Mustafa Shamseldin is a 17-year veteran of PepsiCo, working with its beverages and snacks divisions across the world since 2008. In his current position, category growth officer and CMO for international foods, he combines traditional marketing skills with strategy to grow the entire portfolio. I talked to him about how he accomplishes this in a world of diverse tastes and trends.

This conversation has been edited for length, clarity and continuity. It was excerpted in the Forbes CMO newsletter.

How does the role of category growth officer dovetail with that of a CMO?

Shamseldin: The category growth officer is responsible for marketing. It is looking at the brands, but looking at them truly end-to-end. Marketing is still part of my responsibility: Making sure our brands resonate with consumers, our brands are strategically building connections and engaging with consumers everywhere in the world. But then looking at also the drivers of growth and how the brands show up in the consumer’s lives, from when it’s just a potato seed, all the way to showing on the shelf.

In the new structure, I’m responsible for the marketing teams, but we have integrated all the other functions: commercialization, insights, R&D, innovation. We look at pricing and commercial levers of the business. We have a team looking at the science of growth, all the drivers of growth beyond just the brand. And that is a big change.

We measure ourselves on growth. We look at the business KPIs: It’s about business growth, brand growth, equity growth, but business margin. Are we expanding into new occasions? Are we preparing the brand for the future? Are we thinking about the future of the business, the business models of the future and the channels of the future—not just the brand? It’s a small change in title, but it’s a big change in how we operate.

Are you seeing other companies look at growth in the same way?

I am seeing it a little bit more in other companies. This idea of pivoting from the role of chief marketing officer to growth, I see that consistently in all my discussions with all my colleagues in all of the industry. When I was in Cannes [last] summer, it was the focus of all the talks that I was part of: all about pivoting to end-to-end growth.

Some companies have gone all the way to changing titles, and some companies are just asking the marketing team to think differently and look at growth. I think it’ll catch up. Even if the title doesn’t change, the idea that marketers are responsible for business growth, and end-to-end is the way to grow the business is the way to go.

What kind of things are you bringing to this role that you wouldn’t bring to a pure play marketing role?

Looking at all the different drivers of value and drivers of growth. What I mean by that is we have conversations in the team on how to make sure that we have the right product quality from how we farm. I get involved in discussions on how our supply chain is geared to make sure that we have the best possible cost, the best possible quality.

Also talking about how our supply chain evolves into what we call positive—a positive value chain, positive supply chain. A big part of my responsibility is driving the PepsiCo positive agenda, looking at the farming, products, agriculture and value chain.

Because I’ve done different roles within the company—commercial roles, sales roles, e-commerce roles, I was a GM—what I try to bring to the role is how to best enable the businesses to run the initiatives and the programs end to end. It’s not the traditional create a campaign, create a program, and just let the businesses run with it. When we want to expand Doritos into Loaded or into new meal locations, how do you think about that end to end? What partnerships do we need to bring? What supply chain do you need to build for the trucks for Doritos Loaded? What other value elements or revenue elements can you think about for ourselves and our partners and that deliver value to the consumer? All of these are capabilities that we need for growth.

Working in the international segment of PepsiCo Foods, you’re in many different markets that can be very different from one another. How do you change the messaging and growth perspective for each?

That’s a very important skill, but also a very powerful pivot that is needed in the future of big global brands. The brands are, by definition, more seen and more accessible globally. Given social media, et cetera, humans have exposure to them everywhere in the world. At the same time, we need to make sure that while there’s a global strategy of how the brand talks about itself and what’s the end state, we need to imbue that with local relevance, local flavor, and local creativity.

The way we think about it is: You have the brand platform, the way the brand talks about itself, and it should be mostly consistent across the world. How the brand shows up, what the brand stands for, that should be rather consistent. How you translate that into communication and engagement that is relevant and resonates locally is where you unleash local creative. There will be moments where you have the same message, the same campaign, that runs across the world because universally it’s relevant. There are moments where it is: This is what the brand stands for, go and create and execute locally.

