Samir Singh (Unilever, Personal Care) | The Power of Laddering Down

A recurring theme has started to pop up on the CMO podcast, Sustainability. One of our recent guests even incorporated sustainability into his job title. He might not be alone. According to Deloitte's 2023 Global Marketing Trends Report, sustainability continues to be a focus for brands. While some organizations may want to pull back on sustainability initiatives in times of economic uncertainty, consumers continue to stress that a brand's commitment to sustainability is critical to their preferences. However, only 25% of brands that Deloitte surveyed say their focus for 2023 is on urging consumers to take action. Instead, organizations are recognizing that focusing on their own sustainability efforts can have an even more positive impact on the planet and on their business. For more inspiration on how to make this year be your organization's most impactful year yet, check out Deloitte's 2023 Global Marketing Trends Report at Deloitte.com slash Global Marketing Trends. So, what's the first brand you remember making an impact on you growing up? I would have to say Cadburys. Like again, that comes top of my mind. Now when I analyze it in hindsight, it's about happiness. It's about joy. And it's not just Cadburys. It's Cadburys daily milk. Obviously, the taste, the texture, the weight, melts in the mouth. And then those days in India, you had one chocolate bar and it was Cadburys and it was daily milk. But what is amazing is that even my kids now, they're 11 and 16 and have the choice of a million brands. When I go to London, because you don't get it in Singapore, when I go to London or India, they will always say my son especially, yet me the Cadburys daily milk, because I think that brand and that product has cracked that sweet spot of everyday joy. Hi, I'm Jim Stangel and I help major brands find their purpose and activate it and the profits follow. For seven years, I was the global marketing officer for Prokka and Gamble, where I oversaw the marketing of hundreds of brands. You may not know it, but the CMOs, the chief marketing officers of all of your favorite brands, are trying to connect you with your favorite products and services through purpose. And on this show, I delve into how they do it. My guest today on the CMO podcast is Samir Singh, the chief marketing officer of Unilever Personal Care, a $13 billion business with famous brands such as Dove, Axe Links, Lifeboy, Prexona Shure and Pepsadine. Headquartered in London, Unilever is one of the largest and most influential multinational consumer goods companies, with sales of about $60 billion US dollars. I guess Samir has been at Unilever for 25 years and was appointed Global CMO of Personal Care about 10 months ago. Samir grew up in a small town in India, started with Unilever as an area sales manager, and from there moved into marketing and flourished in a variety of brand assignments. Samir now lives in Singapore with his wife and two children. This is my conversation with the CMO with a clear and compelling personal purpose. Here's Samir Singh. Samir, welcome to the CMO podcast finally. Just as I was finishing my notes for this discussion, my news feed popped in. I saw it up on the right hand corner of my screen to say Unilever has a new CEO behind Shumacher. So I said, oh, well, well, we should start on that. I've been through many CEO changes. In fact, I came into my role as PNG CMO after a CEO change. And they are always times of great hope and great curiosity. So I would like you to start with what's your greatest hope for your new CEO and your company. Let's just start there. I think my greatest hope is that he will continue us on this journey of sustainable living, which is now starting to give great results. We've had a great year. We've had a very effective compass reorganization. And I think that is really starting to work. And of course, that sustainably, he will lift up performance to a new level. So yeah, I'm hoping for great things. So you talked about the compass reorg. I've been through a lot of those as well. Someone well, some did not. And we could have a whole podcast about that. But what is it about this reorg that is working so well so far? I think the early signs are indeed good. I think there is this whole sort of reorganization is based on having divisions with independent P and Ls with end to end responsibility. And I think that just is helping decision making become much, much faster in responding to consumer and customer needs. And of course, it's a process of adjustment, because people's jobs change, etc. But about six months in, I'm getting a good feeling about it. Super. Well, as you know, and as we were chatting before, this recording started, I hail from PNG. And I did battle with many Unilever brands over the course of my long career at PNG. So I'd like to, I'd like you to reflect a bit. You've been at the company 25 years. I was also at PNG 25 years. How do you think over the course of your career, the nature of that rivalry has changed? Ah, that's an interesting question. And I think I've also had the pleasure to do battle with PNG, not in all my jobs. I haven't really thought about how is the nature of it changed, I think. But I have a feeling marketing as a whole. I'm a glass half full guy, as you will discover. And I feel marketing as a whole has become more strategic, more purpose oriented, more based on sort of essential truths. And I think there used to be in the early days from Unilever and PNG and many other sort of lots of small tactical moves and, you know, competitive ad words and stuff like that. Now I think it is more fundamental, sort of based on genuine consumer insights and making big moves on brands. So in a way, it is kind of the fight is fairer, but it's also more difficult. But essentially, I think that sort of healthy rivalry, which pushes people to new heights and into new directions, I think that is still there. And it's a competitor that I obviously greatly respect. I have to follow up on that when I feel over my career, and this is a cliche, perhaps, but Unilever definitely made us better. I mean, we both Unilever and PNG have many more competitors now. I think the markets have fragmented a lot over the last two decades. But I do remember when the whole dove journey started, and we were relatively