Leaders at All Levels: Kraft Heinz’s 5X Speed Secret

2026-03-12 · Source: MIT Sloan Management Review · Field: Business & Management — Corporate Strategy & Leadership, Operations & Process Management, Project & Product Management · Depth: Fundamental Awareness, long

Summary

Kraft Heinz has undergone a five-year agile transformation, moving from lagging in innovation to achieving significant operational improvements and over a billion dollars in value. This initiative, led by Carolina Wosiack, has scaled from a single pilot to 130 teams, drastically cutting product launch times from 36 months to six months for projects like the Pipa pasta sauce in Brazil. The transformation emphasizes redesigning systems rather than replacing people, focusing on a "pull" model for change adoption, and empowering teams with autonomy and clear, outcome-based objectives. Key results include a 31% reduction in meeting time, a 55% increase in employee satisfaction, and substantial market share gains, such as the Kraft ketchup launch in emerging markets and Canadian $15 million NSV delivered in Costco Canada.

Key takeaway

For product development leaders struggling with slow time-to-market and disengaged teams, consider adopting an agile transformation focused on systemic changes. By empowering teams with autonomy, streamlining decision-making, and prioritizing a focused set of outcome-driven projects, you can significantly accelerate product launches and boost employee satisfaction, as demonstrated by Kraft Heinz's 5x-6x speed improvement and over a billion dollars in value creation.

Key insights

Systemic change, not personnel changes, drives significant improvements in speed, innovation, and employee engagement.

Principles

• Prioritize system redesign over individual performance blame.
• Embrace a "pull" model for change adoption.
• Focus on outcomes, not just activity metrics.

Method

Kraft Heinz developed an "Agile Playbook" with light, flex, and full application levels, allowing teams to adopt practices incrementally based on their maturity and specific challenges, supported by a 50-person full-time team.

In practice

• Limit projects per team to a "golden number" (e.g., seven).
• Create one integrated priority list tied to financial outcomes.
• Empower teams with decision rights and reduce hierarchical touchpoints.

Topics

• Agile Transformation
• Product Innovation
• Time to Market
• Operating Model Redesign
• Leadership Empowerment

Best for: Executive, Product Manager, Consultant

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Editorial summary, takeaway, and curation by AIssential. Original article published by MIT Sloan Management Review.