Kolhapur to London: Who is Indian-origin Leena Nair, Chanel’s new CEO?
Indian-origin British citizen Leena Nair has been named the CEO of the French designer label Chanel. Nair joins the long and growing list of Indian-origin people who have come to helm global giant companies.
Leena Nair will be joining Chanel in January 2022 and the role is said to be based out of London. Nair is currently based in London itself where she’s wrapping up as the Chief of Human Resources at Unilever. The woman business leader reacted to her appointment as Chanel’s CEO, saying she’s humbled and honoured for the role.
I am humbled and honoured to be appointed the Global Chief Executive Officer of @CHANEL, an iconic and admired company.
— Leena Nair (@LeenaNairHR) December 14, 2021
She also said that she’s inspired by what Chanel stands for, that is, inclusivity and creation.
Thanking Unilever, Nair said that in the last 30 years of her career at the company, she’s grateful for the opportunities given to her.
I will always be a proud advocate of @Unilever and its ambition to make sustainable living commonplace.
— Leena Nair (@LeenaNairHR) December 14, 2021
Nair is considered a pioneer in many ways. She’s also had many ‘firsts’ to her credit. Even as the CEO of Chanel, Nair is the first woman, the first Indian-origin and Asian to fill the role.
Here are 10 facts about Nair, you may not have known:
1. KOLHAPUR TO LONDON
Leena Nair’s journey from Kolhapur to London has been quite an inspiring and interesting one. Unlike several other Indian-origin business leaders, Nair did not graduate from any top foreign university. However, she did graduate from one of India's top B-schools, Xavier School of Management (XLRI), in Mumbai. She was born, brought up and studied in Kolhapur, Maharashtra and made her way up the ranks at Unilever.
2. ENGINEER BEFORE HR
Did you know that Leena Nair was an engineer before she started off in Human Resources? She earned her engineering degree from Walchand College of Engineering. She also worked briefly at a research lab as an electronics engineer trying to create picture-in-picture televisions.
Yes, Nair was working on something we all have on our devices today. Recognise the picture-in-picture features on your phones? Keep in mind that this was way before 1992. However, she said that she didn’t enjoy being an engineer and decided to switch.
Nair started pursuing Human Resources and also graduated from one of India’s top B-schools, with a gold medal.
3. FATHER AGAINST CAREER DECISION
Leena Nair’s decision to quit engineering and pursue what was then called ‘Personnel’ came as a shock to her father, an industrialist. However, Nair was passionate about her decision and went ahead with her instincts.
Writing for the India Today Magazine, Leena Nair recounted how difficult it was for her to convince her parents to let her study at XLRI, which was in Mumbai, 48 hours away by train from Kolhapur.
4. HER PROFESSOR-GURU
Making the switch from engineering to management was not easy for Leena Nair. Nair in an interview with TIME magazine said that a professor at her engineering college who also taught management encouraged her to pursue her passion.
“Luckily, I had a mentor who was the professor who taught me management and engineering studies, who kept encouraging me and told me I had a talent for people,” she was quoted by TIME.
The professor also told her that she would become an average engineer, but a darn good HR.
5. THANKFUL FOR HER ENGINEERING SKILLS
Despite not liking being an engineer, Leena Nair is thankful for what engineering taught her. She told Human Resources Online that engineering taught her problem-solving skills and dealing with numbers which are very useful for her role in HR.
6. STARTED WORKING AT A FACTORY
Leena Nair joined Hindustan Unilever (HUL), the global FMCG giant’s India name, as a Management Trainee in 1992. She went on to take up various roles on factory levels of HUL in West Bengal, Tamil Nadu, and Maharashtra.
At the time, only 2 per cent of women were employed at factory levels. She recounted in an interview with TIME, that when she went to factories, she found that there were no washrooms or loos for women. So she ensured that there were washrooms for women. She remembered that several of the loos built at company premises were named ‘Leena’s Loos’ as a joke.
7. TRAJECTORY OF NAIR’S GROWTH AT UNILEVER
1992: Management trainee
1993: Factory personnel manager of Lipton (India) Ltd, a brand owned by Unilever
1996: Employee Relations Manager by HUL
2000: HR manager of Hindustan Lever India
2004: HR general manager of 'home and personal care India'
2006: HR general manager
2007: Executive director HR of HUL
2013: HR senior vice president at Unilever and global head of diversity
2016: Chief Human Resources Officer, Unilever, London – the first woman and first Asian to be appointed to the role.
8. INDRA NOOYI AS MENTOR
Leena Nair is now the second Indian-origin woman to become the CEO of a multinational company after former PepsiCo chief Indra Nooyi. Moreover, Nair calls Nooyi her mentor and friend. Moneycontrol reported Nair as recounting that Nooyi would give her a proverbial kick in the pants whenever she started questioning herself.
9. THE BOSS OF CHANEL
Leena Nair’s new role at Chanel is a rare one among rares; one cannot emphasise this enough. First of all, there’s an HR leader brought to the forefront of a company’s leadership, which in itself is rare. Secondly, the company welcoming Nair as the CEO is CHANEL, a French fashion biggie.
The fashion industry is notorious for its gatekeeping. For a company like Chanel, which only brought onboard its head of inclusivity and diversity in 2019, to hire a woman of colour as the CEO, is nothing less than revolutionary.
The brand has faced backlash in the past for appropriating feminism. Its former creative director late Karl Lagerfeld’s inappropriate comments on women’s bodies and the Me Too movement was also criticised.
10. CHALLENGES AHEAD
As the new head of Chanel, Leena Nair faces the challenge of ensuring a safe and fair workplace at all levels of the company. The fashion industry is notorious for unpaid labour, forcing unhealthy beauty standards and more.
Nair leaves a legacy of trying to make the workplace more flexible at Unilever, while also famously achieving the 50/50 gender ratio of employees under her leadership.
How Nair overcomes the challenges at Chanel needs to be seen.
Alain Wertheimer, who was the CEO of Chanel so far and co-owner of the brand with his brother Gerard, will take on the role of global executive chairman.