William R. Johnson- Ceo, H. J. Heinz

William R. Johnson became the President and Chief Executive Officer of H. J. Heinz in 1998. He joined Heinz in 1982 as General Manager - New Businesses for Heinz and held several different positions in during his association with the company. During his tenure, William Johnson displayed exemplary management skills which justifies his way up the corporate ladder in H. J. Heinz.

Now, let us highlight William Johnson's actions in the light of important managerial functions:

Planning: William Johnson was instrumental in the process of creating strategies and a future vision for H. J. Heinz. He was actively involved in the process of ascertaining organizational objectives, projects, devising policies strategies etc. Under William Johnson's leadership, the company made certain strategically competitive moves like acquiring Classico premium pasta sauces, Delimex frozen Mexican foods, Poppers frozen snacks, and licensing rights for the T.G.I. Friday's frozen appetizers (Heinz, 2002). These moves were strategically important and a result of superior degree of planning and foresight by an efficient manager.

Organizing: Johnson was actively involved in the process of organizing various business units of H. J. Heinz. The company merged some of its business units like StarKist, 9-Lives, Kibbles 'n Bits, Pup-Peroni, Snausages, Nawsomes, Heinz Nature's Goodness baby food and College Inn broths with Del Monte (San Francisco Business Times, 2002). This spin-off of certain brands from Heinz into Del Monte was the process of re-organizing Heinz's business units with the objective of achieving synergies and higher market share and leveraging of Del Monte's established status in the markets.

Staffing: Though William R. Johnson was at the peak of the corporate hierarchy as the President, CEO and Chairman of H. J. Heinz, his focus on efficient and effective staffing was commendable. In an interview with Newsweek, he commented that once he realized the importance of leadership and human resource management over technical business dynamics, his prime focus became allocating the right tasks to the most suited employee and reviewing and ensuring employees were adequately motivated and incentivized. He interviewed over 50 candidates in a year and was actively involved in the recruitment and selection of various mid and top level positions like country managers, presidents and so on (Newsweek,

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