Digital Transformation in Retail - 13 Action Steps

  1. Recognize the need for digital transformation extends beyond websites and mobile apps to the entire organization and across all business processes.
  2. Understand the degree of change occurring in retail as a result of customers’ fast-changing behaviors.
  3. Judge accurately where your organization stands on a digital technologies maturity curve.
  4. Show the necessary leadership to change strategies, budget priorities and plans based on new data, trends and insights, and then make the required investments in digital technologies, people and skills to compete successfully.
  5. See that traditional channel-centric strategies are no longer viable; rather, retailers must adopt precise, customer-centric strategies, enabled by digital technologies.
  6. Don’t excuse slow adoption of digital technologies, as the data is clear and compelling and demands immediate action.
  7. Think with a digital mindset, intimately understand the capabilities of digital technologies, understand digital’s role and importance in customer interactions, and develop new digital business models, processes and strategies for supporting today’s and tomorrow’s digital markets and consumers.
  8. Realize that digital transformation and the industry’s adoption of digital technologies are occurring on an accelerated schedule that peaks around 2020. It waits for no retailer’s budget cycles, three-year master plan, leadership change or strategy.
  9. Align the pace of digital transformation initiatives with the speed at which consumers are adopting digital technologies, behaviors, markets and thinking. This might mean over-investment in the near term to catch up or stay ahead of the competition.
  10. Unify disparate digital transformation initiatives behind a single company-wide digital transformation doctrine – a guiding statement that effectively describes the reason for digital transformation, what needs to happen and what winning looks like. This doctrine must be used to direct and shape the entire company’s efforts.
  11. Closely monitor the business impact of rapidly emerging digital technologies to ensure investments are prioritized and acted upon in the right time and place to maximize ROI and competitive advantage, while also balancing the need to innovate and embrace a fail-fast, test and learn mentality.
  12. Understand how digital transformation will alter traditional retail roles, responsibilities and skills for all associates.
  13. Pay close attention to how digital transformation shapes and changes consumers’ interactions and experiences, and train associates to best serve digitally enabled consumers.
 Follow Kevin Benedict on Twitter @krbenedict, or read more of his articles on digital transformation strategies here:
  1. Mistakes in Retail Digital Transformation
  2. Winning Strategies for the Fourth Industrial Revolution
  3. Digital Transformation - Mindset Differences
  4. Analyzing Retail Through Digital Lenses
  5. Digital Thinking and Beyond!
  6. Measuring the Pace of Change in the Fourth Industrial Revolution
  7. How Digital Thinking Separates Retail Leaders from Laggards
  8. To Bot, or Not to Bot
  9. Oils, Bots, AI and Clogged Arteries
  10. Artificial Intelligence Out of Doors in the Kingdom of Robots
  11. How Digital Leaders are Different
  12. The Three Tsunamis of Digital Transformation - Be Prepared!
  13. Bots, AI and the Next 40 Months
  14. You Only Have 40 Months to Digitally Transform
  15. Digital Technologies and the Greater Good
  16. Video Report: 40 Months of Hyper-Digital Transformation
  17. Report: 40 Months of Hyper-Digital Transformation
  18. Virtual Moves to Real in with Sensors and Digital Transformation
  19. Technology Must Disappear in 2017
  20. Merging Humans with AI and Machine Learning Systems
  21. In Defense of the Human Experience in a Digital World
  22. Profits that Kill in the Age of Digital Transformation
  23. Competing in Future Time and Digital Transformation
  24. Digital Hope and Redemption in the Digital Age
  25. Digital Transformation and the Role of Faster
  26. Digital Transformation and the Law of Thermodynamics
  27. Jettison the Heavy Baggage and Digitally Transform
  28. Digital Transformation - The Dark Side
  29. Business is Not as Usual in Digital Transformation
  30. 15 Rules for Winning in Digital Transformation
  31. The End Goal of Digital Transformation
  32. Digital Transformation and the Ignorance Penalty
  33. Surviving the Three Ages of Digital Transformation
  34. The Advantages of an Advantage in Digital Transformation
  35. From Digital to Hyper-Transformation
  36. Believers, Non-Believers and Digital Transformation
  37. Forces Driving the Digital Transformation Era
  38. Digital Transformation Requires Agility and Energy Measurement
  39. A Doctrine for Digital Transformation is Required
  40. Digital Transformation and Its Role in Mobility and Competition
  41. Digital Transformation - A Revolution in Precision Through IoT, Analytics and Mobility
  42. Competing in Digital Transformation and Mobility
  43. Ambiguity and Digital Transformation
  44. Digital Transformation and Mobility - Macro-Forces and Timing
  45. Mobile and IoT Technologies are Inside the Curve of Human Time
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Kevin Benedict
Senior Analyst, Center for the Future of Work, Cognizant
View my profile on LinkedIn
Follow me on Twitter @krbenedict
Subscribe to Kevin's YouTube Channel
Join the Linkedin Group Strategic Enterprise Mobility
Join the Google+ Community Mobile Enterprise Strategies

