“ significant changes in organizational structure and personnel. ”The boots fell to the ground. Unilever, which announced major measures a week ago, announced a new organizational structure yesterday. According to Unilever’s announcement yesterday, its latest restructured structure includes five business departments: beauty and health, personal care, home care, nutrition and ice cream. In addition, the company also announced a series of senior personnel appointments and some personnel optimization plans.The company previously disclosed that after a comprehensive review of the company’s organizational structure, “it intends to change from the existing matrix to an operation model that can improve agility, improve category focus and strengthen accountability” to achieve the goal of improving performance.New architecture Let’s take a look at the briefing first.Unilever said it would get rid of its current “matrix” structure and reorganize five business units: beauty and health, personal care, home care, nutrition and ice cream. Each department will take full responsibility for its global strategy, growth and profits.The company described the new structure as “simpler and more focused on category business”.Under this new architecture, Unilever business operations will provide support to five business departments, including technology, systems and processes. The streamlined Unilever corporate centre will continue to be responsible for formulating the group’s overall strategy.With the restructuring, Unilever also announced a series of personnel changes.·Fernando Fernandez, the current executive vice president of Latin America, has been appointed president of beauty and health, leading hair care, skin care, VMS (vitamins, minerals and supplements) and high-end beauty business.·Fabian Garcia, the current president of North America, was appointed president of personal care, responsible for skin cleaning, deodorant and oral care.·Peter ter kulve will continue to be president of home care, responsible for fabric care, home and sanitation, and water and air.·Hanneke Faber, the current president of food and beverage, was appointed president of nutrition. The Department will be responsible for scratch cooking, healthy snacks, functional nutrition, plant meat and diet planning.·Matt close, the current executive vice president of ice cream, has been appointed president of ice cream business department.The above appointment shall take effect from April 1, 2022.In addition, Nitin paranjpe, the company’s chief operating officer, will serve as the newly established chief transformation officer and chief personnel officer to lead business transformation and human resources. Reginaldo ecclissato, chief supply chain officer, will lead the supply chain department and Unilever business operation Department in his capacity as chief business operation officer.Sunny Jain, the current president of beauty and personal care, has decided to leave Unilever. Other members of Unilever’s leadership will remain in office.Commenting on this adjustment, Alan jope, chief executive of Unilever, said: “Our new organizational model was developed last year and aims to continue to improve performance. Adjusting to five category focused business structures will enable us to respond more sensitively to consumer and channel trends and have clear responsibility for achieving our goals. Growth remains our top priority, and these changes will support us in pursuing this goal.”Alan jopeXiaoshidai noticed that in addition to major structural and personnel changes, Unilever also revealed its personnel optimization plan. It said that the proposed new organizational model would lead to a reduction of about 15% in senior management positions and 5% in junior management positions, equivalent to about 1500 positions worldwide. The specific changes will depend on the negotiation.The company also stressed that the plant team is not expected to be affected. All costs associated with establishing the new architecture will be managed in the existing restructuring investment plan.Accelerate transformation Since the beginning of 2019, Alan jope, the chief executive who has been leading the group, has been under pressure to improve performance and share price. At present, Unilever’s share price is at the same level as it was five years ago, when kafheinz launched a merger and acquisition of Unilever.Xiaoshidai previously introduced that Unilever would adjust the organizational structure as early as more than a week ago to improve its performance.5-year trend of Unilever share price (Bloomberg)On the one hand, Unilever has put forward a new strategic direction, that is, to reposition its product portfolio as a category with higher growth, and to substantially expand its business in the fields of health, beauty and hygiene in the future. “These categories provide a higher sustainable market growth rate, and can obtain important opportunities to promote growth through investment and innovation, as well as taking advantage of Unilever’s strong influence in emerging markets.” The company explained.Based on this, Unilever had hoped to acquire GlaxoSmithKline consumer health products business not long ago, and even quoted a sky high price of £ 50 billion (about 433.985 billion yuan) to seek a “strong strategic fit”. However, there is still no progress in the transaction, and Unilever immediately obtained an increase in holdings from radical investors after it said it would not raise its offer.Just a few days ago, people familiar with the matter told a number of foreign media that trian partners, a radical strategic hedge fund with a scale of up to $8.5 billion, had increased its stake in Unilever, but it was unclear about the scale or start time of trian’s increase. It is understood that trian partners has always been famous for streamlining the company’s management reform and obtaining a lot of returns in the process.After finally giving up the pursuit of GlaxoSmithKline’s consumer health business, Unilever’s strategy has attracted close attention from the outside world. Yesterday, Unilever’s share price rose more than 5% after opening.On the other hand, in order to accelerate the improvement of operating performance, Unilever said that in addition to solving the problem of long-term strategic direction, Unilever has always focused on accelerating the growth of existing business and has implemented a series of measures to improve operating performance, including paying more attention to excellent operation to improve market competitiveness and so on.For Unilever’s official announcement yesterday, international public opinion is generally concerned. Reuters pointed out that the move is to streamline the structure and respond to investors’ concerns. It is worth noting that before the announcement, radical investors have said they have increased their holdings in the world’s second-largest manufacturer of personal care products.The financial times believes that the CEO of Unilever hopes to act fast enough to quell the increasing dissatisfaction of investors so as not to turn against radical investors.Bloomberg is concerned about personnel optimization, pointing out that the CEO of Unilever believes that the personnel of many regions and business departments are unfavorable to rapid innovation, so it needs to be cut, so as to accelerate the transformation of the company.Source: xiaoshidai (ID: foodinc), reprint has been authorized. 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