How To Lead Change Management in Commerce Digital Transformation (2026) – Shopify

Digital transformation presents a distinct challenge in enterprise commerce. Unlike back-office initiatives, commerce transformations directly affect revenue, customers, and daily operations. The stakes are higher, and the margin for error is smaller.

Momentum is everywhere. Digital transformation is hard to avoid across industries. McKinsey recently found that 9 out of 10 organizations are currently undergoing some form of digital transformation. 

Despite the momentum, not all digital initiatives are going well. Gartner reports that fewer than half meet or exceed their business targets. Most transformations don’t fail in a single moment; they lose value across the project lifecycle. 

Businesses underestimate what it takes to prepare people for new systems, workflows, and buying experiences. Change management is often introduced too late, or not at all. Teams focus on launch mechanics and assume adoption will follow—but those assumptions come at a high cost to their bottom lines. 

But McKinsey’s latest research shows that failure is not inevitable. The difference between success and failure is the activity level throughout the transformation lifecycle: the more actions your business takes, the more positive the outcomes. Successful brands embrace planning, role analysis, training, and performance measurement. They change how they plan and operate after launch.

This article outlines a practical playbook for change management in digital transformation for commerce. It focuses on preparing teams and customers for revenue-critical change, launching quickly without disruption, and sustaining momentum after launch.

Why it is critical to prioritize change management in commerce 

Change management can easily become an afterthought in digital transformation. But in commerce, that approach creates risk. The buying experience itself is usually what is being transformed, which means the impact extends far beyond technology teams. Sales, marketing, operations, customer experience, and customers themselves are all affected at once.

Commerce transformations also change how work gets done. Order processing, inventory updates, fulfillment workflows, and customer interactions can shift at the same time. Without a deliberate plan for adopting new systems and processes, even the strongest technology foundation can struggle to deliver expected results.

Commerce digital transformation typically involves:

• Revenue-critical systems with direct customer impact and 24/7 uptime requirements
• Multi-stakeholder complexity, including store associates, ecommerce managers, marketers, partners, and customers moving from rep-led to self-serve experiences
• Channel interdependencies across inventory, pricing, and fulfillment for web, mobile, stores, and marketplaces
• Regulatory and compliance considerations such as payments, data privacy, and taxes
• Speed imperatives driven by seasonality, market windows, and competitive pressure

These conditions raise the cost of misalignment. A minor outage, a new point of friction, or a performance regression can immediately affect conversion, order volume, and customer trust.

Shopify’s platform powers millions of commerce experiences every day, providing a clear view of what separates successful transformations from stalled ones. The difference is about structure and approach. Businesses should plan for adoption, readiness, and operating change with the same rigor they apply to technology delivery.

Effective change management helps commerce teams launch new platforms without disrupting revenue and sustain momentum after go-live. The goal is not to create heavy processes or slow governance. It is about striking the right balance of structure and flexibility, so teams can move fast while keeping the buying experience stable and reliable as customer expectations continue to rise.

The true cost of delaying digital transformations

Digital transformation has a reputation for being slow, expensive, and risky. But in commerce, delaying transformation is even riskier. Buyer expectations have changed faster than most brands can update the systems that support them. McKinsey describes today’s customer as the “zero consumer,” someone who expects physical and digital experiences to be consistent and seamless, and who shows little tolerance for friction. They also have “zero loyalty” and will switch brands quickly for almost any reason.

To compete in this environment, commerce organizations cannot afford to be constrained by legacy systems or prolonged rollout cycles. Aging platforms and complex integrations often trap teams in a cycle of technical debt that limits progress and absorbs resources. Over time, the impact becomes visible across the business:

• Market share erosion as competitors move faster
• Margin compression as technical costs rise just to maintain existing systems
• Innovation delay as development capacity is consumed by maintenance rather than growth

These challenges compound over time. Every quarter of delay adds to the cost, pushing conversion improvements, operational savings, and new capabilities further out while competitors continue to move forward.

But brands don’t have to be stuck forever. Commerce transformations can move quickly when change management is built into the transformation from the start. A focused 90-day migration, with the right planning and discipline, can start delivering value at launch.

When that happens, businesses shift from paying an inaction tax to generating surplus value. Faster time to market, lower operating costs, and productivity gains compound, positioning the business to compete more effectively as customer expectations continue to rise.

