Newsmaker: Harish Manwani

Crisis manager

In the early 1990s, when Le Sancy, a soap brand from the Hindustan Lever stable, was not going anywhere, Harish Manwani, then a not-so-senior executive of the Indian FMCG major, argued for a new advertising campaign with a complete Indian touch.

He wanted to create something different and was ready to give complete freedom to the advertising agency hired to work on the campaign.

Ranjan Kapur, country head of WPP, then working with Ogilvy & Mather in Singapore, worked on the campaign. With the full backing of Manwani, the campaign featured a bubbly boy using the soap in a shower and enjoying himself thoroughly. The ad eventually got the Unilever chairman's award that year.

In HLL, 51-year old Manwani is known for rolling up his sleeves in crisis situations. Colleagues say he is street-smart, "thinks outside the box and loves to take calculated risks".

It was no surprise that he was instrumental in halting the growth of arch rival P&G's juggernaut and in improving parent Unilever's market share in Latin America. The reward has come fast as he has now been named the new head of Unilever's Asia and Africa operations.

His colleagues find him extremely aggressive and innovative. For instance, he redefined TPM, which management books will tell you is total productivity maintenance. But in Manwani's dictionary, TPM meant two per month as he insisted that the company should launch two new products or brands every month.

Born in 1954, Manwani has risen from a management trainee to the top tier of the world's largest consumer goods company. O&M's Kapur, who has known Manwani over the years, finds him transparent, straight forward and extremely aggressive. He has an uncanny knack of making quick and clear decisions.

Graduating with an honours degree in statistics from Bombay University, Manwani completed his MBA in 1976. After working on several sales and marketing assignments, including a two-year secondment with Unilever Export in the UK, he was named the divisional vice-president of marketing for detergents, in 1994.

He was inducted on the HLL board in 1995 as a director responsible for the personal products business. He was also chairman of the wholly owned subsidiary, Lakme Lever and director of the joint venture, Kimberly Clark Lever.

In addition, he held regional responsibility as the category leader for personal products for the then Central Asia and Middle East (CAME) business group.

Recalls Kapur, "In those years when Kimberly Clark was still trying to find its feet in India, P&G was very aggressive in the sanitary napkins business. But Manwani never gave in, as he believed that no other product or competition could outdo HLL."

In 2000, he moved to the UK as senior vice-president for the hair care and oral care categories, and in early 2001 Manwani was appointed president of home and personal care (HPC) business in the Latin American business group. He also served as chairman of Unilever's Latin America Advisory Council.

When he is not burning the midnight oil at work, Manwani loves to spend time with his two teenage daughters. A fitness freak, his other passion is squash, golf and occasionally bridge.