Financial Times: PepsiCo Sustainability Initiative Helps Create and Keep Customers

“The purpose of business is to create and keep a customer,” Peter Drucker, the legendary management guru, once said. No matter how de-layered, outsourced, virtualised or re-imagined businesses become, the company of the future will still need to remain focused on this simple fact.

In their recent book, Management Reset – Organizing For Sustainable Effectiveness, Ed Lawler, Chris Worley and David Creelman argue that the goal for the company of the future, is to become a “sustainable management organisation”. SMOs are different. They set themselves up to be more flexible and fleet of foot than their competitors. They reject a stolid strategy development process in favour of something that is more reactive and imaginative, in part by drawing on the insights and experiences of employees at all levels in the business. Work is organised differently too: to a great extent it is controlled by employees and customers rather than tiers of management. And talented employees lie at the heart of the SMO: not being promised jobs for life, but a deal which makes sense to both sides.   Which SMOs do the authors like the look of? PepsiCo, the drinks and snacks group, has taken on board sustainability as an idea that should inform management decisions and product development.   To continue reading this article, click here.       About PepsiCo 
PepsiCo offers the world's largest portfolio of billion-dollar food and beverage brands, including 19 different product lines that generate more than $1 billion in annual retail sales each. Our main businesses -- Quaker, Tropicana, Gatorade, Frito-Lay, and Pepsi Cola -- also make hundreds of other enjoyable foods and beverages that are respected household names throughout the world. With net revenues of approximately $60 billion, PepsiCo's people are united by our unique commitment to sustainable growth by investing in a healthier future for people and our planet, which we believe also means a more successful future for PepsiCo. We call this commitment Performance with Purpose: PepsiCo's promise to provide a wide range of foods and beverages for local tastes; to find innovative ways to minimize our impact on the environment, including by conserving energy and water usage, and reducing packaging volume; to provide a great workplace for our associates; and to respect, support, and invest in the local communities where we operate. For more information, please visit www.pepsico.com.   PEPSI17933