early in our purpose journey. And that one really shook us up in a positive way. We really admired it. It kept evolving. It kept setting new standards. So for us, that was a beacon externally for our journey, a brand inside PNG at that time that was a beacon was pampers. I'd be interested in your perspective, Samir. What about PNG as influenced you as a competitor of them for many years? I think many things, but a couple of things that come top of my mind are, I think this sort of emphasis on those moments of truth. I think that was, you know, it's so obvious in hindsight, which is how they describe an insight, right? That it really then impacts your work deeply. And I think that first moment of truth at retail. And I don't think in my career till then I had looked at it with quite that amount of sort of criticality. And then I think this whole emphasis on product superiority and sort of seeing it manifest in very practical ways in a consumer's life. I think those were sort of two top of mind things that really influenced me. You were certainly one of the most awarded CMOs. I've hosted on this show. You have multiple FEs, multiple can lines. The fact last time we saw each other was at Cannes a few years ago. You were personal care, marketer of the year in India, and it goes on and on. I'd like you to share with us what is it about how you lead and how you work with teams that has resulted in such admiration from your colleagues because all of these awards are judged based on the data by our colleagues in this marvelous large industry. I know you hate talking about things like this. But what is it about you and how you lead that has attracted such admiration? Now, Jim, look, you are being very kind. My list of awards is like a very short one compared to yours and many others. I think you know very well all these awards and recognitions are sort of a very inadequate way to measure the contribution that a marketer makes. I think in my own little way, I think the one thing that I get very passionate about is, and it's a hot topic, and I think it's probably the essence of my leadership over the last sort of 15, 20 years that I've been leading in marketing is this whole thing of how to embed purpose into brands in a way that makes brands grow, but also in a way that teams extract joy out of that. And I think the word purpose has been much abused and misunderstood because I think somehow it has come to stand for purpose with a big P, saving the world, saving children, saving lives, saving women. But what to me is the essence of marketing and of all great brands and which has informed my career is like purpose with a small P. Because I think there is whether you are handling one of PNG's great brands or Unilevers, there is something about satisfying a consumer's need day after day in a way that gives her or him joy that I think adds up to something bigger. And I think that for me is a much bigger responsibility because it's a joy that the consumer can't even articulate. She will never actually talk about it. But when life voice helps prevent her children falling a little less often, or dove in its way, addresses the problems of beauty and anxiety, it's like that movie inside out, which said that you can't really have joy until you have sorrow. And I think we are those people who kind of understand those little sorrows and bring those little joys. And over time, it adds up to something big, which people love to talk about, which is the purpose with the big P. And that's really the essence of the brands we handle and why I love working for FMCG marketing. Because the way you work is such a reflection on daily life and the rhythms of daily life, you know, which I don't think a banker or lawyer or even a doctor will ever, or maybe a doctor will. But and I think that for me, that opportunity to get that over the last 25 years, over many, many different kinds of brands. And yeah, sometimes that work gets recognized. But most of the time, as you know, a lot of it happens in the core brands, results in a lot of growth, a lot of failures, a lot of ads which go wrong in that the world never hears about. Yeah, I love how you describe purpose with a small P. I often say to people, you know, it's about improving the business. And it's about making a deeper, larger, more meaningful impact in the lives of people that can make them like it might be making them laugh, making them appreciate making them cry, making them help in them do a task more quickly. So but we somehow, and I still we've been at this for a long time, I still run the leaders, very senior leaders, including people who are on the stage at the A&A and a can and at the WFA, who equate purpose with with social justice, yes, for social impact. Of course, that can come out of a purpose that can emanate from a purpose, but it is not the purpose. So Samir, what can we do to to clear this up because it is still a confused concept? No, it is. And you're absolutely right. Like, you know, I run short of the fingers on both my hands. If I tell you the number of senior leaders who still think that that's what purpose is, and the fact that it can be imposed on top of a brand. And you know, you I love that you said that purpose is also about making people laugh. And you know, I want to illustrate through the example of acts, which is about a wit and humor. And it's about making a guy look a young guy look and feel attractive. And to me, that's its little purpose. And who is to say that that purpose is not as noble as, you know, saving children's lives that that life poi does. I think, I think they're almost the same because, you know, giving someone confidence every day in that little way. And I think it's when you try and impose that sort of big pea purpose that you talked about artificially, which, you know, for a brief time, we tried to do an axe. And we said, it's about toxic masculinity and fighting toxic masculinity and fighting male bullying. And they were all very worthy causes. But you know, the consumer was wondering, Hey, what does that got to do with the iconic black can and the fragrance I use? And I think returning that brand back to that sort of trifecta of fragrance, humor, and attraction has resulted in great things that people still ask me. Hey, but okay, so you're not doing purpose on acts and my question is no, we are now doing the true