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Transcript
Our transcripts are generated by AI. Please excuse any typos and if you have any specific questions please email info@digitalshelfinstitute.org.
Lauren Livak Gilbert (00:00):
Welcome to Unpacking the Digital Shelf, where industry leaders share insights, strategies, and stories to help brands win in the ever-changing world of commerce.
Peter Crosby (00:22):
Hey everyone, Peter Crosby here from the Digital Shelf Institute. Digital transformation was once sold as a destination. Today, we know the reality. It is a permanent state of being. As AI and agentic commerce accelerate the pace of disruption, your teams aren't just facing new tools, they are facing transformation fatigue. How do you keep your workforce engaged, agile, and optimistic when the finish line keeps moving? This episode is an audio rebroadcast of a Digital Shelf Summit 2026 session that tackles the human side of the agentic revolution. Our guests, Chelsea Alexander, CEO and founder at OpenGate Consulting, Jennifer Angelis, Senior Director, Digital Shelf, Ecosystems and Capabilities at Danone, Malvika Jagi, VP Partnerships and Platforms at OneTree Brands, Jyoti Malik, Sr. Director, eCommerce at Spectrum Brands, share practical strategies for managing resistance, communicating vision during chaotic times, and building an organization that doesn't just endure disruption, but thrives on it.
01:24 Chelsea Alexander: Well, thank you so much for attending this session. We've got some really cool stuff for you today. So my name is Chelsea Alexander. I'm the CEO and founder, excuse me, of OpenGate Consulting. We specialize in business transformation and digital commerce innovation, okay? And I'm super excited to talk to you about change management today, and I'm going to soon be joined by some fantastic panelists. But first, I wanna do a little bit of grounding and some things that I've learned in my work as a consultant around change management.
01:56 Chelsea Alexander: So first and foremost, and especially coming after a day and a half of sessions at this wonderful conference, we know that there is no shortage of change management in corporate America today, right? I'm not telling you anything you don't know. I see some violent head nods. But just a couple of interesting pieces. So obviously, the general economy, but also different economic uncertainties are causing a number of companies to announce significant reductions in their overall workforce. Procter & Gamble said they're gonna slash about 7,000 jobs, and also a number of other companies have also announced the same.
02:33 Chelsea Alexander: Also, this was interesting. So there's been a number of companies that have changed CEOs. In the last 12 to 14 months, I counted, it's 22 companies that have announced that they're gonna change CEOs. So obviously, change management from a general sense, any type of change drives a drastic number of changes within an organization. But when you're changing the CEO of a business over the next 12 to 14 months, and many others within your competitive set are doing the same, it drives a lot of change, right?
03:04 Chelsea Alexander: Now, this one is probably no surprise to many of you. CPG manufacturers are calling one of the critical competitiveness levers, AI. No surprise. But what's interesting, so Schneider Electric did a study. They talked to about 1,500 executives. And what they're saying is that actually, there is a gap between AI ROI that is expected and what they're actually being able to achieve. And what they're calling the biggest blocker is actually not the technology, it's actually change management. So our ability to actually use the overall technology and be able to withstand the change management that comes with it, right?
03:49 Chelsea Alexander: So it sounds like we're right on time with our topic today, okay? What I wanted to talk to you a little bit about is the interesting thing that I found when it comes to change management is that a lot of times we talk about change and transformation like it's a one-size-fits-all playbook. The reality is that it's not. And oftentimes, a step that I see that gets forgotten when we're dealing with change management is asking ourselves, what type of change am I actually being called to lead as a leader? And the key thing is that the answer to that question should fundamentally change how you are actually responding to said change.
04:21 Chelsea Alexander: So one framework that I like to use, it's called the STARS Framework. It's from one of my top five leadership starter kit books called The First 90 Days, so highly, highly recommend. But what it does is basically says that first you have to make sure that you're matching your change management strategy to the actual situation because it's gonna change how you actually react as a leader. But let's first figure out what are the different types of change or transformation that you might be up against.
04:49 Chelsea Alexander: The first S starts for Startup. So are you in a startup situation or is your function in a startup situation? And startup situations are about assembling capabilities to begin a new business venture. You're essentially building things from scratch, okay? You don't have a lot to go on.