How Filtrous successfully launched in 63 days after a failed transformation

Laboratory supply retailer Filtrous set out to modernize their wholesale buying experience with faster checkout, streamlined fulfillment, and a more intuitive B2B purchasing journey. The team initially selected BigCommerce, expecting a platform that could support rapid development and long-term scalability.

The transformation struggled early. Several critical B2B capabilities were not available out of the box, which forced heavy custom development. Progress slowed, iteration became fragile, and even small changes introduced instability. After more than a year of effort, the experience Filtrous set out to deliver was still not live. The team ultimately decided to stop the project and reassess.

“We did a full year of custom development for our site, but walked away unhappy with the way the site looked and performed. BigCommerce lacked the flexibility for us to fully control our site, and managing the customer experience was time-consuming,” said Yin Fu, director of ecommerce at Filtrous. 

When Filtrous revisited their strategy, they reset both their platform choice and execution approach. The team selected Shopify and focused on a disciplined, outcome-driven launch. In just 63 days, Filtrous went live with a fully featured B2B buying experience. Automation across purchasing workflows reduced manual effort, the customer experience improved immediately, and organic conversion rates increased by 27%.

“Everything is more streamlined with Shopify. I have so much more time to focus on marketing and growing the business,” Yin said.

It’s important to remember that transformation mistakes are survivable, even if a first attempt fails. With the right platform and a focused approach to execution and adoption, Filtrous was able to course-correct quickly, limit further risk, and start realizing value at launch rather than extending another long recovery cycle.

The four phases of an agile commerce transformation model

This model is built for commerce organizations modernizing revenue-critical systems under timelines that need to deliver value fast. It assumes live customer impact, fast launches, and continuous iteration after go-live. Each phase prioritizes decision clarity, team readiness, and change-management best practices.

Phase 1: Alignment and strategy

Many digital transformations fall short before implementation begins. McKinsey found that nearly 25% of potential value loss occurs during the initial target-setting phase. Teams set conservative goals, narrow scope, or compromise too early based on internal constraints rather than true opportunity size. Even when delivery goes well, the outcome is capped from the start.

Ambition sets the ceiling for the entire initiative. McKinsey research shows that organizations with higher aspirations for digital technology achieve stronger results than those that aim cautiously. In commerce, aiming too low often produces partial solutions that depend on workarounds, manual processes, or future replatforming. Those compromises increase complexity and slow progress over time.

With ambitious goals and accelerated timelines, this phase becomes mission-critical. Clear outcomes, ownership, planning, and launch strategy prevent execution from stalling later and reduce friction during vendor selection and delivery.

During this phase, commerce teams should focus on a small set of foundational activities:

• Define transformation outcomes tied directly to revenue growth, operational efficiency, and customer experience.
• Create a stakeholder map that clarifies who is impacted, who influences decisions, and who has final authority.
• Set a launch timeline based on business needs and seasonality, not legacy implementation norms.
• Scope a minimal viable launch that brings core buying and operational workflows live first, with improvements delivered iteratively.
• Plan for adoption, training, and communications for internal teams and customers before build work begins.

Phase 2: Technology selection and accelerated implementation

This is where planning turns into execution. According to Gartner, CIOs and other technical leaders are under sustained pressure to deliver measurable business results. More than half are expected to improve productivity and reduce costs. Under that pressure, technology selection can drift toward feature comparisons instead of outcome delivery.

The work in Phase 1 prevents this trap. When outcomes and launch intent are clear, platform selection becomes a practical decision about speed, reliability, and fit. The goal is not to choose the system that sounds most flexible in theory, but the one that can deliver the required outcomes quickly without introducing delivery risk.

Technology selection should reflect how the business actually operates. Commerce platforms shape daily workflows for teams and customers, not just system architecture. Selecting the right solution requires understanding today’s operating reality and designing for how it needs to change.

During this phase, teams should focus on a short set of clarity-building exercises:

• Map current-state “day in the life” workflows for impacted roles such as ecommerce teams, operations, and customers.
• Define future-state workflows with direct input from those roles.
• Map the current buying experience across channels.
• Design the target buying experience for each customer type.

These steps surface which requirements are essential and where compromise will create friction later. Platforms that require heavy customization to meet baseline needs slow delivery and make adoption harder. Intuitive systems with strong native capabilities reduce training burden and shorten time to value.

Accelerated implementation depends as much on fast decisions as technical execution. This phase requires a lean group of empowered stakeholders who can resolve trade-offs quickly and keep delivery moving. Gartner has found that 35% of value loss during digital transformations occurs during implementation, often when promised capabilities require unexpected custom work, or integrations fail to perform as expected.

