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Forbes
7 days ago
- Business
- Forbes
Self-Driving AI Is Transforming Retail Customer Experience
Charisma Glassman is Senior Partner & Global Head of Retail Advisory at Genpact, helping global brands transform the end-to-end value chain. In today's retail environment, consumers expect more than convenience. They want journeys that anticipate their needs and respond instantly at every touchpoint. To meet these expectations, many leading retailers and consumer brands are adopting the agentic mesh, a system of autonomous AI agents embedded at the front end of the customer journey. These agents work together to enrich each interaction, forming what my team likes to call the CARE cycle: connect, assist, reserve, enrich. This cycle converts hesitation into purchase and builds loyalty, all without human intervention. From Personalization To Self-Driving AI Personalization once meant remembering a customer's name or recommending a product based on past purchases. The agentic mesh meets this challenge by combining AI agents specializing in visual search, conversational commerce, pricing, fulfillment and loyalty. These agents continuously process data from websites, apps, stores, social media and external signals such as local weather. They identify key moments, take autonomous action and learn from results to improve over time. The mesh includes an insight layer that maintains a real-time customer profile, or customer graph. An orchestration engine triggers the right agents to act in sync based on observed behavior. Conversational and transactional autonomy allows these agents to engage customers proactively using product data, inventory levels, pricing logic and interaction history. A learning system—powered by A/B testing (which compares two versions of a feature to see which performs better) and multivariate testing (which evaluates multiple variables at once to find the most effective combination)—works alongside reinforcement learning to ensure the system continuously improves. The CARE Cycle In Action At the core of the agentic mesh is the CARE cycle. This framework shows how autonomous agents work together to improve outcomes across the customer journey. • Connect: The insight agent monitors signals like product page dwell time, cart abandonment and loyalty status. When friction is detected, it connects with the customer and activates the next step. • Assist: Specialized agents guide the shopper. A visual search agent can suggest similar products. A conversational agent can start a real-time dialogue to answer questions, clarify options or apply incentives. • Reserve: When intent is clear, a fulfillment agent reserves the item, applies any discounts and confirms delivery or pickup. This step helps secure the transaction and builds confidence. • Enrich: Loyalty agents add value by offering rewards such as bonus points, tier upgrades or exclusive content. I find these enrichments increase satisfaction and encourage repeat business. Each cycle feeds data back into the system, enabling smarter and more effective interactions in the future. Use Cases Across Retail And Consumer Brands When a high-value client lingers on a seasonal piece, the concierge agent might discreetly offer support: "I noticed you exploring the Alpine Trench Coat in charcoal. Would you like me to reserve it in your size with complimentary two-day delivery?" This helps replicate the attentiveness of an in-store associate at scale. A high-end home decor or couture brand might allow customers to upload inspiration photos rooms, runways or editorials. A visual agent could then use these images to generate a curated lookbook using in-stock pieces. If an item is low in availability, the fulfillment agent could suggest alternatives and notify inventory teams. A loyalty agent might offer a personalized styling consult, creating an experience that feels intimate, not transactional. For luxury beauty or wellness products, a brand could enable voice-first interactions that anticipate restocks. For example, a conversational agent could say something like: "It looks like you're running low on your Signature Candle. Shall I reorder and include an exclusive seasonal scent sample?" Returns are sensitive moments. An agentic mesh could identify return intent and trigger a return agent to arrange pickup, auto-generate shipping labels and recommend tailored alternatives. A loyalty agent might follow up with a thank-you gesture or credit, preserving your brand's reputation for elegance and care. A luxury beauty or fashion brand could track engagement across purchases, app usage and social interactions. When a client nears a loyalty tier, they might be offered a quiz, an exclusive event RSVP or a boutique check-in. Completion can unlock tier upgrades or limited-edition gifts, deepening connection and prestige. How To Build An Agentic Mesh 1. Identify high-impact moments. Start by mapping customer pain points such as cart drop-off, loyalty churn or slow returns. These are great opportunities for agentic intervention. 2. Build the mesh stack. Create a real-time insights layer that powers a unified customer view. Add an orchestration engine to dispatch the right AI agents. Include modular agents for key actions like search, chat, fulfillment and rewards. Use a test-and-learn loop to refine strategies. 3. Start with pilots. Choose one or two focused pilots, such as the shopping concierge or returns optimizer. Measure success by tracking increases in conversion, retention or satisfaction. Expand gradually based on performance. 4. Create strong governance. Implement clear rules around data privacy and fairness. Make sure each autonomous action can be audited. Provide override options where needed. 5. Scale with AI operations. As successful use cases grow, move from experiments to an AI operations hub. This team will be key in monitoring system health, scaling up working patterns and looking for new applications of the CARE cycle. The Future Belongs To The Agentic Mesh As artificial intelligence moves beyond basic personalization, the agentic mesh offers a new standard for customer engagement. Through my experience helping brands transform their end-to-end value chain with AI, I find the CARE cycle to be an increasingly necessary strategy to set the pace for future commerce and enable self-driving experiences. Forbes Business Council is the foremost growth and networking organization for business owners and leaders. Do I qualify?