05:06 Chelsea Alexander: The T stands for Turnaround. Now this is a business that has been probably failing or suffering for quite some time and you're being called as the leader to come in, sort of be a bit of the hero and turn it back around. You're trying to save a sinking ship. Oftentimes if you're not able to save that business, it might not be around anymore.
05:32 Chelsea Alexander: The A stands for Accelerated Growth. So that's managing a rapidly expanding business. So this is a business that maybe they were growing 5% one year, now they're growing 10, 15, 20%. You're being called to come in and deal with that particular situation. This one kind of reminds me of the Amazon of five to 10 years ago. Like I remember when we were meeting with them in 2014, 15, 16. It was like, whoa, when did they become like a 30% growing customer, right?
06:04 Chelsea Alexander: All right, so the STA is usually where a lot of leaders are typically more comfortable, right? Because you get to come in and you can kind of see how you can put your own stamp on the business. The other two is where it gets a bit more challenging.
06:18 Chelsea Alexander: R stands for Realignment. This is where you're re-energizing a previously successful business that is now likely to face a problem in the future. You can kind of see how that one's not as fun as the first three, right? I'll tell you a quick story. When I worked for P&G, I worked on the launch of Always Discreet. This was a huge launch for P&G because it was supposed to be wholly incremental because they were launching into adult incontinence, a brand new category.
06:44 Chelsea Alexander: I got to come in two months after we actually launched into stores. We promised to be a $200 million brand in year one. We were on track to be a $100 million brand. But guess what? We had twice as much distribution as we deserved, i.e. we were at risk of losing half of our distribution in the first year of launch. And I got to be the new person who was coming in leading North America and saying, hey, I know everything's super exciting after the launch, but we probably might lose half of our distribution soon. So not as fun, right?
07:36 Chelsea Alexander: The second S stands for Sustaining Success. Now, this is a business that's been going well. There's no business issues to point to, but you've been tasked with now taking it to the next frontier and the next level. We're gonna get into why that changes the dynamic of how you interact.
07:58 Chelsea Alexander: So three things to remember: Number one, there's an abundance of change in CPG tech everywhere. The second is that you must understand the type of transformation that you're dealing with and use the STARS method. One area of your business could be in startup while finance is in sustaining success. The other thing is different transformation types call for different leadership styles. So don't forget to assess the core emotion. We're still companies full of people. How people feel are going to impact whether or not they're able to take on the change management that you're tasking them with.
08:34 Chelsea Alexander: Now let's do a little bit of audience participation. What do you think the core emotion would be in a startup situation? Yes, excitement with a little bit of confusion. Your job as a leader then is to channel that excitement into productive direction. Get focused. Strategy is just as much about what you will not do as much as it is about what you will do.
09:23 Chelsea Alexander: What about turnaround? Despair, right? Because you're probably not the first person to come in with a dream and what's gonna fix the business. You wanna make sure that you provide a concrete plan—short-term and long-term—but the second thing that often gets missed is you have to inspire. You have to convince people that this version of what you deem to be success is actually going to work.
09:59 Chelsea Alexander: What's the core emotion for accelerated growth? Overwhelmed, right? Probably a little bit of the excitement too, but definitely overwhelmed because with more growth comes more work. Your job is to establish defined processes and systems to make sure that growth is sustainable for the long-term.
11:04 Chelsea Alexander: What about realign? Denial, cringe, hostility. You're optimistic, you don't wanna hear it. But you have to help people step out of that denial to prevent the reinvention of the business from stalling.
12:10 Chelsea Alexander: What about sustained success? Relaxed, complacency. This one's typically difficult because there's not really a challenge that's easily visible. But usually, this indicates it's time for you to start thinking about other ways to take the business to the next level—up-skilling and up-leveling your organization.
14:19 Chelsea Alexander: All right, I have a magnificent three panelists that I'm gonna call up now. They're gonna give you some fantastic information and advice. You guys wanna join me? Give them a round of applause. Maybe you guys could just do quick intros?