***Full Disclosure: These are my personal opinions. No company is silly enough to claim them. I am a mobility and digital transformation analyst, consultant and writer. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.

Mistakes Retailers Make in Digital Transformation

  1. Failing to stay fully on top of changing customers’ needs and behaviors.
  2. Focusing insufficiently on cybersecurity.
  3. Ignoring fresh thinking from outside the company.
  4. Lacking a clear digital strategy.
  5. Moving too slowly. 
  1. Winning Strategies for the Fourth Industrial Revolution
  2. Digital Transformation - Mindset Differences
  3. Analyzing Retail Through Digital Lenses
  4. Digital Thinking and Beyond!
  5. Measuring the Pace of Change in the Fourth Industrial Revolution
  6. How Digital Thinking Separates Retail Leaders from Laggards
  7. To Bot, or Not to Bot
  8. Oils, Bots, AI and Clogged Arteries
  9. Artificial Intelligence Out of Doors in the Kingdom of Robots
  10. How Digital Leaders are Different
  11. The Three Tsunamis of Digital Transformation - Be Prepared!
  12. Bots, AI and the Next 40 Months
  13. You Only Have 40 Months to Digitally Transform
  14. Digital Technologies and the Greater Good
  15. Video Report: 40 Months of Hyper-Digital Transformation
  16. Report: 40 Months of Hyper-Digital Transformation
  17. Virtual Moves to Real in with Sensors and Digital Transformation
  18. Technology Must Disappear in 2017
  19. Merging Humans with AI and Machine Learning Systems
  20. In Defense of the Human Experience in a Digital World
  21. Profits that Kill in the Age of Digital Transformation
  22. Competing in Future Time and Digital Transformation
  23. Digital Hope and Redemption in the Digital Age
  24. Digital Transformation and the Role of Faster
  25. Digital Transformation and the Law of Thermodynamics
  26. Jettison the Heavy Baggage and Digitally Transform
  27. Digital Transformation - The Dark Side
  28. Business is Not as Usual in Digital Transformation
  29. 15 Rules for Winning in Digital Transformation
  30. The End Goal of Digital Transformation
  31. Digital Transformation and the Ignorance Penalty
  32. Surviving the Three Ages of Digital Transformation
  33. The Advantages of an Advantage in Digital Transformation
  34. From Digital to Hyper-Transformation
  35. Believers, Non-Believers and Digital Transformation
  36. Forces Driving the Digital Transformation Era
  37. Digital Transformation Requires Agility and Energy Measurement
  38. A Doctrine for Digital Transformation is Required
  39. Digital Transformation and Its Role in Mobility and Competition
  40. Digital Transformation - A Revolution in Precision Through IoT, Analytics and Mobility
  41. Competing in Digital Transformation and Mobility
  42. Ambiguity and Digital Transformation
  43. Digital Transformation and Mobility - Macro-Forces and Timing
  44. Mobile and IoT Technologies are Inside the Curve of Human Time

************************************************************************
Kevin Benedict
Senior Analyst, Center for the Future of Work, Cognizant
View my profile on LinkedIn
Follow me on Twitter @krbenedict
Subscribe to Kevin's YouTube Channel
Join the Linkedin Group Strategic Enterprise Mobility
Join the Google+ Community Mobile Enterprise Strategies

***Full Disclosure: These are my personal opinions. No company is silly enough to claim them. I am a mobility and digital transformation analyst, consultant and writer. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.

