Unilever is a British-Dutch multinational consumer goods company that produces a wide range of products, such as food, beverages, cleaning agents, and personal care products. It is one of the largest companies in the world, with operations in over 190 countries. With operations in more than 190 countries, it is among the largest corporations in the world. Unilever, however, faces a number of modern business difficulties that have an impact on its operations and profits, just like any other huge firm (Grant, 2021). One such problem is sustainability, which has emerged in recent years as a crucial one for corporations due to greater awareness of social and economic inequalities, climate change, and resource depletion worldwide.
Figure 1: Unilever
Unilever, a market leader in consumer goods, has made a commitment to enhance millions of people's quality of life, lessen its impact on the environment, and increase its social impact by 2025. According to the company's Sustainable Living Plan, it aims to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, improve smallholder farmers' livelihoods, and enhance people's health and well-being in order to achieve sustainability (Nazarova, 2015). However, the company faces significant obstacles in achieving these sustainability goals because it must navigate a complicated web of economic, social, and environmental factors that have an impact on its operations and stakeholders.
The overall aim of the Unilever Strategy project
The purpose of this project is to assess Unilever's sustainability strategy objectively and to pinpoint the opportunities and difficulties it confronts in attaining its sustainability objectives (Caldwell and Patnaik, 2018). The company's sustainability initiatives, such as its Sustainable Living Plan, will be examined in the research to ascertain how well they address sustainability challenges and how they affect the company's operations, stakeholders, and the environment.
Research objective for Unilever Strategy
The following goals will be worked towards in order to fulfil the research's purpose:
To examine the pertinent literature on business sustainability and to pinpoint the main ideas, theories, and models that underpin sustainable business practices.
Examine Unilever's sustainability initiatives, such as the Sustainable Living Plan, to determine how well they address sustainability challenges and how they affect the business' operations, stakeholders, and the environment (Dartey-Baah and Ampofo, 2016).
To recognise the obstacles and possibilities Unilever must overcome in order to achieve its sustainability objectives, including the economic, social, and environmental variables that have an impact on its stakeholders and operations.
To offer suggestions on how Unilever may strengthen its sustainability activities and strategy in order to better address sustainability concerns and improve its social and environmental impact (Hong and Kim, 2020).
Research questions
The following inquiries will serve as a guide for the research:
What are the fundamental theories, models, and concepts underlying sustainable business practices?
How successfully does Unilever manage sustainability concerns and their effects on the business' operations, stakeholders, and the environment through its sustainability strategy, including its Sustainable Living Plan?
How do economic, social, and environmental variables impact Unilever's operations and stakeholders? What possibilities and difficulties does Unilever face in reaching its sustainability goals?
What suggestions can be offered to Unilever in order to strengthen its sustainability activities and strategy in order to better address sustainability concerns and increase its social and environmental impact?
Academic Subject
The academic field of sustainability in business and management encompasses this study (Iglesias et.al 2023).
Literature Review
An overview of the state of knowledge on the present business problem faced by Unilever is provided by the literature review. The published literature on the subject will be discussed in this section, together with the key contributions, pertinent concepts and theories, and the methodological stances taken in this field.
The multinational consumer products corporation Unilever deals with a variety of modern business difficulties that are particular to its operations. The difficulty of using sustainable business practises has been one of the most urgent problems the company has encountered. Unilever, a business that operates in numerous global markets, is under constant pressure to strike a balance between its business goals and social and environmental sustainability. Various stakeholders, such as consumers, governments, and NGOs, are putting pressure on the company to operate more responsibly.
According to Elkington (1998), who introduced the idea of the triple bottom line (TBL), is one of the key authors in the literature on sustainable business practises. According to the TBL framework, companies should be held accountable for both their financial performance and their social and environmental repercussions. Numerous studies have looked at the TBL's implementation in various organisations. This idea has been widely embraced in the literature on sustainable business practises.
Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) is a key idea in the literature on sustainable business practises. This idea relates to the notion that businesses have an obligation to conduct their business in a socially and environmentally responsible manner. a four-tiered CSR framework that takes economic, legal, ethical, and philanthropic duties into account. Many studies have looked at the connection between CSR and organisational success, and this paradigm has been widely embraced in the CSR literature.
Numerous studies in this field employ a methodology that combines quantitative and qualitative techniques. While exploring the adoption of sustainable practises in organisations, qualitative research methods are used to measure the impact of sustainable business practises on organisational performance (Ziora, 2016). The research topic and the study's research goals influence the methodological chosen.
The difficulty of assessing how these practises affect organisational performance is one of the major problems mentioned in the literature on sustainable business practises. The link between sustainable company practises and improved financial success is not always obvious, despite evidence to the contrary (Humphries-Kil, 2019). To build a greater knowledge of the relationship between sustainable business practises and financial performance, many studies have urged for more research in this area.
The literature on sustainable business practises is extremely relevant to our examination of the current business challenges encountered by Unilever in terms of its applicability to the research concerns. The literature offers a framework for comprehending the difficulties businesses confront in striking a balance between their business goals and social and environmental sustainability (Doyleet.al 2020). To have a better grasp of the problems Unilever is facing and the solutions the corporation can employ by studying the literature on sustainable business practises.
While analysing the current business issues that Unilever is facing, there are a number of other factors that must be taken into account in addition to the theories, models, and concepts mentioned above. The effect of globalisation on the business' operations is one of the crucial variables (Juriettiet.al 2017). Unilever operates in many nations throughout the world, but it has a variety of difficulties because of linguistic limitations, cultural differences, and legal systems. To make sure that it can function effectively in many markets and geographic areas, the organisation must manage these complications.
