Management People & Orgs (MPO) Assessment Component 2: Question 1  Plan  (Formative) S2, 2025

Assessment Component 2: Question 1  Plan  (Formative)

Section 1 (Introductory Overview)

1)Name of selected case study organisation?

The case study organization selected for the purpose of Unilever.

2)Please select one perspective you will focus on from the two listed below: Global organisation (specify which country you will be focusing on) or  National organisations (specify which region you will be focusing on)
The global perspective of the specific organisation has been selected where the country chosen is the UK. 

3)Why did you select this case study organisation ?
Unilever has been selected as a case study organisation as Unilever employees a global workforce of 127000 people also it is estimated that 3.4 billion people who are using Unilever products every day. Unilever seems to have grown globally, and the brand is present in almost 98% of the homes (unilever.co.uk, 2025). The company supports growth and employment across different region in the UK. Therefore, being the most successful global business Unilever has been selected for the study. 

4)What is your rationale and academic justification for selecting this case study organisation?
According to Hoffman and Tadelis (2021), a sound management practice helps the firm to improve their performance level by improving their productivity. 

The management team needs to ensure that the employees must have non cognitive skills which are like social skill in order to achieve a desired goal. The success of Unilever across globe is due to sound management system which has helped to manage people effectively. Therefore, the specific company has been chosen in order to proceed the work. 

5)Identifying  and outline a minimum of 3 bullet points or a maximum of 5 bullet points,  addressing the emergent challenges your case study organisation is facing within the last five years (2019 onwards). These emergent challenges should fall within the context of managing people at work (focusing on leadership and HRM issues)? Each emergent challenge should be referenced. 
There are certain challenges which has been faced by Unilever in the past few years have been discussed below:

• The company had to cut nearly about 1500 jobs globally due to its ineffective management and organisational structure. The job cut will reduce the senior management role and junior management role making easier for the company to manage small number of employees efficiently (bbc.com, 2022). 
• The management team of Unilever further struggles to understand the changing demand of the customers and encourage them to take sustainability more seriously. Unilever with its leadership and management skill needs to understand its customer and influence them to purchase refillable pouches for products to enhance sustainability (theguardian.com, 2022).
• The other challenges faced by Unilever due to lack of effective management of people is the lack of innovation capabilities by the employees in order to remain competitive in the market. The lack of effective management of people has also impacted Unilever’s investment choices in its portfolio management (unilever.com, 2023). 

6)From the above (3 to 5) emergent challenges,  select one of the most significant challenge,  you will  focus on for assessment component 1 & 2?

The most specific challenge that will be considered is the leadership executive change. Unilever seems to face challenges due to its ineffective leadership approach. The company was unable to determine the customer preferences and to make innovation to remain competitive in the global market (unilever.com, 2023).

Section 2 (Q1a-Q1e) 600-words

1)Q1a - Critically analyse the one emergent challenge faced by your chosen case study organisation? Why did you select this specific challenge? All points need to be referenced in this section (120 words).

As stated by Hu and Zeng (2024) the business wants to operate successfully often face challenges in respect to resource constraint, strategic transformation and investments. Similarly, it can be understood through the study that Unilever faced challenge in respect to understand the customer behaviour. The lack of  innovative approach by the business has also impacted the business decision making (Hu and Zeng, 2024). 
The reason behind considering the specific challenge on leadership is because the company had come across with the major key shifts that would allow the business to change.

• Under an effective leadership the business could focus more on allocating resources towards the sustainability priorities (unilever.com, 2024).
• The leaders will support the team to drive towards more long term ambitions (unilever.com, 2024).
• The leaders will allow to be more systemic in their advocacy and lead the business towards progress (unilever.com, 2024). 

2)Q1b - Which theory will you use to help explain the emergent challenge? All points need to be referenced in this section (120 words).

It is necessary for leaders at Unilever to undertake significant leadership style which would allow them to operate effectively. The most significantly leadership style that can be undertaken by the leaders is the transformational leadership style. As stated by Hai et al. (2021), transformational leadership style which is also known as holistic leadership style which helps to encourage followers in order to reach to their potential goal. Unilever while undertaking transformational leadership style will ensure that the leaders provide vision and a sense of mission which would develop employees trust and respect for the business. The leaders also need to communicate the plan effectively which would help them to establish their desired goal. Therefore, this specific leadership style will work effectively for Unilever to remain innovative and competitive in the UK market. 

3)Q1c - How  does this challenge impact the organisational environment (such as organisational culture and organisational performance)? All points need to be referenced in this section (120 words).

The challenge further impacts the organisational environment as discussed below:
Organisational culture: Organisation culture encompasses with values, norms that influences the employees or think and behave. Organisational culture impacts an improving the leadership style and job satisfaction (Tran, 2021). Ineffective leadership style in Unilever will lack appropriate vision also the employees would not be encouraged to adapt to change thus impact organisational culture. 
organisational performance: As stated by Douglas et al. (2022), it can be understood that developing leadership capability will help the business to improve organisational performance and achieve effectiveness. The issue in leadership will also impact Unilever’s performance as it would hinder employee motivation, impact decision in Unilever which would ultimately impact the performance of the business.  

4)Q1d - Which culture theory will this emergent challenge be linked to and why? All points need to be referenced in this section(120 words).

According to Irfan et al. (2024), organisational culture has become the most significant part of business that helps to determine business success. Edgar Schein’s three level model offers the business a significant framework that would allow the business to understand true organisational culture. The three level contains artifacts, espoused value and basic underlying assumptions. The artefacts would reflect the observable aspects of the culture including office design, communication style and others. Espoused value ensures business mission statement and ethical guidelines lastly basic underlying assumption would allow to focus on beliefs, authority and nature of work. Thus, following this culture theory Unilever can focus on the specify aspects to improve the organisational culture. The leaders will have sufficient idea to improve the business culture by considering these three levels.  

5)Q1e - Which organisational performance and effectiveness theory will this emergent challenge be linked to and why? All points need to be referenced in this section (120 words).

It is necessary for Unilever to improve organisational performance and effectiveness by overcoming the challenges of leadership. McKinsey’s 7s Model can be considered by Unilever where the leaders can focus on different aspects such as structure, strategy, system, skill, style, staff and shared value would allow Univer to focus on these aspects that would help the leaders to understand the need for change. According to Suwanda et al. (2022) the model uses internal variable in order to measure the organisational performance and strategy. Therefore, to measure the organisational performance and effectiveness Unilever can make use of this model that would allow the company to understand the areas that would require changes for the leaders to achieve the business goal.