This is always a discussion that we have. We have a process around the category leadership team where we bring together every month all the key marketing leads and commercial leads from across the world. We talk about the big initiatives and the state of the business that we are in, and how do we make sure that we take these global strategies and land them at a local level.

What are some examples of some local strategies that you have worked on?

One of the big transformations that renders itself more to local relevance than any other is the work we’ve been doing on what we’re calling “foods transformation.” Foods transformation is stemming from the idea of driving growth, and realization that our brands play a role in what we’re calling the human eating experience. There’s an opportunity for them to play an even bigger role, given that our brands are made from products that come from the earth, that are based on agriculture, and that can give consumers an even elevated experience beyond just the current format.

Two examples that are global campaigns, global platforms that we execute locally. The first is Doritos Loaded. Doritos is a brand that’s really about the boldness of the expression, and the product is about this crunch and intense flavor, but it can do that beyond just its current format. We created this campaign around how can Doritos become a canvas for expression: expressing yourself through your choice of ingredients and your choice of meals. You start with Doritos and then you add to it your own local ingredients, local flavor, but also your own personalized flavor. It is a bold expression of your own eating experience. It’s perfect for Doritos. That is something we initiated maybe 18 months ago, and it is now already in almost 30 countries. In every country, we adapt ingredients, how it shows up, but in a way that’s consistent to Doritos. It’s always crunchy, always bold, always expressed in the deepest way, but then you are able to land that in a way that is more local and then even more personalized as we take that from concept to channels. This is how you build the habits.

We‘re now working with consumers. We built this capability around culinary hubs, which is another way of driving local relevance. We have built hubs in key markets that work with influencers, local recipes and content that are relevant to that market, but they are consistent with what the brand wants to say. We are using these country hubs and these local influencers to bring that experience to the home. They’re creating recipes that are local, that are more relevant in Saudi Arabia or Italy or different parts of the world, and then encouraging consumers to either use their recipes or create their own. It’s a very global concept that I think makes sense in terms of where we want to grow. It makes sense to the brand. We are able to execute with the away-from-home channel across the world, adapt it in a way that's more relevant, and then even localize it using influencers all the way to the individual level.

PepsiCo’s food brands are already iconic and well known throughout the world. Where do you see the biggest growth opportunities?

How do we expand into more occasions? How do we think about the consumer eating experience? We look at the right-to-succeed of our brands, which are made from potato or corn, and can play a bigger role in the consumer eating experience. How do we do that in a way that is relevant to the brand, the market and the individual.

Expanding our occasions is a big one, and not just with complete new recipes. Also looking at occasions where consumers, we know, would enjoy our brands even more. An example is football, or soccer, or sports watching in general. It’s one of the big deliverables this year, and will be next year as we think about partnerships—whether with FIFA or Champions League: How do we make it almost unthinkable that you can enjoy a game without Lay’s? We had this big campaign around ‘No Lay’s, no game,’ which [was] a multiple Cannes winner last year. We’re going to take it to a different level this year.

We will continue to renovate our core. We’ve announced some goals on sodium reduction, fat reduction, diverse ingredients, even thinking beyond that to packaging. There’s a lot of work there to make sure our products are more and more relevant to more consumers

The third [pillar of growth] is channels. Think about how much consumers are spending time and money away from home. We think we have a bigger role to play there, but also in emerging channels like e-commerce.

The fourth one is looking at needs and occasions where our products are under servicing today. So think about innovation, think about new platforms. We have packaging innovations platforms that we think we can go after new occasions with new technologies.

Looking at product renovations, different countries and governments have different requirements on ingredients and food labeling. As a chief growth officer who thinks about products end-to-end, how do you deal with that?

We have been on this journey of “PepsiCo Positive” with positive brands and positive products at the core of it for quite a few years. [We went,] even before any regulation in many markets, and said, ‘We have a target on sodium reduction that meets the WHO guardrails.’ We announced targets on saturated fat reduction. It’s a significant investment in reduction of both. In many markets, we are even ahead of the targets that we announced.

