RETAINING BEST PRACTICES AT COLGATE-

PALMOLIVE
By Donna McNammara

Spreading best practices globally takes commitment from a company’s leadership in terms
of encouragement, resources, and infrastructure. But management can’t do it all.
Employees also have to be willing to share successes and be humble enough to learn from
others who’ve seen success. Here, Donna McNamara, VP of Global Education and
Training, describes how Colgate-Palmolive has taken these factors into account and how
the company is retaining its knowledge as a result.

Colgate-Palmolive’s global education and training strategy aims to result in the retention and
expansion of knowledge within its employees. The company identifies its key priorities - those
issues that are business-critical or those needs that employees have expressed in terms of specific
skills and knowledge - then designs an approach to meet those needs. McNamara says, "Our
knowledge retention strategy didn't come about because we realized our key people were
retiring. Rather, our critical global business issues have always directed our decisions and
prioritized knowledge transfer."
For example, Colgate-Palmolive invests heavily in media, as it's a consumer goods company.
About five years ago, it realized thiat one person held the bulk of its expertise in global media.
To spread that expertise around the company, Colgate-Palmolive identified the knowledge gaps
between this subject matter expert (SME) and others in the company, then set about
documenting and capturing the valuable expertise inside the head of the SME. McNamara
comments, "The knowledge base was, of course, quite large, so we decided to approach the
capturing process by focusing on the business challenges we were facing and what specific skills
and knowledge others would need. We went through a continual process of identifying best
practices in relevant areas."
The best leaders teach
It's one thing to capture and another to effectively spread that knowledge around. Colgate-
Palmolive doesn 't just rely on databases or manuals. Instead, it encourages its SMEs to teach.
"Our philosophy is that Colgate leaders teach. We don't have a traditional training department to
deliver training, nor do we have outside consultants delivering training," says McNamara.
"Rather, the people who deliver training arc those who have been identified as experts and who
have applied to teach in addition to their regular responsibilities. It's respected and sought after to
be in the position of teaching others." In addition to the tacit knowledge transfer that goes on as
part of tuition, manuals are written to capture key explicit knowledge. Colgate also relies on
outside knowledge acquired through benchmarking to supplement its own practices to improve
them for the next time.
The process of identifying courses and placing instructors varies in scope and timing. It's not
unusual for it to take a year, because in the process of documenting and attempting to transfer
expertise to others, Colgate-Palmolive ofen uncovers ambiguities and decision points that need
to have senior management approval. McNamara comments, "The creation of training is often
the catalyst for confirming the best practices and then codifying them. Decisions usually need to
be made about what our principles are around a specific subject. It acts as a checkpoint and a
further reinforcement of Colgate's values and best practices."

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Ensuring global relevance
Colgate's global reach requires that it create a process for learning that's going to work as well in
Kuala Lumpur as it docs in Paris, France and Dallas, Texas. And that's neither simple nor
speedy. A team of recognized, global role models usually develop the courses and put them
through a series of pilots. Very often, the company will run two pilots to ensure that die course
communicates a similar meaning and enconrages a similar level of engagement in different parts
of the world.
We're so rigorous because so much is at stake. These courses are our vehicle for sharing best
practices, forming the global mindset, and building the global knowledge base that is the very
heart of Colgate," comments McNamara. The stakes are high and the investment large, so
Colgate wants to ensure consistent quality and be very clear about what skills it wants to
develop and specific knowledge it wants its employees to acquire.
Transferring knowledge
The classroom. isn’the only means-of spreading knowledge around the company. Being a global
company, Colgate-Palmolive encourages its employees to take on positions in other countries as
part of its knowledge transfer process. Moving employees around for the last 50 years has helped
Colgate’s employees develop a global minuset anu improve the company from within by
moving expertise around. McNamara comments, "Whether we're opening a new subsidiary or
expanding a new product line, we consciously move talent. We have two motivators for that.
One is to meet the business need of moving expertise to a needed location; the second is to help
individuals acquire the deep, contextual knowledge they need to continually move and
contribute.” This might play out by moving one individual from a smaller subsidiary to a mid-
sized subsidiary or from a three-product business to a single-category business. It builds
Colgate’s management capabilities and reinforces its corporate values of Caring, Global
Teamwork and Continous Improvement.
Integrating with KM
These values also drive its knowledge management group, who focus on building communities
of practice, documenting and spreading demonstrated practices, and encouraging continous
improvement reviews. The KM group is now looking beyond its roots in the supply chain part of
the business into partnering with other areas, one of which is education and training.
The KM group and the education and training training department are working together by
implementing an e-learning strategy to migrate successful practices in the supply chain area to
other parts of the business. McNamara comments,”E-learning will be an additional, way to meet
our business objectives. Luckilym, our chairman is very vocally supportive of education and
training. The priority setting process for our company involves senior people throughout the
world who consider business needs and employee needs when marking decisions. That focus
makes for well-thought-out programs and a drive on the part of emplyees to make them happen.”
Running smoothly
Because sharing is an embedded element of Colgate-Palmolive’s 100-year-old culture, retaining
knowledge has been a by product of sharing, rather than a stand-alone strategy. Several factors-
holding training courses taught by its leaders, rotating talent around the world, and providing
connectivity throught e-learnig-result in the preservation of the knowledge that makes Colgate-
Palmolive run smoothly despite a shifting workforce.

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