purpose of acts, which is attraction. And that for me is good enough. I don't want to ladder it higher. Like, I can't tell you the number of marketing blunders that I have seen when people in the name of sophisticated marketing keep laddening things higher. Like one of the biggest things I did on life poi when I came was to because life poi had suddenly become a brand which was not just about sort of kids illness, but about healthy kids and letting them play outside. And those are all very worthy things. And those ads were loved by consumers, but no one got in bought life poi is the result, because no one got germ protection. Because the fact is that healthy kids is a concept that literally hundreds of thousands of brands and entities say, but preventing illness is a concept that almost no one talks about. And that's what we started talking about in life poi that something as humble and mundane as a soap could give you a chance of your child falling a little less often. We'll never eradicate the stomach ache in a small village in India. But if you give the mother and the father a chance that those small illnesses that kind of make pay parents go through sleepless nights, we've all been parents. If you can give them a little chance that they'll be a bit lesser. I mean, that just increases the importance of something as mundane as a soap in their lives. So yeah. And it's the truth of that brand, right? It's the truth is what the brand does. Exactly. So I always tell people that, yeah, I've been very successful in my career in my marketing career by lathering down. I love it. Did you know that nearly a quarter of workers say they are likely to quit their job in the next 12 months? And less than half would recommend their organization as a place to work. Well, if you listened to this podcast, you shouldn't be too surprised by all this. I recently interviewed for the show Upwork CMO of Melissa Waters, and she talked about the need to define a new reality at work. We'll hear some help for you in trying to make progress with all of this. Deloitte Digital's new study of workforce experience has discovered some potential solutions. They surveyed 4000 plus US-based workers and determined the nine factors that can have the most impact on a person's workforce experience. And by elevating the workforce experience for employees, we can help elevate the customer experience. Workers who were surveyed, who have had an excellent employee experience, were found to be three times more likely to say their organization is customer focused and one and a half time more likely to enjoy working directly with their organization's customers and clients. A potential and powerful win-win. For more, get the report today at www.deloittedigital.com slash us slash wxd report. As a marketer, our job is to be creative. But what does that mean? I love George Lois's definition of creativity. George is of course a famous art director and he said creativity can solve almost any problem. The creative act, the defeat of habit by originality, overcomes everything. I love it. The way I think about creativity, I love George's definition, but I think of it as fresh and unexpected ways to solve a problem or to discover new opportunities and new approaches. In the world of business, however, creativity can be a scary word, but it doesn't have to be. In the 2023 global marketing trends report, Deloitte surveyed more than 1000 top executives from today's top brands to understand how they plan to meet their customers needs this year. Turns out some of these high growth brands are reimagining creativity in their organizations. At a time when we're seeing a shift from creative skills to analytical skills in marketing, these brands are often doing the opposite and some CMOs are discovering creativity can be their superpower. Are you looking to make a meaningful impact in your organization in the year ahead? Check out Deloitte's 2023 global marketing trends report today at Deloitte.com slash global marketing trends. Many leaders will tell you you want to retain the best talent. We hear that over and over again on the show. But Deloitte Digital's research suggests that a positive overall experience with an organization alone is generally not sufficient to retain workers. In fact, 25% of surveyed workers reveal they plan to leave their current organization within the year. So what can an employer do? In my experience, I have found that it always comes down to relationships. In fact, when I was at PNG, we found a strong correlation between an employee's relationship with their first boss and their ultimate career advancement. Deloitte Digital's research also found this to be true. A positive relationship with the manager is a critical factor in employee engagement. Deloitte Digital's tool, the workforce experience north star, can help you build stronger manager-employer relationships. It measures a combination of employee experience factors, satisfaction, and retention. If you're looking to drive loyalty and retention at your organization, and I'm sure you are, check out Deloitte Digital's new report at www.deloittedigital.com slash us slash wxd report. Let's stay on purpose for a bit. You know, when we began the journey at PNG, which was largely inspired by Pampers way back in the mid 90s, and it's just gotten better and better ever since PNG's done a good bit of latering down as well to use your phrase, it deeply affected how we taught brand management and our philosophy of brands in the company. And we're both, you're at a company that believes in training development. I came from a company that believes in training and development. So we take how we pass along our knowledge to different generations very seriously. How has this focus on purpose with a small P? How has it affected how you train and develop your people in how to build brands? I think at the essence, what it does is it strips marketing of BS because it makes you focus on the absolute core essence of what you do, you know, which in some ways not to kind of ascribe to our industry a nobler disposition than we are deserving of, but in some ways, great marketing is about sort of focusing on the ultimate truth in a manner that is still commercial. And I think that sort of gets you to focus on what matters. So if I was to divide it into three things or what we focus on on the