Winning Strategies for the Fourth Industrial Revolution


For executives, transforming an enterprise is always difficult, but when an enterprise is highly profitable - digital transformation is even harder. The temptation to follow the maxim, “Don’t fix what isn’t broken,” is just too compelling.  "When you average 8% same-store sales [growth] for 35 years, it can breed a sense of, 'Why do we need to change? Things are working,'" John Mackey, CEO of Whole Foods, said in a recent interview with The Wall Street Journal.  Today, however, Whole Foods is struggling to compete with other lower priced grocery stores that have embraced organics and healthier foods.  If you take your eye off the game for a second, consumers will change directions on you.

The challenge enterprises are faced with today is that digital technologies are changing the way consumers behave faster and in different ways than executives have ever seen before.  Today’s profits can hide or mask the serious problems of tomorrow.

Competitors can’t compete, and leaders can’t lead if they don’t know the rules of the game.  Understanding how the game is played, and how points are scored, are key to any competition.  In the age of digital transformation these are some of the key rules to learn in order to score:
  1. Data is the modern commercial playing field, information dominance is your goal, those that can “act and with speed” have the advantage over those which cannot.
  2. Advantages in the speed of data-driven decision-making, automation, robotic process automation will dictate the winners of tomorrow.  
  3. Complexity is the enemy of agility, and acts as poison from the past.
  4. It takes an optimized Information Logistics Systems (OILS) to support real-time digital interactions.
  5. Faster operational tempos and information logistics systems – open up a plethora of new business opportunities and business models.
  6. Precision and real-time data beats estimates and conjecture.
  7. Digital interactions require real-time business operational tempos.
  8. Bad data will make the smartest systems dumb.  
  9. Competitive advantages from new technologies depreciate quickly – so act fast.
  10. Situational awareness enables management to focus on the knowns, rather than the unknowns.
  11. Demand for real-time digital customer interactions increases the need for contextually relevant and personalized user experiences and digital transformation across all systems and processes.
  12. Data has a shelf life, and the economic value of data diminishes quickly over time, and the more data that is collected analyzed and used, the greater the economic value it produces in aggregate. In addition, the economic value of data multiplies when combined with context and right time delivery.
  13. Digits can be changed faster than the human mindset.
These rules not only help you understand how to compete and win, but they should also guide enterprises in their development of a digital transformation doctrine – a guiding and unifying statement as to the purpose, desired effect and outcome that is wanted.


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These rules not only help you understand how to compete and win, but they should also guide enterprises in their development of a digital transformation doctrine – a guiding and unifying statement as to the purpose, desired effect and outcome that is wanted.

I invite you to watch my latest short video on digital technology trends and strategies: 
Download the full report with charts and data sources here: https://www.cognizant.com/FoW/twa-hyper-digital-transformation-codex2478.pdf

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Kevin Benedict
Senior Analyst, Center for the Future of Work, Cognizant
View my profile on LinkedIn
Follow me on Twitter @krbenedict
Subscribe to Kevin's YouTube Channel
Join the Linkedin Group Strategic Enterprise Mobility
Join the Google+ Community Mobile Enterprise Strategies

***Full Disclosure: These are my personal opinions. No company is silly enough to claim them. I am a mobility and digital transformation analyst, consultant and writer. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.

