enterprise culture has been extremely positive. Some examples are:
Innovative and entrepreneurial projects developed by teams during Leaders into Action have abounded. One project proposed entry into a new country with a major Unilever brand. This was identified as a six million Euro opportunity, and the teamwork on this project was noted as speeding up the entry into the market by six months.
Managers are now familiar with using technology to support learning, and it has become now a standard in the launch of organization-wide change initiatives.
Virtual, cross-boundary teamwork is becoming a way of doing business
Individual participants have expressed positive personal leadership changes that are being noted in annual performance appraisals.
As a result of participants’ attendance in the program, scored development improvements under their Leadership Growth Profile have been noted in the key leadership competencies prescribed for effective leadership at Unilever.
Unilever’s Path to Growth business strategies are clearly visible in the results created from the program.
Learner Perspectives
On individual growth: "I now believe that anything is possible-the Leaders into Action program has shown me over and over again how far people can go."
On peer learning: "Honest feedback from a friend or colleague has more impact than feedback from a third party."
On blended learning: "The combination of virtual and residential working reflects the way we are increasingly working together at Unilever."
On leadership focus: "It’s different from any other course I have experienced. It is not focused on knowledge transfer, but on who you are as a leader."
On application to work: "In the implementation of a single European portfolio for 17 countries, I use what I learned in the Leaders into Action program every day, and I couldn’t have done such an effective job without it."
On cultural transformation: "We are seeing evidence of this happening already. Operating companies are beginning to invest more in coaching."
On business impact: "I could never have imagined we would have achieved so much in the project to develop branded street food for markets in Central America."
Summary
Purpose: To support the development of a leadership enterprise culture while enabling leaders to execute the Path to Growth strategy.Program Structure: The blended model engaged participants, who represented the most senior managers at Unilever, in a learning journey over five months, alternating online learning with face-to-face modules, in a highly integrated approach and requiring application of learnings to real personal and business challenges.
Number of Learning Hours per Learner:
5 months overall
18 days face-to-face learning
Interim virtual learning
Total Number of Hours of Learning in the Program:
396 tutor hours for Leaders into Action for individuals
348 tutor hours for Leaders into Action for teams
Both programs have an approximate 13-week period of applied learning in the work place
Number of Learners in Each Offering: 30Completion Requirements:
Finish all modules
Define and implement three projects with relevant deliverables presented to coaches and stakeholder panel
Media and Tools:
Teleconferencing
Web-enabled forums
Web-based learning community
Online assessments
Deployment Mechanism:
Web-enabled learning community
Face-to-face classroom sessions
Coaching, both virtual and face-to-face
Team and individual projects
Lessons Learned
Begin the program with an online community where one can develop the thinking and dialogue prior to the face-to-face program.
Fully immerse the participants in the program with the first message and give it the look and feel of immediacy, with no option but to engage.
‘Off-the-shelf’ learning content in a blended model should be offered for use at the discretion of the end user, but not as a required component of the program.
Reliability and ease of use of the technology is extremely important to top level participants.
Internally managed Web sites to support learning communities can pose more administration problems than an internal learning staff can generally support, so it is best to outsource this aspect of a blended model.
Relevance of the learning is only valuable if linked to application of real work.
Involving internal graduates of the program as coaches is very valuable; however, intensive learning on coaching skills is mandatory for success.
In e-learning, little bits of small are better than three bits of big. Big files that take a long time to download and complete discourage people from engaging. If it is small enough, people will fit it into their day.
By using online capabilities, relationships can be built without meeting face-to-face.
There is still work to be done in developing capabilities, techniques, and tools that support a virtual, global, networked company.
