When Charles Miller Smith, a former Unilever veteran of 31 years, was appointed as Chief Executive of ICI in 1995, he was faced with the challenge of radically transforming the company. After battling...

When Charles Miller Smith, a former Unilever veteran of 31 years, was appointed as Chief Executive of ICI in 1995, he was faced with the challenge of radically transforming the company. After battling through the recession and the Seneca de-merger, ICI found itself facing tough targets for a group-wide average return on net assets (RONA) over the business cycle of 20 per cent. ‘Those were clear targets and people were anxious to deliver’, says Miller Smith. ‘1995 was good for the business; it made genuine progress and RONA sharply increased. Clearly, as that happened, people became more confident and there was a growing sense of comfort and confidence about the future. You could feel that leeching into the bloodstream of the business.’ But that, so far as Miller Smith is concerned, only brought the new ICI to first base. Take RONA: ‘The 20 per cent RONA target was straightforward, clear-cut, simple, well understood across the business, sometimes too well understood, because everybody assumes that 20 per cent is the reality for everyone, when you have to differentiate.’ Paints, for instance, should make 30 per cent. Overall, he says: ‘We are still short of the best in the industry, which is about 6 per cent above where we were last year.’ ICI’s RONA average in 1995 was 18 per cent. By the best, Miller Smith meant America’s Du Pont.