A new center of excellence at the Naveen Jindal School of Management is poised to become a hub of engagement between retail industry leaders and students and faculty at The University of Texas at Dallas. Job one of the Center for Retail Innovation and Strategy Excellence (RISE) may be shifting consumer perceptions.

“For many people, the first thing that comes to mind when they think of the word ‘retail’ is a brick-and-mortar giant like Walmart or, for e-commerce, Amazon,” said Charles (Chuck) Haseman, director of the RISE Center. (Read Haseman’s new faulty bio on page 10.)

A Back Office for Best Practices

Haseman’s goal for RISE is to be what he calls “the back office” of retail to help the industry implement best practices that will help improve those experiences.

“All our strengths at this University — data management and analysis, computer science and the latest technologies such as cryptocurrency — all of that is very real in retail,” he said. “Even so, the consumer doesn’t care what’s behind the curtain. They want a great customer experience. But to be able to do that, companies have to focus on the behind-the-scenes technology and data manipulation. That’s what has made retail what it is today. That’s what we’re focused on at RISE.”

Haseman said that Walmart is known for its value, in terms of both its prices and the speed of its checkout options, as well as its ubiquity — it currently owns more than 10,000 locations worldwide.

“The reason Walmart is everywhere, the reason it’s cheap and the reason it’s fast is because of technology,” he said. “They’ve cleaned up their supply chain. They get the product in faster than anybody else. And when you do all these things with the technology, the profit goes up and the prices go down.”

Haseman pointed to the term “omnichannel,” which refers to combining the many kinds of shopping available now — curbside, in-store, online, by mail, by phone — as the current state of retail.

“Whether it’s catalogs, or brick and mortar, e-commerce, direct to consumer, delivery, whatever,” he said. “If a company doesn’t have all of these on their pallet, they’re not going to survive. The customer experience has to be outstanding on all those fronts.”

The back office — technology and innovative business strategies to implement it — is key to navigating an omnichannel environment, Haseman said. RISE exists to help companies set up the back office to navigate the varying retail terrain.

Researchers and the Three P’s

“We have outstanding faculty at the Jindal School conducting that kind of groundbreaking operations research,” he said. “Dr. B.P.S. Murthi in marketing, Dr. Özalp Özer in operations management and Dr. Nanda Kumar in marketing are the lead researchers that will be involved with RISE.”

Haseman said the center’s efforts will be based on what he calls the “Three P’s” — preparation, partnership and process. “Preparation — that’s getting the students ready,” he said. “Partnership — that’s the corporations all across the world that we want to work with. Process — that’s where the researchers come in.”

Haseman anticipates working not only with the lead researchers but also with other faculty across multiple disciplines, including global supply chain, marketing analytics, re-commerce, pricing management, channel strategies, customer lifetime value, information systems and mobile technology.

He also has an advisory board that includes Ray Hemmig, chairman of the board at Retail & Restaurant Growth Capital LP and a seasoned retail industry leader who is a past chairman of and continues to serve on the Jindal School’s advisory council.

“There are some amazing opportunities for us at UT Dallas to take advantage of the unprecedented disruption and digital transformation occurring in the retail space,” Haseman said. “As a tier-one research institution, we’re already creating the knowledge that will help us partner with the retail industry. We can use that thought leadership to guide [retailers] in solving their challenges by collaborating with them on research, education and practice. Not only that, but our students will become part of their future workforces.”