training, which is what is the functional truth? Because I think many times or many brands, you know, we ignore that to apparel. What does it mean to be superior? To all other solutions when you are satisfying her need? What does it mean in terms of design? You know, the click of the cap, the wrinkle of the tube, that obsession with quality. And it's not how prestige or luxury brands talk about it because you don't have an unlimited amount of money. But it still is an obsession. I think the focus on the emotional truth, I feel in the talk of purpose, somehow the word emotion has gone missing. And that for me is still, you know, it's about the life insight. You know, when I am very proud of the work that we've done on brands like Dove Deodorants and sort of relating sort of shaving of the underarms to the role the brand plays, but also in the kind of freedom and confidence that you feel is a result. And it's when you have these two, the purpose is already inbuilt in it. And I think that's what like we have tried to train our marketeers in, that you don't have to invent a layer purpose is inherent in the origins of the brand. And the third component, I would say, Jim, I don't know what your experience has been, that because we work with the cadence of life as it is, which is live daily. And our brands have to perform every day, day after day for decades. That's how you earn this trust. You cannot do it if you are constantly sort of imprisoned by process or kind of you work in an unpleasant environment. I always say happy marketeers make the best marketeers. And if that joy is missing, because people talk a lot of joy about saying joy to the consumer, but teams that don't have that joy and learn to associate with each other in a way that creates joy. Because finally, we are creating stuff, whether it's a business, a P&L or a brand in FMCG, we are creating stuff every day. And that process of creation must be about joy. So for me, those three things are what we try to align our, you know, because everything, creativity, all the sort of modules of training, etc, sort of come out of those three. Samira, I love that. And obviously, very similar in approach to Proctor. I love your last point. In fact, just to put up an exclamation point on that when many years ago our consumer insights group of PNG did some very progressive research. And they found that consumers could basically, they could tell when a team, when a brand is inspired and happy and productive by what the brand was sending forth. And it's packaging, it's in store placement, it's communication, it's product. And that was really profound for us to say, you know, if we don't have really engaged and happy teams, it's going to show up in the business. You cannot divorce them. People see that even in consumer products, of course, in a service business, you see it immediately. But so it was very, very profound insight for us in a change a lot of how we thought about our teams, how we work our purpose, how we recruit, how we onboard everything. And how we, I think, I'd love to hear from you actually, that, because I think like you said, that joy of innovation reflects in the innovation. And like, I don't know what your experiences were and how you built that, because that's something, especially in the new org that I'm very, very keen to preserve and sort of recreate. Because we now work a bit more remote. People don't come into office as much. And this job of ours is about co-creation. It's about really kind of living the smells and the touch and just the camera adery, the back and forth. That's very important. And I think we have to be in person to do that. And if you look at Netflix, you look at Disney, look at a lot of the highly respected agencies, they are coming together more frequently now for co-creation. I think there's a lot of work we can do remote. We're in a hybrid world. But when you're doing something, where you're creating something new, solving problems in a fresh way, the collaboration, the building on each other, the trust that has to be in person. That's my point of view. Hey, we're talking a lot about corporate purpose here. And I'd like to talk about personal purpose for a few moments, because as I was doing my homework for this, I came across yours and I'm going to read it for our listeners. Your purpose is to build blockbuster businesses that challenge the status quo and help make a difference to society while being part of teams that spread joy. End quote. Could you talk to us a bit about the origin story of that personal purpose? A question I get almost every day is, I'm struggling with the company's purpose and my personal purpose being in harmony. I hear that from a lot of leaders. And I'm of the belief that you can always find the harmony. And if you can't, if you really can't, you're probably going to move on. So I'd like you to talk a bit about the origin of that for you. How much you talk about it, how open you are about it, and the role it's played and how you lead your teams. That's a good question. I think for me, I wrote that statement, I think sometime in 2012, when had one of these first purpose workshops, and I haven't changed a comma since then. Even today, I would state it exactly in the same way. I think the origin story is that, like for most of us, it comes out of our childhood. I had a very happy childhood, but I also had a big trauma. My father passed away, was very attached to when I was 13. My mother brought me up and she's probably the most inspiring person in my life. But I think through that, that aspiration to do something and to do it for my mom and prove myself, that was that, I think was the origin of saying, I want to do things that make a difference, and that are big and counted because sometimes we put a lot of effort and then it just goes away. And then that's fine. Sometimes that happens in life. So my purpose was to work on businesses, work on things, work on brands that made a positive difference in society. But in the process of doing that, you had joy because to me, the journey was as important as the destination. And that's why actually I've been with Unilever for 25 years. This is an organization more than any other that I've heard of where you have relationships with people that go beyond work. And therefore, that is very important to me. And I think I use the word blockbusters