Workplace Service Director - LATAM

 Workplace Service Director - LATAM

With 3.4 billion people in over 190 countries using our products every day, Unilever is a business that makes a real impact on the world. Work on brands that are loved and improve the lives of our consumers and the communities around us. We are driven by our purpose: to make sustainable living commonplace, and it is our belief that doing business the right way drives superior performance. At the heart of what we do is our people – we believe that when our people work with purpose, we will create a better business and a better world. 

At Unilever, your career will be a unique journey, grounded in our inclusive, collaborative, and flexible working environment. We don’t believe in the ‘one size fits all’ approach and instead we will equip you with the tools you need to shape your own future.

JOB PURPOSE

Unilever is the place where you can bring your purpose to life with the work that you do – creating a better business and a better world.

We create and operate incredible places to work and the Workplace Director is responsible for our Workplaces across Unilever’s office footprint in Latin America - including South and Central America.  The WPS Director will ensure that our Workplaces are Future Fit and aligned to the ambition of a great place to work and trailblazing for best -in-class employee workplace experiences at the right cost to Unilever.

This role requires a self-starter that can drive forward our new org structure, manage and an effective team under the new organization.  Particular focus will be on relationship building skills, senior stakeholder engagement, ability to drive performance leading to success, 3rd party supplier management, and driving change in the workplace environment.

Context

The role will be responsible for leading the Latin America Workplace Services delivery, key projects, partnering with our real estate procurement team and be accountable for the day-to-day delivery of Workplace Services in line with established service levels and service line strategy.  The region includes multiple large corporate locations and numerous regional offices, stretching from Argentina and Brazil to Mexico. The services scope of this role includes primarily Facilities Management (both soft and technical services but excluding technical services inside the production areas of our Supply Chain), real estate portfolio management (in partnership with our real estate team) and capital project delivery in the region. The services scope will also include activities across the other Workplace Services areas (Travel, Fleet, etc)

The portfolio ranges from large head offices to small offices and R&D as well as numerous diverse factory sites across the region. 

WHAT WILL YOUR MAIN RESPONSIBILITIES BE

• Work closely with global, regional and local business stakeholders to identify, shape, and implement best in class workplace strategies – including strategy and operating framework; balancing costs and overall employee experience is key.

• Ensure focus is on ensuring we build an employee experience by listening to our employees that enables business strategic objectives.

• The role also has important function to play with HR, Supply Chain and R&D to ensure that the strategy and operating framework is aligned with the business strategy, supports growth, is cost effective, supports our Sustainable Living plan and meets our Safety & Security standards & values.

• Ensure that the team will manage day to day operations of in-house teams and service provider (s) across the geography.

• Resolve performance and quality issues, escalating to Global Service Operations leads where required, ensuring timely resolution.

• Deliver harmonisation and continuous improvement projects aimed at improving cost and service.

• Partner with our Real Estate procurement team to agree on regional strategies for our portfolio, identify opportunities and drive change through business cases for the region.

• Identify trends and opportunities to drive adoption of the services and work with key stakeholders and clients to develop and implement plans to address these opportunities.

• Ensure the team will provide timely and accurate performance reports and lead changes and improvements to metrics SLA’s, KPI’s, etc.

• Facilitate regular performance reviews with service providers and/or insourced operations teams with geography leadership teams, holding both the supplier(s) and the client accountable for their part in successful delivery.

Key Interactions

• Senior Stakeholder – BG/BU leaders, GBS Leadership and Site Leaders.

• Key 3rd party providers.

• Other service operations in GBS and cross-functional teams.

• Global Real Estate Director.

• Global COE, Travel & Fleet team.

Experiences & Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree completed.

• Experience in Facilities Management;

• Knowledge of real estate transactions.

• Understanding of industry trends in a multi-geography service and best practices, contracting methods, SLAs, KPIs, etc.

• S/he will be capable of developing strategies and developing/executing programs to make them happen.

• As part of a regional unit, this professional must have had exposure to the challenges of regional / sub regional operations.

• Experience in Corp Real Estate and/or relevant experiences in supporting HRS, Workplaces, Finance, IT and other critical service delivery operations.

• Experience in management of third-party service providers (supplier management) - ensuring the services delivered by strategic partners meet the cost and service level expectations of the Unilever business.

• Experience in implementing an integrated service delivery program, through combined insourced and outsourced models.

• Experience in engaging key senior level stakeholders at a corporate centre level along with proven ability to influence and manage relationships with those stakeholders.

• Experience in managing multiple building projects and wide-scale transformation projects & budgets.

• Specific emphasis on implementing best practices, innovations, management of contracts, and vendor management.

• Experience of Workplace Change Management.

Skills

• Big-picture thinker, confident in taking strategic decisions that will impact future of office and hybrid.

• Service delivery and excellence mindset.

• Demonstrated Project management and change management skills.

• Leadership capability to create and lead a complex transformation

• Strong communication skills.

Leadership

• You are energized by delivering fantastic results.

• You are an example to others – both your results and your resilience.

• You are constantly on the lookout for better ways to do things, engaging and collaborating with others along the way.

• As an individual you are the one responsible for your own wellbeing and delivering high standards of work. You must also focus on the Consumer and what they need.

• You are humble and have your head up, looking around to interpret evidence and data smartly, spot issues and opportunities to make things better.

Unilever embraces diversity and encourages applicates from all walks of life! This means giving full and fair consideration to all applicants and continuing development of all employees regardless of age, disability, gender reassignment, race, religion or belief, sex, sexual orientation, marriage and civil partnership, and pregnancy and maternity. 

Unilever is an organisation committed to equity, inclusion and diversity to drive our business results and create a better future, every day, for our diverse employees, global consumers, partners, and communities. We believe a diverse workforce allows us to match our growth ambitions and drive inclusion across the business. At Unilever we are interested in every individual bringing their ‘Whole Self’ to work and this includes you! Thus if you require any support or access requirements, we encourage you to advise us at the time of your application so that we can support you through your recruitment journey.