Human Capital - Chapter 4

             At Unilever, human capital is one of the most important factors that lead to the successful of the company. Being a global company with thousands of products and more than 400 different brands, Unilever understand that the important of hiring and training the right people to work for the company. They attract people through the company’s message. “It's encouraging to see how our sustainable living plan sits with our ambition to double the size of our business while reducing our environmental footprint. That's become an increasingly inspiring message to motivate people to join the company.” – said by Paul Maxin, Unilever's Global Resourcing Director. At Unilever, they look for people to not just have values but also to be able to add values and bring the sustainable living plan to life. When a person goes the Unilever’s website, they can easily the company’s culture, value and objectives. Unilever want to build a winning culture, in which every employee is encouraged to grow to his or her full potential. There are also many different training programs for fresh graduates or internship programs for junior and senior in college. These different programs help training new employees, get them familiar with the company’s culture and help the company to select talented people to stay and work with them after the program finish.

SWOT Analysis

                                                   SWOT analysis for Unilever

Internal Factors	Strength         -          Strong portfolio         -          Global brand         -          Product diversity         -          Sustainable living plan         -          Combine global and multidomestic strategy         -          Strong human resources	Weakness         -          Product can be easily replaced         -          Lack focus on non-famous brands
External Factors	Opportunity         -          Emerging market         -          Raising population         -          Globalization         -          Increase consumer concern for      health and environment	Threat         -          Global competitor         -          Local competitor         -          Changing lifestyle         -          Economic downturn

Strength

-          1. Strong portfolio: Unilever has more than 400 brands and their portfolio ranges from nutritionally balanced foods to indulgent ice creams, affordable soaps, luxurious shampoos and everyday household care products.

-         2.  Global brand: Unilever’s products are now sold in 190 countries in the world. Approximately, on any given day, two billion people use Unilever products. They have many famous brands that we all have heard about such as Doves, Omo, Knorr, Lipton, Magnum,…

-         3.  Product diversity: Unilever divide their products into four main segments: Personal care (36% of sales) with Dove, Rexona, Lux, Sunsilk,…; Foods (27% of sales) with Knorr, Hellmann’s, Flora, Rama…; Refreshment (19% of sales) with Lipton, Magnum, Wall’s,…; and Home Care (18% of sales) with Surf, Omo,… The diversity in products and product lines help Unilever reach their customer more easily.

-         4. Sustainable living plan: The Unilever Sustainable Living Plan sets out to decouple growth from environmental impact, while at the same time increasing their positive social impact.

-          5. Combine global and multidomestic strategy: Unilever have both global products that are the same in every country and the differentiate products based on different local preferences.

-          6. Strong human resources: Unilever have many program such as Future Leadership Program in many different countries to attract talented people

Weakness

-         1.  Product can be easily replaced: Many of Unilever products are easily replaced and substituted by local products with cheaper prices.

-         2.  Lack focus on non-famous brands: Having more than 400 brands make it difficult to manage and focus on all of them equally. The core brands are giving much more attention than the less famous brands.

Opportunity

-          1. Emerging market: Many new emerging markets allow the company to expand their business further in these markets.

-         2. Raising population: Raising population, especially in developing countries, leads to increase in demand for consumer’s good which is a good opportunity for Unilever to develop more new products and reach out to new customers.

-          3. Globalization: Globalization makes it easier to do business across countries borders. It can also help with cheaper production cost and supplier.

4

-          4. Increase consumer concern for health and environment

Threat

-           1. Global competitor: Strong global competitor such as Procter & Gamble which offer many similar products and same quality.

-          2. Local competitor: Unilever also have to deal with local competitors who offer the same products but cheaper price because of the small economic scale and cheaper labors.

Competitive Advantage

    Unilever is an international company with more than 400 brands focused on people's health and well-being. Unilever's brands range from luxurious hair treatments and mouth-watering ice creams to low-cost nutritious foods, antibacterial soaps, germ-killing sprays and much more. Every day, there are nearly two billion people in the world are using Unilever products. Many of their products are familiar in our daily life such as: Doves, Sunsilk, Lipton, Vaseline, Ben&Jerry’s,… Unilever competitive advantage strategy is differentiation. Their goal is toward the sustainable growth. The Unilever Sustainable Living Plan sets out to decouple growth from environmental impact, while at the same time increasing their positive social impact. The plan has three big goals that are:

-        . Help more than a billion people to improve their health and well-being.

-          Halve the environmental footprint of products.

-          Source 100% of agricultural raw materials sustainably and enhance the livelihoods of people across value chain.

By taking social responsibility as a main goal, Unilever bring a different image to customer compare to many other companies in the same industry. Unilever believe that as a business they have a responsibility to their consumers and to the communities in which they have a presence.