Forbes
04-08-2025
- Business
- Forbes
Reimagining Crisis Leadership For The New Normal
Dahlia Mihyar is the VP and Global Head of National Security Accreditation at SAP. The world is a colder place than it was in the past. Multiple regional conflicts seem perpetually at a knife's edge, moments from exploding to a global scale; old axes of economic and political power are shifting as alliances are broken and remade; conflicts between great powers, even if more tension than outright aggression, have yielded a scramble for data, infrastructure and technology autonomy, as countries tighten their digital dependencies and privacy regulations like feudal lords pulling up their castle drawbridges. Globalism is over; we are now in an era of multipolar chaos, where national security, sovereignty and self-interest are the domineering forces at play. And within that harrowing context, the ideas of crisis leadership and management at the enterprise level have been forced to evolve rapidly. Managing Crises, Then And Now In the past, crisis leadership was primarily focused on internal emergencies, such as cyberattacks against the company, reputational crises or scandals, sudden financial upheavals within the company, or even kidnapping or hostage situations during business travel. (You would see that particular focus more prominently in industries like oil and gas.) Many companies had some version of a crisis management team or role, and traditionally, those roles focused more on projection than action: If you're operating in oil-rich regions like Cameroon or Nigeria, how do you assess the risk of kidnapping or cyberattack? Or, when a cyberattack gets severe, how and in what capacity would you involve the local government? But the new phase of crisis leadership goes beyond these traditional focuses. As geopolitical tensions escalate, global enterprises are being impacted. Consider a scenario in which a war breaks out in a region where a company has a major presence, or a mass-casualty terrorist attack occurs; the managing director of a company might suddenly be responsible for verifying employee safety, coordinating evacuations and overseeing other emergency logistics. Actions that weren't previously considered within the scope of mainstream management would now be part and parcel of the role, which is why having a designated crisis leadership team is critical. The problem is that although modern crisis leadership increasingly must account for external, global challenges (wars, pandemics, broad economic collapse), most companies simply aren't hiring with this in mind. When people are recruited for leadership roles, the focus tends to still be on KPIs or metrics—whatever makes the role successful in a 'business as usual' context. Not enough companies are asking the hard questions: How do you respond in a crisis? Do you have the skill set to lead in high-pressure, uncertain situations? What would you do if, suddenly, everything were on fire? Key Capacities For Crisis Management Part of the challenge in hiring for crisis management is that the best candidate may not have metrics, certifications or degrees to support their qualification. As they reassess qualifications for these roles, company leaders might be uncertain what they should be looking for. One major criterion for success in crisis management: a cool head. Patience is critical. When a crisis strikes, you rarely have all the information immediately available. You have to take a step back, assess the situation and identify whom to contact to get the right data ... all before making any decisions. That's how you avoid creating panic. Strong relationships are also key. You could be the smartest person in the room, but if you don't have connections—across your industry, inside your company, with government contacts—you won't be able to get anything done. In a crisis, it's all about who you know. You need contacts in government liaison offices, law enforcement and internal departments; you need access to people who can get information and maneuver quickly. That's how you generate real action. In a panel I moderated recently in Dubai, entitled 'The New Reality of Crisis Leadership,' we discussed the importance of building crisis management relationships before you need them. A lot of people don't take the time to do this because, frankly, crises aren't frequent—so they don't see it as necessary. But this is short-sighted: With escalating regulatory requirements around the world, as well as the increasing frequency of events such as cyberattacks, having government contacts is key. Moreover, each country has different rules; multinational businesses will often need local enforcement and cross-functional coordination to navigate those effectively. It isn't about