Unilever shifts to a category focus

Unilever has announced that it is to move away from a matrix structure to organise around five distinct business groups. 

What are the new groups?

Beauty & Wellbeing, Personal Care, Home Care, Nutrition, and Ice Cream: each will be fully responsible and accountable for their strategy, growth, and profit delivery globally.

“Moving to five category-focused Business Groups will enable us to be more responsive to consumer and channel trends, with crystal-clear accountability for delivery,” said CEO Alan Jope. “Growth remains our top priority and these changes will underpin our pursuit of this,” he added.

Anything else?

Unilever says the changes will mean a 15% reduction in senior management roles and a 5% cut in more junior management roles – around 1,500 jobs in total globally. Factory teams won’t be affected.

What it means

The widespread assumption is that the moves are a response to recent demands by investors seeking a better performance. The creation of the separate divisions opens up the option for sell-offs in future of slower-growing operations, with ice cream likely to be first in the queue. 

Sourced from Unilever [Image:Unilever]