PEPSICO DOESN'T NEED ANOTHER HEADCOUNT REDUCTION. IT NEEDS LEADERS WHO KNOW HOW TO WIN.
With the reported loss of the KFC fountain beverage business and the continuing struggles in Frito-Lay sales, PepsiCo finds itself in an alarming position.
But what concerns me most is not the losses themselves. It is the apparent loss of the leadership mentality that once made PepsiCo one of the greatest competitive organizations in America.
During my 42 years with PepsiCo, I witnessed something extraordinary: our ability to bounce back from almost any setback.
We were taught that losing was never the end of the story. When we lost, we got back up, studied the competition, developed a new strategy, and prepared for our next victory.
We didn't build our reputation by counting our losses. We built it by winning back what we lost.
Unfortunately, I believe that winning mentality has been fading over the last several years, particularly since Indra Nooyi's departure.
I have never witnessed such a concerning shortage of proven leadership talent at the highest levels of PepsiCo.
Let me be clear. I am not talking about the frontline employees. PepsiCo still has extraordinary people working in its plants, warehouses, delivery trucks, sales territories, and distribution centers.
The talent problem is not at the bottom of the organization. It is at the top.
Yet when performance declines, what is the familiar corporate response? Another restructuring. Another headcount reduction. Another round of cost-cutting.
You cannot continue reducing the workforce and expect that alone to rebuild market share.
You cannot cut your way back to greatness.
And while PepsiCo is busy counting desks, Coca-Cola is busy counting the accounts it just took from us. Nobody in Atlanta is holding a town hall about "efficiencies." They are in the stores.
And you certainly cannot rebuild a winning organization by promoting people who know how to explain a loss but have never demonstrated that they know how to deliver a win.
Accounts like KFC are not lost in a budget review. They are lost years earlier, when the people who actually knew the customer were "streamlined" out of the building and replaced with a dashboard.
PepsiCo needs leaders who understand competition, customers, sales, operations, and the marketplace.
Leaders who know how to take market share, not simply report how much was lost.
We need executives who inspire people to fight for the business rather than manage its decline.
The PepsiCo I knew didn't surrender market share without a fight. We didn't wait for the next financial report to tell us we were losing. We went into the marketplace and did something about it.
My message to the PepsiCo Board of Directors is simple:
Stop looking at the workforce as the primary problem. Start examining the leadership decisions being made at the top.
Stop promoting people simply because they can manage numbers. Start promoting people who have demonstrated that they can build businesses, develop people, win customers, and defeat competitors.
PepsiCo doesn't need another generation of executives who are experts at managing decline.
It needs a new generation of leaders who know how to win.
I still believe PepsiCo can come back. I witnessed that fighting spirit for over 40 years!