| Biggest had also to
be best when Cadbury Schweppes became the world's largest confectionery company with the
acquisition of Adams from Pfizer in 2003. City and investor confidence had to be
maintained as the deal had cost £2.7 billion and had to show returns in terms of cost
savings from consolidation, market share gains, increased profit and shareholder value. The company took the opportunity to make wide ranging changes in
management and operational structure in a 4 year programme aimed at exploiting synergies
and driving growth.
Chris Bones, Group Organisational Effectiveness and
Development Director, led the organisation and change aspects of this programme.The
company aimed at delivering cost cutting, reinvestment and targeted growth in sales,
profit and shareholder value. The targets were tough: net growth in sales value of 3-5%
per annum and gross savings of c£400m in costs over a three year period.
Chris pointed out, "To make it happen we
all had to resist the urge to apply traditional thinking and find different and more
effective ways of managing the new enlarged company.
We spent time developing a very business focussed approach to thinking about
planning and implementing the change. As part of this thinking we needed to change the way
people thought about major strategic change and looked for a catalyst to find our own way
effectively, not a prescriptive or off-the-shelf solution.
We had to take our people with us through a period of massive change and
rationalisation in which confidence would be tested. They had to be happy to adopt a
single approach to thinking about programme and project management methodology." |
|
Eddie Obeng of Pentacle was the catalyst of choice for
Cadbury Schweppes. He had worked with the company two years previously on a behavioural
change programme which had been fully and successfully implemented prior to the
acquisitions of 2002-3. He knew the company culture and had experience of customising his
own project management delivery techniques to it. He had worked with small groups of key
managers in structured workshops where he helped them identify where to consolidate, where
to innovate, where to focus resources for growth and how to implement the changes
effectively.
The tools and techniques which evolved from this process were
immediately put into practice and worked. Pentacle got a very positive reception and the
project generated a high level of interest, reflected in, for example, a huge amount of
email discussion.
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The process of changing
the thinking about strategic change is still underway, but it has got off to a good start
with key programme managers being supported in developing their approaches and plans to
improve the chances of meeting or beating their targets. It is supporting the business change where ten business units
have been rationalised to a leaner, more effective 5 operating regions, supported by 6
staff functions and new global leadership headed by a team of eleven key executives
reporting to the new CEO.
In 2003 the company announced better than expected
results. Margins are growing on target. The integration process is producing savings which
are being fed back into support of key brands.
For the new Cadbury Schweppes the change is working. |
