Unilever North America

Starting Small

For nearly 20 years, beginning in the early 1990’s, RAI advised and assisted Unilever North America and its unions in the transformation of multiple traditional manufacturing facilities into high performance innovative organizations. After an intensive education process, management and the unions agreed to work system redesign focused on achieving specific business and people objectives. The restructured organizations reflected socio-technical systems (STS) and lean, total preventative maintenance (TPM) principles, and were structured around self-managed teams within decentralized business units, multi-skilled workers rewarded through innovative pay structures, and collaborative labor management relations.  Performance results exceeded planned goals. Click here for Article.

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The organizational designs that RAI helped develop and implement subsequently became the templates that were rolled out across the Unilever corporation.

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Separately, RAI also led the design of a pay-for-performance plan.