ORGANIZATIONAL CHANGE EXPERT
EXECUTIVE COACH | ADJUNCT PROFESSOR
ORGANIZATIONAL
CHANGE CONSULTING
PepsiCo (NASDAQ: PEP) & University of Chicago Booth School of Business
During a 4-year period, Rita managed an emerging leaders development program for high-potential talent across all business sectors of PepsiCo in partnership with both PepsiCo University and the Chicago Booth School of Business.
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Built program architecture for a 9-month experiential learning program aimed at creating the PepsiCo 21st Century Finance Leader.
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Continuously gathered participant feedback (qualitative and quantitative) to make ongoing improvements.
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Created executive socialization decks for PepsiCo CFO and other global finance and senior executives. Wrote all participant communications and managed key stakeholder groups.
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Conducted a rigorous 3-year program analysis (with quantitative and qualitative data that included all participants, managers, and the program executive sponsor to determine return on investment for the global finance organization.
“I wanted to make sure that we gave our top talent leadership development, because leadership is something that you can learn, and something that you can practice and get better at over time.”
— Hugh Johnston, CFO and Executive Vice Chairman of PepsiCo Inc. and himself a graduate of Booth's full-time MBA program.
Bruker Corporation (NASDAQ: BRKR):
Over the course of 18-months, Rita worked side by side with senior HR leaders to drive the global HR transformation of this second generation–led German biotech company. Led the change management/communications effort for the full-suite SuccessFactors implementation to 6,000 employees located within 40 countries around the world. Communications were completed in the following languages: English, Spanish, Portuguese, Chinese, Japanese, German, and French.
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Coached senior HR leaders through critical conversations with key stakeholders, including the executive team and the board.
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Drafted all change management strategy and training materials, as well as coached HR leaders through the multi-country organizational cascade process.
PepsiCo (NASDAQ: PEP)
In 2019 Rita served as the coach for the Away From Home Global Ambassador Pilot Program within the Global Foodservice business ($6 billion in revenues). The program had several objectives:
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Provide international participants with first-hand exposure to the broader segment perspective from the highly profitable US business through a multi-week shadow experience, and exposure to product/brand parallel new business reviews, market visits, and annual operating plan activities.
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Create an opportunity for participants to collaborate with peers to solve a business-specific problem, utilizing new perspectives gained from immersion exposure with subject matter experts and peer learning.
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Enable participants to build self-awareness and increase their ability to effectively lead within the PepsiCo leadership framework based on PepsiCo new CEO vision.
The Sherwin-Williams Company (NYSE: SHW):
Completed 2-years of research at the Sherwin-Williams Company, a 152-year-old American-based global company, following its acquisition of Valspar, which closed on June 1, 2017. Research explored the relationship between organizational history, identity, and culture. Three conclusions were drawn from this study:
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During organization change, organizational identity is challenged, and at this pivot point, organizational history can be utilized to either sustain organizational identity or open the organization’s identity to changes.
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In navigating critical events such as mergers and acquisitions or major leadership transitions, organizational leaders can be more successful in the long term if they have a deep understanding of the dynamics that exist between organizational history and organizational identity.
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All different types of organizational history, including stories (i.e., critical events), founders, traditional cultural practices, and memory forms, have an important role in organizational identity dynamics.
“We live in the days of large affairs, and while principles never change, methods do, and great opportunities open to those who have the ability to see and grasp them.”
—Henry Sherwin, Co-Founder and President, Sherwin-Williams Company, 1866
“While today we are large, more diverse and global than ever before, we must never stop looking for ways to improve and create value for our customers. . . . We must continue to anticipate the needs of tomorrow and leverage our excellence initiatives globally to establish a common language, standardize and create best practices in leadership development, and reinforce a clear focus on our business strategies.”
—John Morikis, Chairman, President and CEO, Sherwin-Williams Company, 2018