very often because frankly, in our line of work, I feel, if you don't do something big, you might as well not do it because I think it's the small middling stuff that is very, very counterproductive, that sucks energy. But a lot of people put in effort, but finally it makes no difference. So I think I'm always a believer that even if you're working on a small brand, try and do big things on it. And I also use the word blockbusters because I'm a huge movie fan, both Hollywood and Bollywood. So I wrote it in the way that it was most nearest to what I thought. But yeah, for me, I think doing big stuff that makes a difference and having joy while doing it, those are the three things in that purpose. We'll talk about movies later, but I want to stay on the personal purpose for a moment. How do you keep yourself true to it day in and day out in the pressures of daily work and the rhythms of business? Do you have any advice, any rituals, any practices to be sure that you always wake up fresh and alive and ready to activate that purpose in new and interesting ways? And the last person to give advice on a healthy wholesome lifestyle. So I won't even try. But I would start the reverse way in on my purpose to give one piece of advice, which is mentioned in my WhatsApp status on my phone, which says happiness every day. And I feel in my life, it might not work for everyone. But in my life, things are worked by not always trying to plot your future and trying to obsess about where you're going. I'm a huge believer in being happy every day, in getting up happy and sleeping happy. And I literally mean that because I think like everyone, I can feel it in my bones when I'm sleeping and there has been something in the day, which is kind of disturb me. And I don't like those days. So I try and minimize those days. And I think if I find that if you go about life with that attitude, but then do your work and your family with passion and love, good things happen to you. Samir, when are you happiest at work? What are the characteristics or the situations when you are happiest and also when you're not working? I think when I'm not working, it's a bit of a cliche to say that, but I'm happiest with my kids. They're 16 and 11. Increasingly, they are not the happiest when they're spending time with their because they don't have to do it. It gets better, by the way, when they get older. I can't wait for that. Though the 11 year old, I can still bully a bit more. And I have to say with my wife, in case she ever hears this. I hope she does. Yeah, I hope she does. And I think it's a bit similar. I'm happiest when I'm working with my teams, when I'm having meetings that are more unstructured. Because I think we have so many time bound, strictly agenda, don't meetings, and Amazon has taught us a way to do it. And the pre reads, and that's most of our days. So what I try and do is that at two and average of about three hours a day, I don't have meetings. I spend time with myself or I spend time with people having a coffee. Like when I go to office, which is almost three to four days a week now, I spend almost half my time with people, with my teams, just talking, shooting the breeze, talking brands, we're still talking business and brands. But it's in an atmosphere which is not always a sort of agenda. But of course, you need those structured meetings, etc. But I get a lot of my energy from sort of being with people and talking to people and using that process to co-create, to get new ideas and to move forward. I feel like think best in that scenario. Well, Samir, as we are recording this, and the audience doesn't know this, but you're at an R&D center in the US, and your normal home is in Singapore. So you've just finished a day of being with people and talking about ideas and so on. So what was it about how you spent your day at the R&D? And by the way, why is the CMO of the R&D center? I should have you talk about that first. And what made you happy about this visit? So this is a place that I love coming to. It's an R&D center in Unilever for many of our personal care businesses. And I'm the CMO for personal care, and I'm sort of in charge of all the innovation that happens on all our brands. So this is the absolute right place to come to. And what I love about product, and which is what our R&D colleagues do, is that like in B&G, I'm sure, product and marketing are fully, fully integrated. More than any other two functions. I used to come here almost every year, once a year. And this time I came here after four years because of COVID. And the kind of scientists we have and the depth that they have, Jim, again, you would have seen this, right? Some of our scientists and people in our creative directors and our agencies have worked on our brands for far more than any market here has. So for me, that engenders so much respect because they know the ins and outs of the brands, what has worked, what has not worked. And then seeing technology move forward and sort of find a new way to satisfy consumers' needs and to delight people. And to see, like today, it was amazing how much of it was about ooze and ooze. Like, there was a new clinical result, which was better than one of our competitors. There was a new piece of packaging that we couldn't believe had come through. So it was really that. And then, of course, it's also a lot about challenging and seeing how can we satisfy some of the needs better, where we are kind of trailing or not doing as well. So it's a very, very dynamic day and it kind of sets the agenda for the next year. You've been the global CMO for personal care for about 10 months, I believe, after working in the category and multiple roles over your 25-year career. This is kind of a strength, maybe and a challenge, right? To be elevated to this role in a category you've been so much a part of for many years. How did you come into this role and how to just set your agenda? I just find it very interesting. Very few people are promoted to CMO in a category they've been in for as long as you have been in. Yes. And what it has done is that for me, it is the perfect mix of continuity because I was leading one of the categories, not all the three. So I was leading skin cleansing, which is the biggest one, which has brands like Dove, Lux, Life Boy, Pairs, etc. But what got added was deodorants and a bit earlier