In this interview, Peter High and Pawan Verma discuss World Class IT Principle Four, IT and Business Partnership, and Principle Five, External Partnerships. Among the other topics they discuss include:

Pawan’s diverse role as Global CIO/CTO, which encompasses overseeing Foot Locker’s global technology function, the digital supply chain, digital marketing and the customer experience across physical and digital touchpoints, and driving loyalty

How Foot Locker uses customer journey mapping to activate strong signals and amplify weak signals to better understand the rapidly changing expectations of their customers

Why machine learning and data analytics is playing an increasingly important role in enabling rapid decision making, and the ways in which the technical team of data scientists collaborates with the business

The three foundational elements of Foot Locker’s customer loyalty strategy, which include (1) engage and earn, (2) redeem, and (3) freshness

The customer-facing aspects of Pawan’s responsibilities, and how having end-to-end visibility enables him to find synergies, respond to customers more quickly, and serve them in a more meaningful way

Eye on the Trends: artificial intelligence, blockchain, experiential commerce, connectivity and networks