Dr. Sumit Mitra is CEO of Tesco Business Solutions and Tesco India, overseeing a team that spans payroll and finance to AI, property, supply chain, and customer contact — serving 90 million shopping trips a week.

In this episode he gives us an inside look at how Tesco is applying AI across the business, what's actually delivering results, and what India's retail revolution is signalling for the rest of the world.

We cover:

• What Tesco Business Solutions actually does — and why the CEO calls it Tesco's key competitive differentiator
• How Tesco structures AI into three buckets and why prioritisation matters more than technology
• The 50K / 60-day rule: how they cut failing projects before ego gets in the way
• Real AI use cases delivering triple-digit million returns in cash flow and personalisation
• Why AI for operations means reimagining the whole process, not automating a step
• India's leap from kirana stores straight to quick commerce — and what's driving it
• Whoosh, Tesco's 30-minute delivery service, already a £400M business
• Omnisol: how Tesco is now taking its proprietary AI tools to market for other retailers

Guest: Dr. Sumit Mitra, CEO, Tesco Business Solutions & Tesco India Hosts: Renee Hartmann & Chris Baker

Most companies are pretty good at writing strategies. Far fewer are good at executing them. That gap — and what to do about it — is exactly what Kevin Ertell has spent his career studying, and now he's written the book on it.

Kevin brings a rare perspective to this conversation. He started as a clerk at Tower Records and worked his way up to Senior Vice President over 20 years. From there he held senior roles at Borders, Sur La Table, and Nike, where he led digital and retail operations globally. He has seen strategy succeed and fail at every level of an organisation.

His new book, The Strategy Trap: Why Companies Fail at Execution and How to Get It Right, lays out a six-part framework he calls the Six Cs, built around two phases: setting the stage (co-creation, clarity, capacity) and showtime (communication, coordination, coaching).

In this episode Kevin, Chris and Renee dig into why execution breaks down, what leaders consistently get wrong, and why the first step of execution is actually writing the strategy itself. They also get into the role of outside consultants, how OKRs done right can transform alignment, and why stack ranking priorities beats high-medium-low every time.

Plus the NASA janitor story. You'll want to hear that one.

Key takeaways:

• Strategy writing is the first step of execution, not a precursor to it
• Co-creation drives commitment — the IKEA effect is real
• Capacity has to be created before a strategy is launched, not found along the way
• Communication should be early, loud, and continuous
• The bigger the organisation, the more structured the approach needs to be — but smaller organisations need it too

The Strategy Trap is available now on Amazon.

What does it take to turn around 12 supermarkets during a COVID lockdown? Or build a centralized logistics operation under economic sanctions? João Correia has spent 25 years solving retail operations challenges across four continents—from Ghanaian supermarkets to Iranian department stores to Paraguayan wholesale operations.

In this episode, João shares hard-won lessons about what actually drives store performance: it's not the latest AI tool, it's disciplined execution of operational fundamentals. We discuss stock visibility challenges when supply chains stretch three months, why real-time store performance matters more than post-visit surveys, and how technology should remove friction—not create it.

Key Topics:

• Why operational excellence is becoming a competitive advantage while competitors chase AI
• The critical difference between reported experience and real experience on the shop floor
• How to implement technology in resource-constrained environments (and what that teaches us about priorities)
• Store execution fundamentals that work across markets: expiry date management, standards compliance, workflow efficiency
• Change management lessons from converting stores, building logistics networks, and implementing new systems across different cultures
• The role of technology in empowering frontline teams vs. replacing them

Guest Bio:

João Correia is a retail operations veteran with nearly 30 years of experience across Europe, Africa, the Middle East, and South America. He's led turnarounds, store conversions, and logistics operations for retailers including SPAR, Primark, and Media Markt. His experience spans grocery retail, hypermarkets, supermarkets, convenience stores, and wholesale operations in markets including Portugal, Angola, Nigeria, Ghana, Iran, Malta, and Paraguay.

Key Quotes:

"AI and all the tech tools that are there come to improve the ecosystem in a way that they remove all the friction and give people the tools to provide a better service."

"You might have the best product, you might have the best stores, you might have the best decor in the stores. Everything fails if the human factor doesn't deliver."

"Retail is process. Retail is discipline. The truth happens on the floor—where real experience occurs."

"Back to the basics will be a competitive advantage in the future, in my opinion."