14:54 Jennifer Angeles: Perfect, thank you, Chelsea. Hi, everyone, my name is Jennifer Angeles. I am the Senior Director of Digital Shelf Ecosystems and Capabilities at Danone.
15:04 Malvika Jaggi: Hey, guys, I'm Malvika. I'm the VP of Partnerships and Platforms at OneTree Brands. We're a 3PL-turned e-commerce accelerator and currently very focused on being a TikTok shop partner.
15:15 Jyoti Malik: Hey, everyone, I'm Jyoti Malik. I've been managing Belkin's North America e-com business and I've been in e-com for 15 or so years.
15:26 Chelsea Alexander: Awesome, well, thank you so much. So, let's jump right in. Where do you think transformation actually tends to break down within organizations?
15:42 Malvika Jaggi: I can sort of kick us off. People are a big, big part of the transformation, right, and coming with people come emotion, come trust. Change is hard, whether good, bad, or ugly. Imagine going through change and not being bought in—you'd be scared. But if you trusted the direction, it would be okay.
16:21 Jennifer Angeles: When you have new leadership coming in, everyone wants to have their impact. The second your strategy is misaligned with what's being executed, everything starts to break down. You need to make sure you have super clear objectives to drive that culture of agility and efficiency.
16:59 Jyoti Malik: To add to that, it breaks down on capacity. There's day-to-day work, and then there's the change management on top. That has to be accounted for. The other issue is when management mandates the transformation but operates out of control when it becomes inconvenient. Change must be lived from the top down.
17:41 Chelsea Alexander: I love that. Jennifer, how do you ensure strategy stays at the forefront of any transformation initiatives within your organization?
18:21 Jennifer Angeles: The greatest risk factor of change is ambiguity, which brings fear. Where there's ambiguity, you need to create structure. For example, instead of saying "we're the digital shelf team," we say we are "driving commercialization in the organization." Changing the narrative gives that ambiguity structure and the fear dissipates.
19:42 Jyoti Malik: To make sure strategy stays at the forefront, you have to embed that in the operating rhythm. If the strategy has shifted, you actually need to start looking at the business in that new way. If a bad quarter happens and things are deprioritized, it needs to be communicated down immediately, otherwise, you start the drift.
20:23 Chelsea Alexander: When it comes to people within the organization and adoption of change, what's the largest challenge to embracing broad org transformation?
20:42 Malvika Jaggi: I think there's a big element about being vulnerable and talking about what you're afraid of. You're no Iron Man; you're also scared. Being open and honest about how you're feeling, but then also how you're gonna take on the change, inspires your team to take on that change with you.
21:40 Jennifer Angeles: In terms of my leadership style, I'm always leading with the whole person in mind and what's really core to that is energy management. In one-on-ones or team meetings, I always start with an "energy check" (1, 2, or 3). It creates a space for people to be vulnerable and let their guard down, building psychological safety.
24:01 Jyoti Malik: One of the biggest challenges is when the transition state is not acknowledged. You have a beautiful deck showing the future state, but people are living in the messy middle. If we don't allow for that, people become resentful of the change.
25:21 Chelsea Alexander: What needed to change in any of your operating models to support transition? And what did it look like in actual practice?
25:33 Jyoti Malik: The change is happening at a very fast rate. You're not going to change your org chart with every single announcement. What needs to change is the rigor around processes, decision rights, and having a framework for when you don't have it figured out.
27:24 Jennifer Angeles: Whenever we're all going through change, a lot of people are just waiting to hear, "what am I supposed to be doing?" In reality, the number one way to get through change is by taking ownership. I told my leadership team to create a plan on a page for what they wanted to accomplish instead of waiting for cascading objectives. It ended up being a super energizing exercise.
30:57 Chelsea Alexander: I want to shift to how we measure success. Malvika, what changes were required in performance measurement to support transformation?
31:16 Malvika Jaggi: A couple of years ago, a hungry team was given the task of solving the company's e-commerce problem from zero to a hundred. Everything that could physically go wrong went wrong. Bonus payout was zero. But because of the incentives in the background—which rewarded trying and failing over doing nothing—not a single person left that year. We went on to the next year building our strongest year ever.