Platforms with proven delivery patterns, supported integrations, and mature ecosystems reduce this risk. Independent research has shown that Shopify implementations complete 20% faster, are 66% more likely to be on time, and 3x more likely to stay on budget. This is driven by structured delivery approaches, focused change management, and extensive out-of-the-box and ecosystem capabilities.

Adoption planning also becomes operationalized in this phase. Before launch, teams should be prepared to support new ways of working:

• Identify impacted roles and create role-specific quick reference guides.
• Pilot new workflows with real users before full rollout.
• Design customer-facing communications that set expectations for buying changes.
• Select and enable change champions to support front-line teams.
• Prepare role- and scenario-based training using real workflows.
• Define success metrics with clear before-and-after benchmarks.

Phase 3: MVP launch, training, and adoption

Accelerated commerce transformations begin with the fast launch of a minimum viable product. For most commerce migrations, this means the essentials: streamlined ordering, optimized checkout, and integrated operational workflows with core systems. Launching an MVP allows teams to start delivering value quickly instead of extending time on legacy platforms that continue to drain resources.

With modern commerce platforms, launch does not represent the end state. New features and capabilities can be added post-launch. The objective in this phase is stability, usability, and readiness for real-world use.

Change management becomes most visible at launch. Teams are introducing more than a new tool or technology: they are introducing new ways of working for employees and new buying experiences for customers. Readiness on day one determines whether momentum builds or stalls.

During this phase, commerce teams should focus on a small set of execution priorities:

• Execute launch communications aligned to the plans defined earlier.
• Deliver just-in-time training focused on the workflows users need at go-live.
• Provide clear guidance for customers, especially in B2B scenarios where buyers may be shifting from rep-led to self-serve ordering.
• Identify and activate change champions to support front-line teams during launch.
• Measure early outcomes such as revenue performance, operational efficiency, and customer experience.
• Recognize quick wins to reinforce new behaviors and build confidence.

How Belstaff’s transformation empowered their employees 

Belstaff’s transformation illustrates this dynamic. As the brand approached their 100th anniversary, they sought to modernize their commerce operations to better connect in-store and online experiences. Their existing technology stack had become expensive and restrictive.

“We had an expensive IT outsourcing model, the technical debt was building up, and the architecture was a black box. Our point of sale and ERP system were monolithic and complicated, making it hard to adapt to the changing market,” said Navid Jilow, director of technology at Belstaff.

Belstaff migrated to Shopify to unify point of sale (POS) and ecommerce and adopt a headless commerce approach. This allowed the brand to launch a headless storefront and deliver a distinct front-end experience while simplifying back-end operations. During launch, the team saw an unexpected benefit. The platform’s intuitive interface accelerated adoption across teams, reducing reliance on external support.

“Sometimes, you get a level of resistance during a new implementation. That’s why system intuitiveness is essential. The user interface of Shopify was a real highlight. When I looked at it I was like, ‘Okay, I can actually pick this up really quickly,’” said Navid.

With a stable MVP in place, Belstaff’s teams gained confidence. Clear APIs and flexible architecture enabled ongoing customization without reintroducing complexity. The result was not just a successful launch, but an organization better equipped to move quickly, adapt, and continue innovating after go-live.

Phase 4: Iteration and innovation

For many organizations, value erosion begins after launch. McKinsey found that roughly 20% of digital transformation value loss occurs after implementation is considered “complete.” This happens when teams stall at basic use cases, adoption plateaus, or the organization reverts to old operating habits. In commerce, this risk is amplified when platforms introduce more work instead of enabling progress.

Modern commerce platforms make continuous improvement possible, but they do not guarantee it. Moving from legacy systems to a more flexible architecture requires a shift in how teams operate. Organizations accustomed to long release cycles and high change costs must adapt to a model built around feedback, experimentation, and frequent delivery.

This is where change management evolves from launch readiness to an operating rhythm. Teams must adjust how they review performance, prioritize ideas, and roll out improvements without destabilizing the buying experience.

In this phase, commerce organizations should focus on a small set of repeatable practices:

• Identify adoption gaps, including roles or teams not using new capabilities.
• Expand into new markets or channels based on early performance and demand.
• Capture lessons learned to refine future rollouts.
• Establish lightweight processes for feature development, testing, and release.
• Shift from maintenance mode to continuous improvement as the default operating posture.

