Value Creation in Business Support Functions at Unilever

The value creation opportunities for consumer packaged goods (CPG) companies afforded by social technologies is enormous. A study by the McKinsey Global Institute found that these technologies have the potential to create between $212-308 billion in value potential annually within the global CPG sector alone. Approximately $36-46 billion of this figure is derived solely from application of social technologies to business support functions.

One company that has recognised and harnessed this value creating potential is multinational consumer goods corporation Unilever, who are applying social technologies externally in their talent recruitment process and internally via their custom-built social collaboration platform based on the Salesforce platform.

Social Media and Recruitment at Unilever:

Unilever use a variety of digital media outlets to source and match talent to positions globally. These include:

• The global careers website;
• a LinkedIn company page;
• a careers Facebook page;
• a careers YouTube channel;
• and a Careers Twitter feed

The careers website provides two separate links for graduates/students and professionals. It is worth noting the use of the keywords 'opportunities' in the graduate section and 'vacancies' in the professionals section. It can be inferred that Unilever is using the careers website to advertise a long-term career opportunity to students and graduates, as opposed to a position for professionals who have been working within the industry for some time.

Unilever's LinkedIn page is extremely popular with over 500,000 followers which may come as no surprise given the company's global reach and reputation, however in an interview with Global Resourcing Director, Paul Maxin, he revealed that by rolling out buttons in email signatures they went from "40,000 followers to about 235,000 in a period of 10 months". Over this period, Unilever also experienced an exponential increase in page visits and a significant increase in new hires from LinkedIn.

The Unilever Facebook page is also extremely popular with over 200,000 'likes'. Whilst, this page might have a universal URL, the content is specific for each country/region from which an individual is viewing it, thus ensuring this resource is relevant to the user.

The Unilever Careers YouTube channel features a unique 'How far could U go?' branding, however conforms to their Facebook strategy of having country specific channels, relevant to the user. Across all 20 country-based channels, Unilever has amassed an astounding figure of over 200,000 views. Clearly, this video sharing platform has much merit from an organisational recruitment perspective and is useful for more than just the sharing of funny cat videos.

Unilever does not yet have an Australian careers Twitter feed, but has since late August of last year had a global careers Twitter feed which has yet to really take off. However, with 500 followers at this point in time, it serves as a good back up to the other social media channels in widening Unilever's ability to source and match talent.

Through combination of universal and local social technology mediums, Unilever is truly a world leader in 'Glocal' recruitment. Through enhancing the opportunity for talent to hear about current opportunities, Unilever has a much greater chance of finding the right person for the job and taking advantage of the value creation afforded by social technologies.

Internal Collaboration at Unilever:

With marketers, brand managers and partners spread across 190 different countries, Unilever has much to gain from the increases in efficiency that could be attained through implementation of an internal social collaboration tool.  Global management consultancy firm Accenture was hired to develop and implement a digital social platform based on the Salesforce platform that also integrated Salesforce's chatter.

This new platform was developed in a mere 12 weeks and has enabled Unilever's 7,500 marketers to quickly and efficiently share "knowledge, best practices and creative assets across the network". Just like the Salesforce platform, Unilever's platform creates value through enhanced collaboration by providing staff with a secure, central hub for access of resources and collective knowledge.

Question for my Readers: Have you ever used YouTube to learn more about a company's career opportunities? If so, what advantages/disadvantages do you feel this format has in comparison to conventional written job descriptions?