15: Jerry Storch, Former CEO Toys R Us and Vice Chairman of Target

“Amazon is eating the world” is today’s conventional take for retail outsiders. It’s certainly a position I espouse and it’s why this week I was so excited to chat with Jerry Storch. Jerry most recently was the CEO of Hudson’s Bay Company and previously was CEO of Toys R Us and Vice Chairman of Target. Jerry is known in the world of retail for his forward thinking on technology and has embraced technology heavily as a Senior Executive. At Target, he founded and led the e-commerce strategy of target.com, at Toys R Us he expanded the e-comm business to over $1 billion and led international expansion into China, and at Hudson’s Bay he drove the acceleration of the all-channel e-comm business model.  We talked about a number of topics in our conversation related to technology and retail, leadership and careers. Some of the most interesting perspectives Jerry had centered around: (1) the importance of thinking through big bets via first principles, (2) why the debate around AI and it’s impact on society should be reframed to a short term discussion on displacement and a long term discussion on growth, and (3) how learning in 2017 is all about being a maniacally vociferous reader.