Unilever Looking for Customer Experience -IT Director, South Asia at Bengaluru, Karnataka, India Full Time

WORK LOCATION: BANGALORE

About Unilever

Be part of the world’s most successful, purpose-led business. Work with brands that are well-loved around the world, that improve the lives of our consumers and the communities around us. We promote innovation, big and small, to make our business win and grow; and we believe in business as a force for good. Unleash your curiosity, challenge ideas and disrupt processes; use your energy to make this happen. Our brilliant business leaders and colleagues provide mentorship and inspiration, so you can be at your best. Every day, nine out of ten Indian households use our products to feel good, look good and get more out of life – giving us a unique opportunity to build a brighter future.

Every individual here can bring their purpose to life through their work. Join us and you’ll be surrounded by inspiring leaders and supportive peers. Among them, you’ll channel your purpose, bring fresh ideas to the table, and simply be you. As you work to make a real impact on the business and the world, we’ll work to help you become a better you.

About Uniops

Unilever Operations (UniOps) is the global technology and operations engine of Unilever offering business services, technology, and enterprise solutions. UniOps serves over 190 locations and through a network of specialized service lines and partners delivers insights and innovations, user experiences and end-to-end seamless delivery making Unilever Purpose Led and Future Fit.

Business Context And Main Purpose Of The Job

South Asia is undergoing a rapid transformation underpinned by digitization. This rapid digitization has transformed the market dynamics across sectors and has led to fragmentation of customer choice, new channel shifts and the creation of service ecosystems.

The eB2B market in India is expected to cross US$ 60 billion in 2025; with credit increasingly being made available to businesses, online transactions in the B2B market are expected to grow. New age B2B retail businesses are trying to resolve traditional retail value chain challenges through technology led innovation and are acting as catalysts to accelerate this growth. With the entry of big players like Amazon, Jio, Tata, this space has never seen the level of change and digital adoption as we are seeing today. There is 10+ known platforms with a marketplace model in eB2B in India and there are many small players running locally. Everyone one of them has FMCG products in offering.

Shikhar, an innovative HUL – eB2B platform, allows retailers to take the digital leap through convenience of anytime ordering, delivery tracking & access to working capital. During the pandemic it ensured orders were received when the salesman couldn’t reach the outlets during lockdowns. Shikhar was started as a project in 2018, as a good to have for the retailer, but with the pandemic it soon became a must have and a key pillar for us to do business. Shikhar has now helped 1Mn + retailers to take the digital leap in world of mobile phones with low-cost data.

With the growing size & importance of Shikhar, which is now playing an important role with strategic advantage, the current team will need to be enhanced with specific skillsets. So far, we have been running the platform with third party resources. From HUL business perspective, Shikhar is bringing the competitive advantage in the market and this model is growing very fast. It is therefore very important to create an insourced core tech team who will manage the platform end to end and also retain the expertise of running a successful eB2B program in the market.

Shikhar is further enabled by strong foundational technologies that have been built over the last decade – Ikea, the Distributor Management System, IQ the recommendation engine for assortment, COMM the Retailer Master Management solution, Atlan our data democratisation platform, and iCube our Salesforce application.

The Customer IT ecosystem in India large & complex due to the size and the complexity of business operations. India CDIT team has always been a pioneer in bringing the best-in-class technologies to help business grow.

Main Accountabilities

• Be the key partner for senior leadership.
• Works closely with the CD Center of Excellence to define and execute the strategy on CD technology across Demand generation, Demand capture and Demand Fulfilment
• Constantly aware of industry trends and guide the sales organization appropriately.
• Builds resources, expertise, and talent networks to ensure effective delivery in market.
• Works closely with global RTM tech stack to build a future fit version for all DT markets.
• Support the set-up of Digital Selling Hub in HUL
• Accountable for the insourcing agenda in CD IT – with 35 critical roles planned to be insourced in 2024.
• Support the digital agenda for Nutrition, Ice Cream and upscale the tech capabilities for Modern Trade
• Creates awareness of digital capabilities and seeks opportunities for benefit maximization (usability, exploitation).
• Driving business adoption and continuous improvement of Customer IT platforms
• Run platform teams to identify and experiment market suitable capabilities.
• Provides inputs to global design teams to tailor solutions for market modalities.
• Ensure the Customer IT platforms and ecosystem is fit for purpose for markets – drive OneTech agenda by partnering with global platform teams.
• Land value in P&L by embedding the right data/AI/ML systems into key CD decisions.
• Maintains technical awareness at a level where alternatives can be analysed, modelled and classified according to technical feasibility and performance.
• Utilizes business experience and skills to assess and advise on technical alternatives, marrying up technical capabilities with customer expectations and business objectives.
• Applies available standards, methods and tools in an intelligent and effective way, and produces a consistently high standard of documentation of both a technical and a descriptive nature – this includes playbooks that enable UIM & CD teams to land the programs effectively.

Direct Reports: 30+

Key Interfaces

• Senior CD Leadership Market & Global
• Global RTM Platform team
• Market Geography IT and Data & Analytics

At HUL, we believe that every individual irrespective of their race, colour, religion, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, age, nationality, caste, disability or marital status can bring their purpose to life. So apply to us, to unleash your curiosity, challenge ideas and disrupt processes; use your energy to make the world a better place. As you work to make a real impact on the business and the world, we’ll work to help you become a better you!