than that oral care. So we have a small but mighty oral care business in Asia, which is made up of brands like Close Up and Pepsudent and in France in Italy. So that business got added, but the amazingly successful and strong deodorants business got added. So it's like half of those businesses are new. Half I had done for some time, in fact, for the last three or four years, but they've all come together in a sort of new construct of this compass organization, which like I told you earlier is really seems to engender a lot more faster and more effective decision making. And I think that coming together is quite heady. What I have done is that each of there are about six or seven billion dollar brands and some of them are two, three billion dollars each. The CEOs of those brands reported to me. So really, the excitement in my role is that I'm the last line of defense on those brand equities and I get to see the sort of innovation and advertising that happens. But those brand heads are empowered to work with the key countries to develop their. So one is on the brands. I think the second is the portfolio management, which is you're the world expert at it, but that is extremely exciting working with our key countries to see in this new personal care business where to put the emphasis and sort of what portfolio to have. And I think third is culture, which is I'm responsible for creating whether a marketer is working in a global team or a local team in the countries or in one of the brand teams. How do you create a culture where a culture of joy, a culture of creation, a culture of risk taking, of experimentation, of really embedding our brands into culture, which is really one of the things that we need to do much more effectively. But yeah, I think if I could describe one thing over all else, I love working, we call them core brands, but there might be other terms that other companies use. But we have about seven core brands and those are like sort of more than 90% of our business and frankly more than 100% of our growth. And working on them and sustaining them is sexy and exciting because I think when people look at it from outside, they find a lot of excitement with these sort of new startup brands and believe me, I've done those. I've launched 10 new brands over the last three or four years and I'm an angel investor into some of these brands. But I would any day give my left hand to work on a brand like Dove or Life Boy or Xona or Axe or Closer or Pipser into a Lux because the way you renew them and the way you create value and meaning for a consumer is challenging and exciting and the way you keep sort of new competitors at Bay and the way you do everything with embedding more purpose and sustainability into them. That for me is really the fun of the job. We had this challenge at PNG to the big brands at one time were not seen as the sexy jobs and we flipped that script and they became the sexy jobs but we also had to bring the same values of a startup to them. Experimentation, trial, smart risk taking, investing in the culture. And I think when you marry that with the scale and the reach and the impact of these brands, very special things can happen. They're unstoppable. And we've talked of our two companies but look at KitKat, look at Coca-Cola, look at Nike. So for me, it's exactly what you said. You bring that culture of experimentation, excitement, even the culture of joy and sort of creation of challenge of pushing yourself hard and you don't define your job is I have to maintain this brand. Hey, I've got a hundred year old equity. I have to maintain it because that is the start of the decline. You have to constantly recruit newly, you have to constantly recruit young people or Gen Z or whatever we call them because if that's not happening, this brand won't survive. So, Mayor, how have your KPIs changed in this role? I think a lot of the KPIs stay the same like we measure our brand equities through brand power and that hasn't changed. That's still the essence of how we define. But in this new role, global media reports into me and I think the opportunity to embed our brands into culture into places like TikTok into sort of more global events, that has changed because I think that we can do a much better job. And our personal care brands frankly are much, much bigger in the consumers' mind than they are in culture, which is a bit different from some other brands that have a higher profile in Khan or whatever. And I think that's something that I'd like to change. So, I think that's one big KPI that has changed. And I think frankly, our industry is being driven by premiumization. And while we have done a great job in the core, driving premiumization, harder, bigger, better, faster, those are two I can think of, which are much higher on the priority list. What's the best part so far of being the CMO of this vast personal care portfolio at Unilever? Many things. But first thing that comes to mind is the diversity of talent that I meet. Because I'm very lucky in having some of our biggest and leading markets as part of my team. But I also base my teams in London, in New York, in Mumbai, in Singapore, in Dubai, in in Bunesairs. And I think just the diversity of talent that I met and increasingly our marketers are sort of young people who are in the culture of the place. That has been the biggest learning experience for me. What's the most challenging part of this new expanded role? I think it's the travel. I mean, that really, really gets to me. But what I've seen in the post-COVID world, if you don't travel enough to the markets and get enough FaceTime, then that will impact your work. So it's become a necessary evil. But I think that time of a way for family and this time I have to spend even the weekend away, that really hurts, I have to say. I want to go back to your career path for a moment. By my count, you have had about 12 different roles in your 25-year career at Unilever. But it seems like the defining role has been your time on LifeBoy. You've already talked about that numerous times in our chat today. And I knew you would. I know you've told the story a million times, but I would like you to reflect right now how this experience has shaped your view of brand building and your philosophy of brand building and your view of team building and your philosophy of team building. When