We just came out a few months back and announced a diverse ingredient target. That’s not something that was driven by specific regulation. We just realized that there is a gap in the human diet across the world on diverse ingredients, and we’ve linked that to better health. We want to add billions of diverse ingredient units to the human diet, and we think that’s the right thing to do.

That’s how we think about it: We always think about what are the things that we can do to continue to make our products and brands positive? It’s part of our core strategy of being better.

PepsiCo’s largest market is the United States. How does the U.S. influence what you do with messaging in the rest of the world?

It has a very important say in how we shape our brands and the future of the brands. A lot of what we do, we look at it as a global business and then make sure that it fits the needs of the local market, U.S. included.

There have been cases where we’ve done work that originated in the U.S. that we’ve taken to the rest of the world. And there have been cases where it’s been the other way around. [For] example, Popcorners: We saw the opportunity in the U.S. and now we’ve launched it in a couple of markets outside. The other way around: Flamin’ Hot, which is a very big platform in Latin America. We launched in the U.S. and it’s expanding. ‘No Lay’s, no game’ was developed for soccer. We believe this is a platform that is relevant everywhere in the world because sports watching is relevant.

We work very closely as one team. The U.S. is represented in the category leadership team because they’re an important market, and they have the scale that the other markets can benefit from.

Tell me about the Lay’s Kitchen initiative.

It’s something I’m very proud of. It goes back to what I shared with you about the growth opportunity of expanding occasions and our brands having a bigger role in the human eating experience. We know there’s a significant percentage of occasions where our brands just don't feature. We know that our brands are rooted in real. Lay’s especially—it is rooted in the potato. It is an experience of the potato, and you make it a great tasting potato that we believe is relevant to all eating occasions.

On top of thinking about occasions like sports watching, where Lay’s can play a role in this kind of format, we also understand that we can use this idea of the humble potato and transform it into ways that enable consumers to enjoy, and experience it in innovative ways that are exciting but also relevant to the occasion, whether it’s a meal occasion, or on the go, or away from home.

Lay’s Kitchen, launched in Disneyland Paris, started with that idea. We wanted to understand the reaction of Disney Paris guests to a waffle. We created four recipes based on a waffle made out of potato. I tried it without anything on it. It’s a fantastic experience and expression of the potato. We created four recipes where we added toppings and ingredients that are very relevant in France. We had a brie cheese flavor, we had a caramel flavor, [a chocolate flavor], and one was French onion flavor.

This was an actual business where people would line up. There was quite a line when I was there. The food was great, that was important. And the overall experience was great. It helps elevate the brand. It helps explain that Lays is an experience of the potato. It’s not just a chip. It is about how you experience the potato in new, innovative ways. It’s very local and a very relevant and engaging product because it’s a waffle with French toppings. I saw people who were so intrigued and taking pictures of the menu and talking about it. I don’t speak French that well, so I didn’t understand everything they said, but it could tell that they were happy.

That is just the starting point. Doritos Loaded started as an idea 18 months back. Now it’s in 30-plus countries. I believe giving consumers the opportunity to experience the potato in new and innovative ways through Lay’s is a big idea. That’s why I’m very excited about this.

[Lay’s Kitchen operated in Disneyland Paris for] less than two weeks. This is a capability and a journey, so we wanted to learn from it. Less than two weeks is actually not a short period of time. The logistics to run this for two weeks at high season has been quite interesting, but it also enables us to understand the business model, the logistics.

It’s not just about the brand: How you make the waffle, how you transport it, how you make sure that you have consistency of the ingredients, what are people buying, what’s their experience before and after. That’s actually why we’re doing this: to measure all of these things. I believe this will be just the start. And I’m pretty sure, based on the data I’ve seen so far and my own experience, that this is going to enable us to do so much more with Lay’s and with experience around the potato.