The business's corporate social responsibility (CSR) policies should also be taken into account. Unilever has received praise for its dedication to ethical corporate behaviour and environmental preservation. However, as the business expands, it must make sure that its CSR policies are consistent with its overarching corporate goals. To achieve long-term success, the corporation must strike a balance between its economic, social, and environmental goals.
The development of digital technology has also fundamentally changed how businesses run. To ensure that it can compete in the digital age, Unilever must keep up with the most recent technology developments. This entails implementing cutting-edge marketing tactics, streamlining supply chain management, and using data analytics to influence corporate decisions.
Finally, Unilever's operations are susceptible to a variety of political and economic factors because it is a multinational corporation. This includes changes in government laws and regulations, variations in currency exchange rates, and political unrest in some areas (Pant and Ramachandran, 2017). The business has to have plans in place to reduce these risks and make sure it can adjust to shifting market conditions.
Research Methodology and Design
The study's methodology and research design will be described in this part. This will cover the techniques for data collection, information sampling, and data analysis. The choice of approach will be explained, along with its benefits and drawbacks.
Research Design: A mixed-methods approach incorporating both quantitative and qualitative techniques was used for this study's research design. This strategy is especially well suited for answering the already mentioned research questions and objectives, which call for both numerical data and descriptive information. While qualitative approaches will be used to acquire data through interviews and focus groups, quantitative methods will be utilised to analyse the data gathered through surveys.
Methods for Collecting Data: Focus groups, interviews, and questionnaires will all be utilised to gather data. Quantitative data will be gathered from a sample of Unilever employees from various levels and departments using the questionnaires, which will be developed for this purpose (Adams, 2015). Managers, executives, and other pertinent Unilever stakeholders will be contacted for interviews and focus groups in order to collect qualitative information that will supplement the quantitative information gleaned from the surveys.
Sample Plan: A stratified sample plan will be used to choose the study's respondents. To generate a representative sample, stratified sampling will make sure that participants are chosen from all organisational levels and departments. The sample size will be determined by the size of the population, and random sampling will be used to guarantee the selection procedure is fair.
Data Analysis Techniques: Statistical software like SPSS will be used to analyse the data gathered from the surveys, interviews, and focus groups. Descriptive and inferential statistics like mean, standard deviation, t-test, and ANOVA will be used to analyse the survey data. To find themes and patterns in the qualitative data collected from interviews and focus groups, content analysis will be used (Enoch, 2016). To fully comprehend the research problem, the conclusions from the analyses of the quantitative and qualitative data will be combined.
Methodology Benefits and Drawbacks: The mixed-methods approach has many benefits, including a more thorough grasp of the research problem, increased validity and reliability of the study, and the capacity to triangulate data. This strategy does, however, have some drawbacks, such as the time and resources needed to gather and analyse both quantitative and qualitative data.
The study's recommended research design and methodology adopt a mixed-methods strategy by combining quantitative and qualitative techniques. Surveys, interviews, and focus groups will be used to gather the data, which will then be subjected to statistical analysis and content analysis (Amankwah-Amoahet.al 2018). The methodology's benefits and drawbacks have been examined, and the stratified sampling approach will be utilised to choose study participants.
Expected Results
The study's anticipated findings will give Unilever important information about how to handle the current business issue of sustainability. The results will help the business determine how to better align its operations with the Sustainable Development Goals of the UN and where its sustainability efforts may be strengthened. This will assist Unilever in upholding its reputation as a trustworthy and ethical company, which is crucial for luring in customers and investors who are becoming more and more concerned about how businesses affect the environment (Gorvie, 2019). The study will assist Unilever in identifying emerging trends in sustainability and proactively addressing them.
Project Plan
Microsoft Project will be used to create the project plan for this research proposal. Four phases will make up the project: planning, data gathering, analysis, and writing. Following is a timeline for each stage:
Planning (first phase): two weeks
Specify the purpose, goals, and research queries.
Perform a literature review.
Create a research strategy and technique.
Obtain ethical approval.
Data collection in Phase 2 (4 weeks)
Find and enlist volunteers for surveys and interviews.
Conduct surveys and interviews
Gather information from secondary sources.
Analysis in Phase 3 (4 weeks)
Write down and code qualitative information.
Make use of statistical software to analyse quantitative data.
Recognise trends and themes in the data.
Writing (6 weeks) Phase 4
Draught sections for the introduction, literature review, methods, findings, and discussion.
Edit and revise draughts
Complete the research report.
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References
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Caldwell, N. and Patnaik, S., 2018. The emergence of brand building in the nineteenth century: William Lever and Sunlight Soap (UK, 1884).
Dartey-Baah, K. and Ampofo, E., 2016. “Carrot and stick” leadership style: Can it predict employees’ job satisfaction in a contemporary business organisation?.African Journal of Economic and Management Studies,7(3), pp.328-345.
Doyle, J., Farrell, N. and Goodman, M.K., 2020. The cultural politics of climate branding: Project Sunlight, the biopolitics of climate care and the socialisation of the everyday sustainable consumption practices of citizens-consumers.Climatic Change,163, pp.117-133.
Enoch, C.L., 2016.The importance of strategic leadership and change management in achieving the national sustainability objective: the case study of Unilever(Doctoral dissertation).
Gorvie, F.Y., 2019.An analysis of the impact of cultural diversity on grievance handling: A case study of Unilever Nigeria(Doctoral dissertation, Dublin Business School).
Grant, R.M., 2021.Contemporary strategy analysis. John Wiley & Sons.
Hong, J.O. and Kim, H.G., 2020. Possible use case of the multidisciplinary approach of art collaboration.Journal of Scientific & Industrial Research,79(10), pp.898-901.
Humphries-Kil, M., 2019. Unilever and Leadership: Gender, Race, and Classification in Corporate Globalisation. InSAGE Business Cases. SAGE Publications: SAGE Business Cases Originals.
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