building transactional connections, but actual relationships, so that you all can help each other reciprocally in times of crisis. And if you haven't built those relationships ahead of time, when a crisis hits, you're already behind. When The Network Is The Head Start But the right type of person doesn't necessarily have to already possess a Rolodex of connections. If you don't have those networks, then start creating them—just begin with one person. It's not about knowing 20 people; one great contact is more helpful than a dozen mediocre ones. Start showing up: Attend networking sessions, and join professional groups. There are always niche security or crisis response groups being held. For example, I attend presentations organized by OSAC (the Overseas Security Advisory Council), which is run by the U.S. Consulate. They bring together people in corporate security roles. Sometimes the sessions are deep and insightful, and sometimes you just pop in, say hi and leave—but over time, you get to know people who might be able to help you (and vice versa) down the line. The key is: Start before the panic. There's no worse time to begin building relationships than in the middle of a crisis. Also, understand that you'll never know everything. You could be the smartest, calmest person in the room and have the best-prepared plan, but you'll still need help. You'll still need someone to call. Asking for help is underrated. There's nothing wrong with saying, 'I don't know what to do—whom should I talk to?' It's all about starting and, more importantly, staying consistent. Keep the relationships alive. You don't need to call every week, but grab a coffee every few months. When the time comes and you do need something, they'll respond more quickly because you've already built a connection. Refining The Crisis Process A lot of organizations do have systems for crisis management, at least on paper. For example, our company (like many others) has a crisis management team that includes key people from different departments. When an event occurs, a systematic process gets triggered through an automated alert system, prompting us to jump on a call immediately to discuss the situation at hand. Those kinds of alert-management tools are useful. But the bigger issue is that most organizations need more tabletop exercises—simulations that help us stress-test the process. It's not just about reacting well in the moment. It's about asking throughout the year: Do we have the right people in this group? Are we missing any critical skill sets? Do we need to rethink our scenarios given how fast the geopolitical landscape is shifting? Governments are changing how they operate, too. Today, your country's aligned with another; tomorrow, that could shift. So, companies need to constantly re-evaluate, not just annually, but multiple times per year. Waiting for the panic moment is too late. A Necessary Reality Check Does this all sound like doom and gloom? Perhaps. I prefer to think of it as healthy realism. The takeaway is this: No one is relaxing. A mere glance at global news will tell you that everyone is preparing—militarily, economically, digitally. Countries are both ramping up their defenses and reemphasizing the sovereignty of data and assets. They want control over their information, their citizens, their future. They're building their own firewalls, literally and figuratively. Companies need to do the same. Today, enterprise leaders need to look at how their policies align or conflict with the countries in which they operate. There are more regulatory demands than ever before, and companies need reporting protocols for incidents. In highly sovereign or classified environments, countries may want their own nationals handling the most sensitive data. You can't just align to your corporate values anymore—you also have to follow your host country's rules. The business model of operating globally is becoming ever more complicated. We're living in a time of chaos, and companies must take that seriously. If they're focusing only on sales, growth and production, then it's time to re-evaluate for their own self-preservation. Security, crisis preparedness, resilience ... these aren't optional anymore. In fact, they are the only way through. Forbes Technology Council is an invitation-only community for world-class CIOs, CTOs and technology executives. Do I qualify?
CNA
17-07-2025
- Business
- CNA
Multinational clients are rethinking global supply chains amid tariff turbulence: Citi
Shahmir Khaliq, Citibank's Global Head of Services, outlines how multinational clients are reassessing manufacturing locations, reconfiguring trade routes and adjusting strategies in response to escalating geopolitical tensions and economic volatility.