How Skullcandy phased their digital transformation for rapid launch and innovation

Skullcandy’s transformation highlights how this shift creates momentum. Before replatforming, the brand was constrained by a highly customized stack that consumed time and limited innovation.

“The team spent too much time on monitoring and making sure that things were flowing instead of adding capability,” said Mark Hopkins, CIO of Skullcandy.

Skullcandy set an aggressive 90-day timeline and selected Shopify for its out-of-the-box capabilities and ecosystem. Within 30 days, test orders were flowing through core systems. At launch, operations were stable, allowing the team to move immediately into optimization rather than recovery.

In the weeks that followed, Skullcandy expanded into new global markets and streamlined checkout from five steps to one. Teams replaced one-off builds with reusable templates and repeatable processes. Product launches that once took a full day were reduced to under an hour across regions.

The business impact followed quickly. Skullcandy reduced technical complexity, avoided millions in implementation costs, and delivered their strongest holiday performance to date with 45% year-over-year revenue growth.

“We used to say no to our best ideas. Now we say yes and ask how fast we can get it done,” said Jenny Buchar, director of global digital experience at Skullcandy.

Governance for commerce transformation and growth

Organizations constrained by legacy technology often lose the muscle for continuous improvement. Long delays and high costs for even small changes train teams to avoid innovation rather than pursue it. When those constraints are removed, the challenge shifts. Without clear decision discipline, teams can move too fast, introduce unnecessary complexity, or dilute the customer experience.

Effective governance in commerce exists to sustain momentum, not restrict it. As platforms like Shopify continue to release new capabilities and expand their ecosystems, teams need a lightweight way to evaluate opportunities, prioritize improvements, and move quickly without fragmenting the experience or bloating the stack.

The objective is to enable fast decisions while keeping the platform cohesive, fast, and focused on customer value. Commerce teams can achieve this with a small set of repeatable governance practices.

Build a lean, cross-functional group

Establish a small group, typically five to seven people, representing commerce, technology, operations, and marketing. This group meets on a regular cadence to review customer feedback, operational friction, and performance data. They can also identify future improvements and ways to deliver unique, personalized experiences. 

The group can prioritize improvements that can be delivered in short cycles, often within 30 days, based on customer impact and delivery effort. This cadence reinforces continuous improvement and reduces the need for internal workarounds.

Use a short approval path for changes

Speed is critical in commerce, but cohesion matters just as much. New features and integrations should move through a single, lightweight checkpoint designed to protect the platform over time. This approval path should balance velocity with cohesion, so changes don’t outpace users or overwhelm the platform.

Clear criteria are usually sufficient:

• Impact on performance and reliability
• Value to customers and internal teams
• Fit within the existing architecture

This approach limits duplication, reduces long-term maintenance risk, and keeps innovation aligned with business priorities.

Anchor prioritization to measurable outcomes

Every improvement should map back to defined outcomes such as revenue per session, conversion rate, average order value (AOV), or operational efficiency. Outcome-based prioritization keeps teams focused on impact rather than activity.

Unified commerce and customer data in a platform like Shopify can make prioritization more strategic and measurable. When teams can see customer behavior, demand signals, and performance trends in one place, they can better understand the potential impact of new ideas and initiatives.

Govern rollout and adoption, not just development

Shipping a feature is not the finish line. Governance should extend through rollout, enablement, and measurement. The same group that prioritizes improvements should ensure they are introduced with appropriate training and tracked against expected outcomes.

This includes internal readiness, customer response, and post-launch iteration. Over time, this operating rhythm builds confidence that change can happen frequently without destabilizing the business. Governance done well becomes invisible. It creates clarity, maintains focus, and allows teams to move faster as the organization grows.

How David’s Bridal evolved its business strategy through commerce transformation

David’s Bridal is one of the most well-known wedding retailers in the United States, engaging more than 90% of brides during their planning journey. Despite that reach, the brand struggled to evolve their digital experience. Years of heavy customization had created a maintenance trap. Routine updates, security patching, and outdated custom code consumed time and budget, leaving little room for innovation.

To break the cycle, David’s Bridal committed to a full ecommerce migration across the US and Canada. The team adopted a composable approach, relying on native platform capabilities and ecosystem applications instead of rebuilding features from scratch. This shift reduced technical burden and allowed the team to focus on experience rather than infrastructure.

The transformation enabled new capabilities, including an endless-aisle experience supported by interactive POS touchscreens. In-store stylists, known as Dream Makers, can now access a bride’s profile, preferences, and online activity in real time, connecting digital research with high-touch, in-store service.

