I Am Dorothy, The Small And Meek

#ecommerce The State of Unification: If we believe what we are told, today's speech will be about the desire to Unify - similar to the message at #NRF last week. Unified everything is the mantra for the second half of this decade. Last week, I did see how investment in Unification is also splitting decisions on investment cycles. Unified commerce may be the destination but the journey to it may still seem far away for many.

Single view on inventory, Single view on Stock, please welcome Single view on Systems, People and Process. I am being glib to a point but this is the state of Unification.

This should remain the goal for most but was what became even mpore evident was that the journey to get there is longer:

> Not many willing to fully replatform. Lack of experience, skills and appetite. The Riskometer is in the red.

> Stores power is beginning to win versus what was "DTC" rhetoric. This should not be a perennial tustle, but it remains so. Column inches are being spread further into store stories. Chapter 11 aside. CEOs betting safe.

> Ironically, the best performing retailers/brands are those with evolved, long term solutions in place.

> Experience in stores and in ecomm has become siloed. Such has been the depth of expertise required in certain fields, that your ability to be a strong generalist reduced. A good generalist is better than a great specialist in heads of functions. A good generalist will know where to give freedom.

> Investment in the customer has got to be the key consideration. Most investment and why I called out this seperation (Store vs Online investment) is because we are thinking from the inside <> out. Solve our problems first and wrap them in customer experience. Hard to achieve. Good customer policies with depth and data to inform you an help solve process, people and technology prioritization.

The Wizard of Oz, The Yellow Brick Road and Pink Floyd - The journey will take many paths - And along the way, this changes. We look off the East ands the Wicked Witch of AI or the Emerald City of "New stuff" to distract us. But tech moves so hard it is hard to see the woodcutters from the trees. Ultimately, we need a heart, a brain and courage, not always in this order to make the right changes, but we do need to start somehere.

In this day and age, not starting is not an option and we do not have magical red, high heel shoes, (mine are regular, not magic) that can bring us home at any time we want. But on Jan 20th 2025, we can say for certain - we are not in Kansas anymore.