Sep 28, 2026 · 36 min · 14 segments
AI is moving faster than ever, and retail leaders are shifting their focus from basic operational testing to real-world customer journey transformations. In this episode of *Future Shop*, host Wendy…
Wendy LiebmannHost
Justin HonamanGuest
Now on to my continued conversation with Justin Honneman from Amazon Web Service.
Justin and I always talk about sort of our cloud chat, but we're always talking about sort of the key topics of the day.
And I really feel in the maybe four or five months since we've actually spoken that we Things have shifted some.
They feel a little less operational AI discussion and much more how do we think about the impact on the journey of the shopper and what they're doing.
I'd say, first of all, you know, just as a reminder, maybe I haven't met some of you, but, you know, the scope of who we work with are retailers, traditional retailers, consumer goods organizations, consumer goods brands, food service distributors and restaurants like chain restaurants and whatnot.
So, but it is interesting in retail and as it relates to AI, the last, let's see, now 19, 20 months or so, where I would put agentic commerce and agentic AI as really just skyrocketed in terms of interest and investment, quite frankly.
But you're right, so no longer are we in the what is, what are agents and what is agentic AI would definitely see many retailers already doing it very quickly.
Like it moved very quickly into leveraging elements of agentic commerce and some of the capabilities there.
And also with that is coming the spotlight on bad data or disconnected systems.
I was with a retailer just yesterday here and they, you know, the CIO was so excited to, you know, talk about, he wants to educate his board on kind of what's real, what's not, what are the governance concerns, what are the opportunities and, you know, kind of that.
And then he needs help with his organization getting buy-in to use AI instead of, hey, I'm a better programmer than that.
And then the last thing he mentioned was like, You know, I still have three ERPs and I've got to put a data platform together just to get a view of what we're doing.
And how in that, how do you play the role in that conversation about providing credibility, you know, facilitation? I mean, you know, you've got so much knowledge in that space.
the CIO was laying out kind of, you know, not priorities, but just things that he's focused on and thinking about.
It's interesting, in addition to what I just shared around kind of AI and the challenges with data, his other big buckets were change management and people.
And change management being how do you get the organization to buy in? How do you get leaders in the business to be kind of flag holders for new capabilities? Do I have the right talent? We're struggling to find the right talent.
Now on to my continued conversation with Justin Honneman from Amazon Web Service.
Justin and I always talk about sort of our cloud chat, but we're always talking about sort of the key topics of the day.
And I really feel in the maybe four or five months since we've actually spoken that we Things have shifted some.
They feel a little less operational AI discussion and much more how do we think about the impact on the journey of the shopper and what they're doing.
I'd say, first of all, you know, just as a reminder, maybe I haven't met some of you, but, you know, the scope of who we work with are retailers, traditional retailers, consumer goods organizations, consumer goods brands, food service distributors and restaurants like chain restaurants and whatnot.
So, but it is interesting in retail and as it relates to AI, the last, let's see, now 19, 20 months or so, where I would put agentic commerce and agentic AI as really just skyrocketed in terms of interest and investment, quite frankly.
But you're right, so no longer are we in the what is, what are agents and what is agentic AI would definitely see many retailers already doing it very quickly.
Like it moved very quickly into leveraging elements of agentic commerce and some of the capabilities there.
And also with that is coming the spotlight on bad data or disconnected systems.
I was with a retailer just yesterday here and they, you know, the CIO was so excited to, you know, talk about, he wants to educate his board on kind of what's real, what's not, what are the governance concerns, what are the opportunities and, you know, kind of that.
And then he needs help with his organization getting buy-in to use AI instead of, hey, I'm a better programmer than that.
And then the last thing he mentioned was like, You know, I still have three ERPs and I've got to put a data platform together just to get a view of what we're doing.
And how in that, how do you play the role in that conversation about providing credibility, you know, facilitation? I mean, you know, you've got so much knowledge in that space.
the CIO was laying out kind of, you know, not priorities, but just things that he's focused on and thinking about.
It's interesting, in addition to what I just shared around kind of AI and the challenges with data, his other big buckets were change management and people.
And change management being how do you get the organization to buy in? How do you get leaders in the business to be kind of flag holders for new capabilities? Do I have the right talent? We're struggling to find the right talent.
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