MCI INTERVIEW
MCI INTERVIEW
In at the deep end
Cynthia Gordon, chief marketing officer of MTS, tells Sean Jackson how she manages
the direction and strategy of one of the largest carriers in Russia and the CIS.
�the only British and only female
member of the senior
management team at Mobile
Telesystems (MTS)—the largest mobile
phone operator in Russia and the
CIS—Cynthia Gordon seems unfazed
by the challenges of determining the
marketing strategy and direction of a
firm with over 91 million customers
spread across six countries.
The road to Moscow saw Gordon
start out at Unilever as a management
trainee after acquiring a BA Business
Studies from Brighton University. After
stints with UK retail banks Lloyds
TSB and Abbey National from 1989
to 1993, Gordon made the move into
the world of cellular communications
(see career history).
Prior to joining MTS in January 2007
Gordon was vice president of Business
Marketing at Orange so the jump over
to the Russian carrier was a major
departure. “Because this is primarily
a consumer business, in terms of the
majority of the customers and the majority
of the revenue, there has been a
strong learning curve,” she says.
MTS has a massive customer base,
though penetration varies across its
six territories. In Russia and Ukraine
teledensity stands at 123 and 109 per
cent respectively, according to Informa
Telecoms & Media, while in Belarus,
Armenia, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan
it is 74, 72, 31 and 11 and per cent
respectively.
The carrier’s network sits comfortably
in an area larger than the entire
continent of South America with a total
population of over 230 million. In the
last quarter alone the firm gained an
additional two million subscribers.
One of the key cultural issues that
Gordon has faced in Russia is the
pace of business. “Decisions are made
quickly and we see those returns very
quickly as well, because the business
is growing so significantly. In my experience
the Russian culture is very
decisive in terms of bringing together
a lot of information, synthesising that
Cynthia Gordon
information very concisely and making
sure we make very clear and accurate
decisions.”
A well-established system of business
units and operational control
helps Gordon and MTS keep growing
the diverse business. There are three
different divisions at MTS. Russia and
Ukraine each have their own CEO and
are separate business units. The four
smaller territories, which represent
about ten per cent of the carrier’s
revenue, form another business unit
with one CEO. Gordon, as with each
business unit CEO, reports directly
to the recently appointed MTS CEO
Mikhail Shamolin.
Shamolin—who took the helm in
June—had been VP of MTS’ largest
business unit; Russia. His predecessor,
Leonid Melamed, has moved on
to become the president and CEO of
MTS’ parent company Sistema —one
of Russia’s largest consumer firms.
“We’ve found that what works really
well within the marketing area
is a mix of a few global international
experts and a lot of very good local,
30 Mobile Communications International | First for news, best for business
CIS, marketers. So it is a balance of
those things. Certainly, my role is
more to do with setting strategy and
direction,” says Gordon.
“In very practical terms there was
an element of defining who and what
we are. There was a danger that we
could have gone down the route of
becoming a low cost operator. That
would never have been true to what
MTS is or the customers that we have.
We tend to have higher value customers,”
she adds.
According to Gordon, the firm needed
to carry out extensive internal
research to define its mission, vision
and strategy. “We described the strategy
in very simple terms as ‘be more’
when we’re trying to give customers
high level services and build affinity
and emotional engagement with them.
Then that moves to ‘do more’, which
describes the types of services that enable
customers to do things that they
couldn’t do before. Finally there is a
very practical level called ‘get more’,
which is really about value for money
and tariffing.”
To view a Ceros magazine you need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser and have the flash player 8 or higher installed. To install the latest flash player, click the icon above, install the flash plugin and then click here to refresh this page.