Today is Darwin's 200th birthday, so what better time to reflect on the evolution of e-commerce leadership.
A recent article about e-commerce executive recruiting in Times Online reveals that retail experience is among the least important attributes that retailers now seek when hiring someone to lead their online effort. While at first I was surprised, some quick memory checking made me realize how much the e-commerce leader's role has changed in the last decade, and how very different the skill set requirements have become. Still, when I thought about the important perspective that a seasoned retailer brings to the online channel, I'm nI decided I wasn't necessarily willing to push retail experience to the bottom of the pile. Here's why:
In the years following my graduation from college, I spent a lot of time on the selling floor of retail stores. It was the early 80's; there was a recession going on (sound familiar?) and jobs were scarce. It wasn't glamorous. My feet hurt, it didn't pay well, and the customers were demanding. I was glad to leave. But, 15 years later, as a pioneer in the early days of e-commerce, I drew from that selling floor experience in a big way. When I had to think through how to present a product online, what information a customer would need to make a decision, how to communicate helpful service information without a human, I thought back to those days when I had to look the customer in the eye (not in the email address) and tell them that the item they wanted was out of stock or that the sale didn't start till tomorrow and I couldn't honor the price today. I remembered that sick feeling in the pit of my stomach when I had to walk a customer because I didn't have what they wanted. To this day, when I am getting a website ready to launch, I think about how I had to be sure that the selling floor was "ready for showtime" every morning, with the best selling products front and center, the right signs on the fixtures and my brain up to speed with what specials were running and what new items had just come in. Today, as an e-commerce consultant, I can always tell when the client I'm working with came from the retail ranks. They are typically the ones with an intuitive sensitivity to the customer experience and a maniacal sense of urgency about every customer facing detail. I never ask, but I suspect they have that same sick feeling in the pit of their stomach when the customer isn't happy.
Of course, e-commerce has grown up, and with it, the expectations of the e-commerce leader. In the beginning, retailers had no choice other than to choose a passionate person from the inside. After all, when an industry is only a few years old, there are no seasoned veterans to choose from. Early stage e-commerce leaders relied heavily on their offline institutional knowledge and internal company relationships to get things done. They found insight and validation from their peers at other companies through Shop.org and regional/local networking groups springing up to share information. They became evangelists in their organizations, and were often the catalyst for channel coordination and integration; and who better to do this, they were the ones who had a view of what the future retail experience was going to be.
As the online business matured, these e-commerce leaders became a very special breed: seasoned execs who not only had an extensive background in traditional retail or catalog operations, but who now offered a bonus layer of expertise in how to get it done online.
But, sometimes evolution happens very quickly, as it has in e-commerce. The demand for seasoned e-commerce leaders has outpaced the supply. E-commerce businesses and technologies have become more sophisticated and complex. E-commerce now represents a substantial portion of many retailers' sales and profits. For most retailers, e-commerce represents one of the few bright spots of growth and innovation.
Retailers eager to make the most of the online channel may no longer have the luxury of putting a good store/catalog person in charge of e-commerce and letting them "figure it out". The learning curve has gotten steep and the e-commerce leadership job now comes with c-level expectations and demands. When seeking an online leader, the Times Online article points out, retailers may cast a wider net for talent. That net may include top tier talent with little or no experience in retail.
In the wide net, you may find someone with the right leadership and vision to drive e-commerce, but before you leap to hire someone without retail chops, think about these questions:
- Who else on the e-commerce team can be the retail voice? Is their voice loud enough and respected enough to be heard?
- Is the boss of this potential new leader someone with a strong retail mindset and can they provide mentorship in this area?
- How critical are cross-channel and multi-channel initiatives in your organization? Will this potential new leader understand the complexities and cultural challenges in executing these initiatives without hands-on retail experience?
And finally:
- Has the potential new exec spent any meaningful time dealing directly with customers, and in what capacity? In other words, have they had to look the customer in they eye (not in the email address)? And what gives them that sick feeling in the pit of the stomach?
There are consequences to taking retail out of your e-commerce gene pool. Be sure you're ready for them.
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