“It’s hard to find a technology partner where you could actually change your corporate business strategy based on the functionality they have, but that’s where we are with Shopify,” said Elina Vilk, president and CBO of David’s Bridal.

David’s “Aisle to Algorithm” transformation delivered immediate experience improvements while establishing a foundation for long-term innovation. By offloading operational complexity, the organization gained flexibility to evolve alongside changing customer expectations.

“Shopify is taking on the heavy lifting so we can focus on what we do, like creating amazing experiences for brides. We’ll be able to leverage the investments Shopify is making so we can continue to evolve with our customers and meet their needs,” said Ravi Raparla, CIO of David’s Bridal.

Measuring success: Change management key performance indicators

Measuring success in a commerce digital transformation goes beyond measuring cost and launch dates. Leaders need a clear view of whether the transformation is delivering business impact and whether teams are adopting new ways of working.

Establish baseline performance before changes are made so progress can be measured accurately. Define success metrics early and anchor them to both revenue outcomes and operational efficiency. 

For commerce transformations, core business KPIs typically include:

• Time saved by sales, support, and IT teams
• Conversion rate, cart abandonment, and traffic growth
• Changes in average order value
• Reductions in order errors and support requests
• Improvements in repeat purchase and retention

These metrics show whether the transformation is improving performance, but the tracking should not stop there. Adding change-management KPIs helps businesses track how well the organization is positioned to sustain those gains. 

After launch, teams should monitor indicators that reveal how effectively employees and customers are adapting to new systems and workflows:

• Login rates and feature usage to confirm active adoption
• Support ticket volume and themes across both customers and internal teams
• Workaround detection that signals resistance or process gaps
• Customer engagement with new capabilities
• Training effectiveness, measured by reduced errors and support reliance
• Change champion engagement as a proxy for front-line momentum

Together, these measures connect adoption to outcomes. They help leaders distinguish between short-term performance improvements and sustainable change, allowing teams to course-correct early and focus investment where it drives the greatest impact.

How Rainbow Shops replatformed for rapid innovation and customer feedback

Rainbow Shops operates more than a thousand physical stores, with ecommerce as their largest channel. The team had strong ideas for improving engagement and conversion, but platform limitations slowed execution. New features took months to build and carried high costs. Innovation was constrained by infrastructure rather than ambition.

Rainbow’s leadership understood the risk. They had lived through difficult transformations before and knew how exposed replatforming decisions can be.

“Replatforming decisions are really hard. People in my position lose their jobs when replatforming projects don’t go well,” said David Cost, VP of digital and ecommerce.

The shift to Shopify changed the operating model. Complexity dropped, costs fell, and the team gained the ability to move quickly. Capabilities that once required months of development could be launched in minutes, allowing the organization to test ideas and act on opportunities while they were still relevant.

“We can stand things up in fifteen minutes that would have taken multiple months and hundreds of thousands of dollars on Salesforce Commerce Cloud,” David said.

That speed allowed them to act on customer feedback. Rainbow implemented post-purchase surveys to capture buyer preferences immediately after checkout. Insights flowed directly into experience design. Customer responses around delivery options led the team to roll out home, store, and third-party fulfillment choices, and survey data proved predictive of adoption.

“That kind of data is invaluable. We stood it up in 15 minutes on Shopify. It was automatic and easy,” David said.

The platform to help you lead change at the speed of commerce

Digital transformation in commerce is often a high-stakes endeavor. Revenue, customer experience, and operational continuity are on the line, often under tight timelines for delivery. In this environment, change management becomes the differentiator between success and failure. Businesses that focus on the people alongside the technology create operational systems that allow them to move fast without putting the business at risk.

The four-phase model outlined in this article provides a repeatable approach for commerce-led transformation. But across every phase, one factor consistently determines success: front-line adoption. Platforms only create value when teams and customers can use them confidently in real workflows. Organizations that plan for adoption early, enable it deliberately, and measure it continuously are far more likely to realize their intended outcomes.

This is where the platform matters. Shopify is built to support commerce transformations that move fast and keep brands competitive. Comprehensive native capabilities, an extensive app ecosystem, and proven delivery patterns reduce execution risk while giving teams the flexibility to iterate quickly after launch. That combination allows leaders to focus less on managing complexity and more on leading change.

To learn more about how Shopify can help your business transform, talk to an enterprise commerce expert today.