Surabhi Pokhriyal Named Chief Digital Growth Officer at Church & Dwight
Church & Dwight has named Surabhi Pokhriyal as its Chief Digital Growth Officer.
Previously worldwide director, global head of digital commerce at Colgate-Palmolive, Pokhriyal will lead the consumer goods company’s digital transformation and e-commerce initiatives across cross-functional teams. As part of this, Pokhriyal, who has also held roles at Johnson & Johnson and Procter & Gamble and is a member of the CGT/RIS Executive Council, will join Church & Dwight’s leadership team.
Pokhriyal had been engaged with the Church & Dwight leadership in the years past, she tells CGT, and was intrigued when they reached out to discuss her joining the company. As they co-crafted her new role, she says she was sold on the move by not only the company’s potential for digital acceleration, but also the passion of both the leadership and associates and their willingness to have candid conversations.
"Church & Dwight is a fantastic growth oriented company that has an established track record of consistently delivering broad based growth both on organic sales and EPS," she notes.
[See also: Pokhriyal On Digital Commerce Team Sports]
Pokhriyal was also drawn to lack of the many nimble and multi-functional roles of Church & Dwight employees.
"Fun fact: C&D is a lean company with about 5,000 employees making up over $5 billion in revenue, so that’s an industry-leading $1 million/employee revenue," she notes. "It tells you how multi-functional non-siloed roles the employees play day to day, and that is something I was really impressed with to bring about a transformation with talent that already has and yearns for being always on the learning curve with broad based accountabilities."
Church & Dwight was founded in 1846 and includes such brands as Arm & Hammer, Trojan, Oxiclean and First Response in its portfolio. Its brands have gained momentum in last few years and the company has nearly doubled its e-commerce penetration, to 15%, according to Pokhriyal. But in looking ahead, she intends to accelerate this momentum across more than just e-commerce growth, including through M&A.
“We grow by means of acquisitions for the most part, and I’d ensure that our current and new acquisitions keep pace with the growth we anticipate,” she says. “I plan to bring together digital transformation and digital IQ as a shared muscle across the company to elevate the knowledge base, capabilities and outcomes that are a shared goal across marketing, sales, R&D, IT, finance, supply chain, HR, etc.”
"I am pumped to join a company that believes in the ‘more power to you,' is truly nimble, easy on communication, and adapts to the changing times," Pokhriyal adds when asked what she's most excited about in her new role. "Above and beyond the digital transformation, e-commerce P&L commercial growth agenda, a new skill that I look forward to develop as part of the executive team at C&D is the ability to engage and participate in M&A decision making as we continue to expand our brand footprint. All of this, and again the C&D people, that are audacious in vision, diligent in action and nimble in execution are the folks I am super excited to partner with."
