Managing People Is All a Matter of Feedback

Hanging on the walls of the Campbell Soup Company board room is an Andy Warhol. It's the eponymous painting which has made the corporation's can of tomato soup one of America's best-known symbols around the world. Today the Campbell Soup Company is a food multinational with a global turnover in excess of $8 billion, its brand-name soups accounting for only 25% of sales, with rest of the product portfolio including snacks, cookies, beverages, bread products, and other items. Since the 1st of February, the company has been partitioned into three divisions. At the helm of the Global Biscuits and Snacks Division, grouping firms accounting for $2.8 billion in sales in 2014, there is a Bocconian manager: Luca Mignini, a 1986 Business Administration graduate, 52 years old and a career spent filling managerial posts in Europe, Asia, Australia, Latin America, and the United States.

What were the reasons for your restructuring?

It the first major reorganization of the company in more than a decade, and makes Campbell move from a traditional structure based on geographical areas, to one base on product categories. The new structure enables us to have divisions more aligned with corporate strategy. Each division will have its own financial target. Some will be more focused on profit-seeking while others on market growth. We calculate savings in excess of $200 million over the next three years, thanks to synergies and a leaner organizational structure more attuned to the objectives of the company.

What are the characteristics of your division?

The objective for my division is profitable growth. Biscuits have strong potential anywhere in the world, depending on various indicators, and the market grows on average by 5-7% each year. The division oversees a large part of the company's international operations, which are mainly operating in unsaturated markets.

You had an exceptional career. What do you think the success of your career is due to?

If you had asked me 15 years ago, I would have said: to me and myself only. Today instead, I think it's 50% luck and 50% your own determination. But you still have to work 100% if you want to seize the chance offered by that 50% of luck.

When does a stroke of luck become manifest?

There are so many fundamental things we don't control in our lives: where we are born, what kind of people we meet, the kind of meaningful experiences we had in life. My career is an example of bad planning and unintended consequences. I graduated with a thesis on service companies operating in the fashion industry, which was mainly helpful for making me realize I could never work a in family company. I then started in marketing by pure chance. Also, sometimes great opportunities can come dressed as major setbacks.

When did this happen to you?

In 2009, I was Senior Vice President of SC Johnson for Europe, Japan, and Australia-Pacific. It was the kind of job that makes you travel around the world day and night. I broke a ligament, had an operation, but then I stubbornly neglected recovery, ending up with an infection to forced me to stay in bed for five months. I even told my brother and my wife my Last Will, when I had to enter the operating room a second time. When I got out of the hospital, I was unable to lead the same life as before, at least momentarily, so I quit. I did a stint in private equity, which was very useful to get back in the food business, until Campbell's offer came, and now my promotion as division head.

You managed people in all parts of the globe. What are the differences you found?

At a given stage of my career, I moved from Latin America to China, which meant going from a place where every meeting can turn into a pitched battle to another where nobody says either yes or no for fear of losing face before his/her colleagues, if he/she ends up in the minority position. However, I still think that similarities overcome differences: people everywhere share very similar ambitions, it's only the packaging that changes. At each latitude, people want to be shown respect, work with pleasant colleagues, be successful. A leader must understand how each individual expresses these needs and to deserve the collaborators he/she has surrounded himself/herself with. Before giving answers, it's always important to understand why a question was made. In China, I was once told it's very important to learn how to read what remains unwritten...

How do you prepare for such experiences?

I really don't know how you can prepare yourself from a theoretical point of view. Personally, I would say curiosity is a crucial point. I'm the type that can stay up all night to watch the Discovery channel; at the start of my career I just wanted to discover the world and maybe lose myself in it. Also, you must take calculated risks. I learned a lot from the risks I took, the errors I made and how I put remedy to them. And it's with people you have to take the biggest risk.

In what sense?

I'm convinced a leader is only worth as much as the quality of his/her collaborators. It's fundamental to select them attentively and give them trust: right away, without waiting for them to prove themselves. Let them operate freely within limits, let them make mistakes on their own, so that they can learn how to fix them and do it better the next time around. As a president of my division, I don't have to be more knowledgeable in finance than my CFO, or know about Australia more than the CEO of our Sydney subsidiary. My task is to put them in the condition to work at the best of their talents, without communication barriers, or unreasonable fears about risk-taking.

When do you draw the balance sheet?

I'm not a fan of annual performance reviews, but rather of continuous feedback. Feedback truly is the breakfast of champions and you must understand when and how to give it. For example, with time I've become persuaded that negative feedback must always be given privately: there is no advantage in public displays of arrogance. Conversely, positive feedbacks must be given in public. Of course, it works both ways. You must give feedback to your collaborators, and they to you. I remember that when I was working in Latin America, I placed my trust in a financial manager who proved himself not to be up to the task. He couldn't improve his performance, but I insisted and persevered in sticking with him, until my boss made me understand that by being insistent I wasn't acting in the company's interest. I was just trying to avoid making a painful decision, which was in fact inevitable.

Is it painful having to change one's mind?

Not really, at least not for me. Actually, it's very positive. Performance improves and I can learn new things.

Who can help a manager change idea?

In addition to collaborators' feedback, I find two kinds of figures essential: mentors and coaches, who can really help understand your potential. Among the various mentors I had the privilege of having, I remember Gianni Cordero di Montezemolo with affection. At SC Johnson, when I was only 30, he appointed me "General Manager of Nothing", meaning that I had to launch startups in the then two, then freshly separated, countries of Czech Republic and Slovakia. I didn't know if I could do it then, and I don't know if I could it now again, but he understood that it was the right time for me. Also, in my current position I'm assisted by a coach, a person who is able to take out what's best in you, who makes you understand what keeps you anchored to wrong kinds of attitudes and helps you change. This enables you to continue to learn, no matter your age.