Digital Transformation - Mindset Differences

  1. Analyzing Retail Through Digital Lenses
  2. Digital Thinking and Beyond!
  3. Measuring the Pace of Change in the Fourth Industrial Revolution
  4. How Digital Thinking Separates Retail Leaders from Laggards
  5. To Bot, or Not to Bot
  6. Oils, Bots, AI and Clogged Arteries
  7. Artificial Intelligence Out of Doors in the Kingdom of Robots
  8. How Digital Leaders are Different
  9. The Three Tsunamis of Digital Transformation - Be Prepared!
  10. Bots, AI and the Next 40 Months
  11. You Only Have 40 Months to Digitally Transform
  12. Digital Technologies and the Greater Good
  13. Video Report: 40 Months of Hyper-Digital Transformation
  14. Report: 40 Months of Hyper-Digital Transformation
  15. Virtual Moves to Real in with Sensors and Digital Transformation
  16. Technology Must Disappear in 2017
  17. Merging Humans with AI and Machine Learning Systems
  18. In Defense of the Human Experience in a Digital World
  19. Profits that Kill in the Age of Digital Transformation
  20. Competing in Future Time and Digital Transformation
  21. Digital Hope and Redemption in the Digital Age
  22. Digital Transformation and the Role of Faster
  23. Digital Transformation and the Law of Thermodynamics
  24. Jettison the Heavy Baggage and Digitally Transform
  25. Digital Transformation - The Dark Side
  26. Business is Not as Usual in Digital Transformation
  27. 15 Rules for Winning in Digital Transformation
  28. The End Goal of Digital Transformation
  29. Digital Transformation and the Ignorance Penalty
  30. Surviving the Three Ages of Digital Transformation
  31. The Advantages of an Advantage in Digital Transformation
  32. From Digital to Hyper-Transformation
  33. Believers, Non-Believers and Digital Transformation
  34. Forces Driving the Digital Transformation Era
  35. Digital Transformation Requires Agility and Energy Measurement
  36. A Doctrine for Digital Transformation is Required
  37. Digital Transformation and Its Role in Mobility and Competition
  38. Digital Transformation - A Revolution in Precision Through IoT, Analytics and Mobility
  39. Competing in Digital Transformation and Mobility
  40. Ambiguity and Digital Transformation
  41. Digital Transformation and Mobility - Macro-Forces and Timing
  42. Mobile and IoT Technologies are Inside the Curve of Human Time
************************************************************************
Kevin Benedict
Senior Analyst, Center for the Future of Work, Cognizant
View my profile on LinkedIn
Follow me on Twitter @krbenedict
Subscribe to Kevin's YouTube Channel
Join the Linkedin Group Strategic Enterprise Mobility
Join the Google+ Community Mobile Enterprise Strategies

***Full Disclosure: These are my personal opinions. No company is silly enough to claim them. I am a mobility and digital transformation analyst, consultant and writer. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.

Digital Transformation and Time-Space Compression

Speed impacts us in many different and unexpected ways.  It can alter how we perceive the world.  For example, a person might say they live 5 minutes from town.  Five minutes of walking is a third of a mile.  Five minutes by automobile is 5 miles - by airline it could be over 40 miles.  Our perception of five minutes, and the distance and space that can be covered, changes as technologies advance.  Our expectations about what can be accomplished in 5 minutes are transformed.  Instead of one hour of shopping in a brick and mortar store, we expect to accomplish the same in one minute online.  Dr. Paul Virilio a “philosopher of speed” wrote that increasing speeds destroy space, compress time, and alter the way humans perceive reality.   

Time-space compression occurs as a result of technologies that seem to accelerate speed and reduce distances.  Digital technologies such as broadband internet, IoT, smartphones, social media, webcams, Skype, mobile messaging apps, satellites, mobile payments, mobile banking, digital commerce, etc.  All of these digital technologies and capabilities enable us to experience events, participate in activities and collaborate instantly from anywhere in the world.  These capabilities change our expectations and habits, both personally and in our commercial dealings.  Organizations that don’t recognize how their customers’ realities and perceptions are changing and why - won’t succeed.
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Kevin Benedict
Senior Analyst, Center for the Future of Work, Cognizant
View my profile on LinkedIn
Follow me on Twitter @krbenedict
Subscribe to Kevin's YouTube Channel
Join the Linkedin Group Strategic Enterprise Mobility
Join the Google+ Community Mobile Enterprise Strategies

***Full Disclosure: These are my personal opinions. No company is silly enough to claim them. I am a mobility and digital transformation analyst, consultant and writer. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.

Chatbots Rising - Learning from Oracle's Suhas Uliyar



    Kevin Benedict
    Senior Analyst, Center for the Future of Work, Cognizant
    View my profile on LinkedIn
    Follow me on Twitter @krbenedict
    Subscribe to Kevin's YouTube Channel
    Join the Linkedin Group Strategic Enterprise Mobility
    Join the Google+ Community Mobile Enterprise Strategies

    ***Full Disclosure: These are my personal opinions. No company is silly enough to claim them. I am a mobility and digital transformation analyst, consultant and writer. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.

    Interviews with Kevin Benedict