Transformation
Talk through the work that needs to change.
For leaders looking for a grounded conversation about operations, transformation, and the decisions in front of them.
Experience
Thirty-five years inside the work of running businesses.
Sumith Jayawickrama's perspective was built in operating roles at Dilmah Tea, Global Sea Foods, AGC Alokozay, Basilur Tea, and T.K. Fastner Lanka — close to the systems, processes, teams, and decisions that make a business work.
The operating record
Judgement formed where the work happens.
The work has involved building and leading operations: making processes usable, giving teams clearer routines, and connecting information to the decisions people need to make.
ERP rollout, ISO systems, Kaizen practice, manufacturing, FMCG distribution, blending, packing, export, refrigeration, automation, and controls are not abstractions here. They are the operating contexts that shaped how Sumith sees performance and change.
Career chronology
Five chapters of operating leadership.
Each role brought a different business, market, and operating challenge. The through-line has been practical leadership: understand the work, strengthen the system around it, and help people make better decisions together.
- 2011 — Director, Operations · Basilur Tea Colombo, Sri Lanka
Operations across blending, packing, and export — ERP, ISO and Kaizen running on the floor, not in a binder.
- 2009 — 2010 General Manager · AGC Alokozay Dubai, UAE
FMCG distribution across the GCC, with the daily reality of demand, supply, and execution close at hand.
- 2006 — 2009 General Manager · Global Sea Foods (GSF) Sri Lanka
Refrigeration, automation, controls, and the operational work behind a cold-room plant.
- 1993 — 2006 Senior Manager · Dilmah Tea Sri Lanka
ERP rollout, ISO systems, and Kaizen practice inside a disciplined tea operation.
- 1986 — 1993 General Manager · T.K. Fastner Lanka Sri Lanka
Manufacturing, machining, and fasteners — the first sustained lesson in reading a shop floor.
What those years taught
The shop floor was the first teacher.
Cleaning floors. Testing products in laboratories. Running factories. Managing teams. Each part of the work made the next one easier to see: information either flows to the people who need it, or it creates delay, uncertainty, and avoidable effort.
Along the way, Sumith gained hands-on experience and training in eight countries. The point was never to collect credentials; it was to keep learning how different businesses organise work, solve problems, and improve.
- Singapore
- Taiwan
- Japan
- USA
- UK
- Italy
- China
- Germany
A supporting capability
AI has a job to do in the operating system.
The Unified Decision Engine (UDE) System brings together information from spreadsheets, manual records, and enterprise systems, then connects it with AI tools so people can work with clearer, more timely information.
It is a practical extension of the same operating question: can the right person see the right information at the right time and act on it? AI supports management judgement; it does not replace responsibility for the work.
Recognition
CEO Magazine Sri Lanka
CEO Magazine Sri Lanka featured Sumith as one of the region's leading AI practitioners. Earlier, the European Business Assembly named him Best General Manager (Oxford, 2016).
Education
Bachelor of Commerce
University of Kelaniya, Sri Lanka.
The rest of the curriculum has been cost sheets, audits, ERP rollouts, factory floors, and — lately — large language models.
Work together
Bring the next operating question into the room.
Speaking
Give leaders a more useful conversation about change.
Keynotes, panels, and leadership sessions grounded in the realities of making businesses work better.