Unilever 2002 Annual Report Download - page 16

Unilever Annual Report & Accounts and Form 20-F 2002
Report of the Directors
Seasonality
Certain of our businesses, such as ice creams and prestige
fragrances, are subject to significant seasonal fluctuations in
sales. However, Unilever operates globally in many different
markets and product categories. No individual element of
seasonality is likely to be material to the results of the
Group as a whole.
People
Year end in thousands 2002 2001 2000 1999 1998
Europe 60 71 80 74 80
North America 21 22 39 22 23
Africa, Middle East
and Turkey 52 49 48 50 59
Asia and Pacific 82 85 84 71 72
Latin America 32 38 44 29 31
Total 247 265 295 246 265
Establishing an Enterprise Culture, to inspire a passion for
winning among our people is an essential ingredient of our
Path to Growth strategy. In 2002, we made further progress
in making this culture into an integral part of Unilever.
One example of Enterprise Culture in action was the
turnaround achieved at our previously slow-growing
operation in Australia and New Zealand. This followed the
creation of a single Australasian business that challenged
employees to do things differently and to connect more
closely with consumers. Their energy and drive are indicative
of similar initiatives around the world.
To further motivate our people towards sustained business
growth, we surveyed over 100 000 Unilever people from
110 countries, giving us invaluable insights into our Path to
Growth progress. The results will help further develop our
human resources strategy.
Career development at Unilever, as befitting our Enterprise
Culture, is a shared responsibility between leaders and
their teams.
In 2002, we pursued several diverse development initiatives.
We became more exacting in measuring performance,
through more rigourous application of Leadership for
Growth Profiles – a move which also allows managers
to become better coaches. Originally designed for top
management, profiles have now been expanded for use
across all levels.
Unilever’s future depends on developing its up and coming
managers. In July, some 80 managers from 35 countries
spent five days together as part of the young leaders of
tomorrow programme, which is part of our comprehensive
management development strategy. This event, which was
attended by both Unilever Chairmen, helped participants to
consider how their personal goals complement Unilever’s
strategic objectives.
We continued to adopt new ways to foster team spirit and
encourage commitment to Unilever values. For example, we
brought together 120 Latin American Home & Personal Care
managers in a team project to refurbish a number of
community facilities in São Paulo, Brazil.
Our new divisional structure empowers our people to take
decisions quickly and seize opportunities. Amongst others,
we built on the momentum of early Dove hair successes in
Asia by rolling out the range in 31 more countries in 2002,
in a vastly accelerated timeframe.
To conclude the reorganisation that accompanies Path to
Growth we are streamlining the corporate centre, making
services more responsive to Unilever’s changing needs.
As part of our strategy to encourage managers to take more
control of their careers, we rolled out open job posting in
2002. Under the initiative most Unilever vacancies are
advertised internally on a new intranet site. This helps us to
identify existing employees who could fill these positions
and to retain talented people.
Externally, the roll-out of our new Employer Brand across
55 countries has made our approach to potential employees
more attractive and effective.
Unilever is one of the most diverse organisations in the
world: our top 200 leaders are drawn from 33 nationalities.
Over a quarter of our managers are women. In 2002, as a
step towards developing our diversity vision and strategy, we
conducted a global diversity assessment. Future initiatives
include steps to improve our top leaders’ understanding of
the barriers faced by people from diverse backgrounds.
We are keen to recognise and reward success. We extended
our long-term incentive programme to a further 4 000
employees and variable pay to 15 000 more employees.
Related party transactions
Transactions with related parties are conducted in
accordance with the transfer pricing policies described
on page 68 and consist primarily of sales to joint ventures
and associates. Other than those disclosed in this report,
there were no related party transactions that were material
to the Group or to the related parties concerned that require
to be reported in 2002 or the preceding two years.
In approximately 40 countries, our associated company,
JohnsonDiversey Inc., acts as Unilever’s sole and exclusive
sales agent for professional channels, in return for which it
receives an agency fee. Information concerning guarantees
given by the Group is stated in note 24 on page 99 and
under ’Mutual guarantee of borrowings’ on page 140.
Guarantees are also given within the Group by the parent
companies, as described on pages 133 and 136.
Intellectual property
We have a large portfolio of patents and trademarks,
and we conduct some of our operations under licences
which are based on patents or trademarks owned or
controlled by others. We are not dependent on any one
patent or group of patents. We use our best efforts to
protect our brands and technology.
About Unilever 13