I came into LifeBoy, the condition that I found and addressing that was, I think that really shaped how since then I look at jobs about the business you have to turn around or what you find. And I think this thing of the first 90 days of humble, respectful listening, which I so often find when new leaders come in, they come in with biases from their previous job. And they don't listen. They don't listen enough to diverse stakeholders. And I think I was able to do that well. And then of course that your best ideas come in the first 90 days and you have to just shut up long enough to make sure that you pick the right ones because there's so many. And I think on LifeBoy, again, it was returning to the small P, the essence of what the brand was about. And it's been taken away, like I said, into sort of these higher order children are healthy kind of stuff and have no fear of getting dirty. And every mother was saying, no, I do have a fear when my child goes out in place in the garbage. And I think what we were able to do on LifeBoy, which is the insight I talked about saying, how do you prevent children from falling ill a little less often in the role of so plays? And then take it into every touch point of the brand. Because I think that's again a trick that people miss. So we created something called the LifeBoy infection alert system, which was every moment of hygiene anxiety in a D&E country in places like India and Indonesia, Africa. LifeBoy, we made a communication and an innovation that was tailored to that. And that just, you know, if you remember the roti advertising at the Kummila, where we printed LifeBoy and the world's biggest fair that happens in millions of people before they were eating their chapati or roti with their hands, the roti had to do wash with LifeBoy, and then they went and wash their hands. So we did many, many campaigns like that, including the father walking on his hands, the Ghandappa campaign, which was called the Help a Child Reach 5 campaign, which by the way, the brief for that was like, I was almost angry because, you know, there were 2 million people, 2 million kids who die of diarrhea and pneumonia, under the age of 5, 2 million. And we'd been, you know, advocating about it, we'd been talking about it, hand washing, we went to the UN, no one listened to us. And the insight I gave to Lo, the brief to Balke, who used to head Lo was I said, look, if you keep telling the story of 2 million children, no one will listen. But if you tell the story of one child, people will listen. And I gave him a very shocking brief, which of course he turned upside down and that was the rest is history. But the shocking brief that I gave was I said, for the first time, I want to maybe show a child dying in a piece of advertising or a piece in a campaign, because I want to shock people out. And the way he came back with it after 5 days was that I won't show it, you know, there was a creative director called Sagar and another guy called Ahmed, they came back with an idea of it said, we will show a child living till 5. So it's a father walking on his hands till the temple and this journalist following him saying, why is he doing that? And then he says, I'm doing that because, you know, it's my first kid who has survived beyond 5. And it's just there we announced that LifeBoy has adopted a village called Theskora, which has the maximum incidence of diarrhea, pneumonia in the world. And then we adopted that village gym for the next three years. And we just did hand washing, there was no other intervention and not a single child died in the next three years. So those were some and that film was actually shown to Obama, like it just made us absolutely famous. I can't tell you the amount of funds we got from governments and NGOs to fund our hand washing program, because they had seen that film and they realized that we had a behavior, we ran the world's largest behavior change program. And I think we contacted more than a billion people to change their hand washing behaviors. But I think it was just this kind of returning it to its essence, putting it at every touch point and then being ruthlessly consistent. That's why I get very emotional talking about these four brands, because behind all the sort of seeming simplicity of it, there is a, you know, there is a story. It's a beautiful small pea purpose story. Could you speak? You don't have to share the specific numbers, but just give us an idea of the impact this has had on the business. This getting back to the simple truth of the brand and bringing it to life in so many creative, high impact ways. Tremendous. We've grown double digit keger over the last 12 years. We ended up becoming the world's largest antibacterial hygiene soap, a lot of gains in market share, etc. So in terms of business, it's been absolutely amazing. But we have also kind of upgraded the business. So it's not like we didn't do all the other stuff, because there was also a big movement happening to body wash and liquids from bars. And we were able to do that. I want to shift to the creative brief. And my first question has to be the most influential movie in your life. Where do I start? I could go on forever. So I have my top six or seven, which I can never choose. So let me quickly list that. So it's the godfather. It's some like it hot. It's dirty, Harry. Don't ask me why it's embedded deep into my childhood. Why I can't get over Clint Eastwood. It's an Indian movie called Shole. There is a Sataji Tre Bengali movie called Pather Panchali, which is the song of the little road. And if I was to pick one gym, it would be that if you ever get the chance and you have the patience to see a black and white movie made in the 50s, he was very influenced by these Italian near realist directors, you know, like Vittoria Daseka, etc. And I don't know if you've heard of the name Sataji Tre, but he's probably India's greatest film director, but he was not Bollywood. He was a Bengali film director. And I love art, movies, books, in which there is no plot in which nothing much happens because I love the sort of cadence of life. But it's very difficult to capture it in a movie, right? Because you're all looking for narrative. And this is about a boy and his sister, a small boy and his sister growing up in a poor Bengali village in the middle of famine. They don't have