Where did Singh fall short?

Singh’s efforts bore fruit as he aided in making Unilever the fastest growing brand, outpacing Dettol.
Although these results were encouraging, the goal of incorporating a behaviour change in India did
not show the results as expected. Here were the shortfalls:

 The country’s allocated behaviour-change target was 450 million by 2015 and in 2012, they
were able to hit 47 million. This was well below the initially agreed upon trajectory.
 Singh felt that behaviour-change programs were a great way to ensure that the media-dark
locations unreachable through traditional media are reached. He prayed that Sitapati would
double the behaviour-change advertising and promotion percentage but as the payback on
these were three or four times that of traditional media, it was a tough sell.
 The KKD Lifebuoy demonstrations to housewives were not generating the sustainable
behaviour-change that would satisfy PwC auditors.
 Singh was dubious about the liquids in rural areas as they were too expensive for the poor
rural masses who were the target of the behaviour-change program, but as the program had
to be profitable, he agreed upon the initiative.
 KKD’s “five non-negotiables” included in the presentations just increased cost and made the
process slower.
 Majorly, Singh fell short in being able to bring about a behavioural change amongst the masses
which was one of the goals as per the USLP.

Let us try to analyze why these shortcomings took place and what the future might hold w.r.t. the
strategies implemented through the “FIVE LEVERS OF CHANGE” suggested by Unilever:

Make it Sometimes people don't know about a behavior and why they should
Understood do it. This raises awareness and encourages acceptance. This should
be done to the concerned target audience.
Make it Easy People are likely to take action if it's easy, but not if it requires extra
effort. This establishes convenience and confidence.
Make it Desirable The behavior needs to fit with how people like to think of themselves,
and how they like others to think of them. This is about self and
society.
Make it New behaviors need to articulate the tangible benefits that people
Rewarding care about. This demonstrates the proof and payoff.
Make it a Habit Once consumers have changed, it is important to create a strategy to
help hold the behavior in place over time. This is about reinforcing
and reminding.

While the efforts put in seemed enough, the problem lied in the first and the second lever.

- Problem in the first lever: Although they were successful in making people understand the
difference between visibly clean and actually clean, the scale of this was less than what they
 hoped for. The handwash program had only reached 119 people globally and this wasn’t
enough to meet the USLP target of 1 billion.

- Problem in the second lever: The rural masses, who were the main target of the behavioural-
change program, would find it difficult to buy a liquid as it is too expensive. Thus, making the
change easy for them would be difficult here.