32:10 Jyoti Malik: If you are transforming towards long-term sustainable digital growth, you have to shift from output metrics to outcome metrics. You shouldn't just be measuring ROAS; you have to look at share of shelf, organic rank, and new-to-brand customers.
35:12 Chelsea Alexander: Let's talk about when things don't go as planned and how we can learn from failure.
35:36 Jennifer Angeles: Sometimes you get the most work accomplished not by actually doing the work, but by having moments of connection and influence. It's the connections and the influence you're driving in the organization that's truly going to define how you make it through change, whether it's failure or success.
36:23 Malvika Jaggi: You can't be afraid of the failure. The biggest moments in my career came out of failure. Just make sure you learn from it and don't make the same mistake twice.
37:12 Jyoti Malik: It's very important that you stay open to failing, and that those learnings are embedded into the next phase. You also have to think end-to-end; you can't just change e-commerce if content creation sits disjointed somewhere else in the organization.
38:51 Chelsea Alexander: Closing question. What is one thing that leaders often overlook when driving transformation?
39:07 Jennifer Angeles: Energy. Energy is everything. If you don't have the tenacity, the grit, and the energy to drive you, then you'll never make it through the change.
39:31 Malvika Jaggi: The people. All of the emotion, the trust, being vulnerable, and being honest about what you're scared about. That's the only way you're all gonna be able to unite.
39:49 Jyoti Malik: Measure twice, cut once. What gets overlooked is the need for defining the problem properly first before you jump and start implementing a solution that you have to rip and replace two years later.
40:36 Chelsea Alexander: I think you heard some common themes today: the balance between process, strategy, and operating models, but also not forgetting that these are organizations of people. We have a few minutes left for audience questions.
41:33 Audience Member 1: You can do all the things right and get 95% of your team on board, but there's always a couple that are very difficult to get on board, and they are typically the loudest. Any suggestions?
41:58 Malvika Jaggi: You have to build peer pressure by making the transformation fun and exciting. You don't give in to the 5%; you stay true to your 95, and the 5 will just follow.
42:54 Jennifer Angeles: You have to spend time learning your team's superpowers. Give them custom projects attached to their superpower so they feel impact and connection.
43:24 Jyoti Malik: Resistance is normal. Understand the root cause behind it and solve for it. Once solved, do not be afraid to demand that the team work together in a single direction.
44:03 Chelsea Alexander: I would add two things. First, "straight talk"—often people haven't explicitly been told their behavior is a barrier. Second, focus on winning. A winning locker room is so much more fun than a losing locker room.
44:49 Audience Member 2: I'm wondering how you try to promote forward-thinking amongst cross-functional teams who really don't see the holistic picture until they are actually in the digital space?
45:23 Malvika Jaggi: Everybody should come together and share the one metric that gets them up in the morning and the three things blocking them. You'll quickly realize that your KPI might actually be their blocker. Getting on the same page breaks down those silos.
46:30 Chelsea Alexander: Building digital commerce fluency has to be a strategic choice from the top. Getting people to do rotations in and out of digital spaces helps them learn by doing over time.
47:40 Audience Member 3: How do you encourage buy-in from brand teams when you are not senior to them, and they push back on the metrics you need?
48:17 Jennifer Angeles: Change the narrative. Tell them you are a commercialization engine for the business. They have no choice but to commercialize their innovation. Speak their language—sometimes I say "paid search equals slotting" when I want the sales team to listen.
49:22 Jyoti Malik: I just opened up my Weekly Business Reviews to everybody. Product, marketing, even the CFO would attend from time to time. They get to see how we are operating real-time and it naturally builds understanding.
50:07 Chelsea Alexander: You're probably going to have to create a little bit of tension to help senior leadership understand that sales and marketing aren't separated anymore. E-commerce depends heavily on search investment, and educating them on that loop is critical. Try having them do a store walk outside their product category and watch how they act as consumers—they often forget they are the exact same consumers shopping on Amazon. Thank you so much for your time.
51:48 Peter Crosby: Thanks to our guests for allowing us to share their impactful session with a broader audience. This generosity of knowledge and spirit is at the heart of the DSI, where you can become a member at digitalshelfinstitute.org. Thanks for being part of our community.