to eat. It's the most joyous movie you will ever see. Because it's just about them discovering life in this village. That for me is my favorite movie, but when people ask me to describe it, I'm like, nothing happens. These two children, they just, you know, they grow up. Not the best way to advertise the movie, but yeah. You got me interested. I'll watch it with my wife. So, what's the first brand you remember making an impact on you growing up? I would have to say Cadburys. Like again, that comes top of my mind. And paradoxically, and I'm not doing this deliberately, but paradoxically, because now when I analyze it in hindsight, it's about happiness. It's about joy. And it's not just Cadburys. It's Cadburys daily milk. I don't know if that thing is still available in the US or it's a more British Indian thing, but there is obviously the taste, the texture, the weight, melts in the mouth. And in those days in India, you had one chocolate bar and it was Cadburys and it was daily milk. And then of course, they did a thousand other variants. But what is amazing is that even my kids now, they're 11 and 16 and have the choice of a million brands and are cynical about most things. When I go to London, because you don't get it in Singapore, when I go to London or India, they will always say, my son especially, get me the Cadburys daily milk, the original one, because they don't like all the variants that they have done. Because I think that brand and that product has cracked that sweet spot of everyday joy. So what's your most admired P&G brand and why? We have Unilever brands in our cabinet, by the way. So I'm just being honest about that. My wife's a Dove user, by the way, even though many years of P&G and still lots of P&G stocks she loves Dove. I think I've gradually stopped using P&G brands in my life. That might be one. That's a fair answer. That might be one reason. But I don't know how that brand is doing now, but I always admired head and shoulders. Again, I think because of its fierce discipline, about how it kept itself relevant and topical and even in culture, in a market that was always moving away from Dandruff, so that I found very interesting. Most influential mentor in your career. Oh, there have been many right from a person called Vivek Rampal to Amit Chopra, who were my first to really help me mentor people like Fabian Garcia, Alan Jop. Alan and I worked with very closely. I think Dave Lewis, who was my boss for two or three years, who then went to Tesco, now is Chairman of Halleon, was one of those businessmen and marketers who had an amazing mix of values and marketing instinct and business acumen. I've never seen that, so therefore, he could relate to you at a very emotional, fundamental level and yet kind of talk brands and businesses. I think he, along with those other names, I mentioned influenced me most. I usually end with this question. Who's been the most inspirational person in your life? You answered this earlier as your mom. But I'd love you to give another chance to speak about that and their impact on you. My mom, for the reasons I mentioned that, after my father died, she didn't sacrifice. She was never a tragic figure. Actually, she was a PhD and she went on to become a professor, had a full life, but she really made sure that I left home. But if I was to pick, because I love giving this answer, if I was to pick someone not living, and I apologize that both the answers might sound very cliche, but I really believe in them. It would be Mahatma Gandhi, because I don't practice any of his teachings. I'm not at all disciplined, but I think what he did for India and the world, and showed that non-violence can defeat an empire. I think that is the biggest lesson that we have for the future. And if those ideals could even be practiced 10% like they were with Mandela, etc., the world would be an amazing place. Certainly, the world is not going in that direction, unfortunately. And the person I most admire living, and again, I'm sorry to give you a cliche answer is Obama, because I just felt his presidency and his post-presidency, because we know how important the post-presidency is, is really an example to everyone. All of us at whatever small level we operate, of grace under pressure, I'm a huge believer in sort of grace, which I think he displayed in every aspect of his life. That's a beautiful place to stop, Samir, this wonderful conversation. It just felt like we were having a cup of coffee together. Yes, I have to say you're a brilliant interviewer, conversationalist, and I feel humbled that you were so interested in my life. I have to say that that was an absolute pleasure to talk. And thank you for taking up the time. That was my conversation with Samir Singh. Three takeaways from this one for your business, brand and life. And the first one, purpose with a small P. This was a beautiful discussion about how to think about purpose on a business, how to bring it to life, and how to ensure it stays true to the truth of the product and the category. This was a masterclass in bringing purpose to life in a business. Second takeaway, the power of a strong personal purpose. Samir has an explicit purpose. He wrote it about 11 or 12 years ago. It guides his thinking. It guides his behavior. It guides how he spends his time. He's a big believer in happiness, happy teams, deliver successful and happy brands. And he's very disciplined in how he spends his time based on that personal purpose. And the last takeaway, listening and curiosity, we hear that a lot in this show. When I asked Samir about the most influential brand in his career, and that was Life Boy, and why it was so influential for him, the first thing he said was it all happened in the first 90 days. I went in, I was curious, I'd listened, and out of that listening came the strategy that has built Life Boy into the one of the most admired, purpose-driven brands in the world. That's it for this episode of the CMO podcast. If you found this helpful and entertaining, I would be so grateful if you could share our show with your friends. And I would be super happy if you subscribe so you can be updated as we publish new episodes. And if you really want to help, leave us a five-star rating and a positive review on Apple podcasts or wherever you listen. The CMO podcast is a gallery media group original production.