Case Study — IT Backbone Transition for a Growing Online Retailer
Initial Situation
Executive management recognised that migrating the existing, non-scalable IT backbone would not succeed without active business involvement.
Up to that point, the initiative had been driven primarily by IT and the lead architect, focusing on system selection and technical planning. As a result:
Confidence in the feasibility of the programme was low
Business stakeholders questioned their role and level of commitment
There was no integrated project plan
No firm resource commitments
Priorities and a shared roadmap had not been jointly defined
Without alignment between business and IT, the programme lacked traction.
Company
The project was executed by an interim manager on behalf of a technology service provider.
A fast-growing online retailer operating across nine European subsidiaries, generating approx. EUR 300 million in revenue with 450 employees, specialising in sports equipment and apparel.
Key Pain Points
Strong dependency on the external provider
Limited understanding of the end-to-end process landscape, systems and interdependencies
Low acceptance of IT-led transformation within the business
Risks related to system stability and transition were unclear, as were potential mitigation measures
Mandate & Objective
Role: Interim Programme Lead
Objective:
To stabilise the programme, restore trust and establish a clear structure — creating a reliable transition phase for the onboarding of a permanent programme lead.
Approach
Creating Transparency and Shared Understanding
The core of the approach was to establish end-to-end transparency across:
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Business processes
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Information flows
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Supporting IT systems
Together with business and IT stakeholders, we developed:
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Brown paper workshops to visualise real-life processes
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SIPOC models (Supplier – Input – Process – Output – Customer)
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A high-level enterprise architecture overview
This combination formed the basis for identifying dependencies, system interfaces and critical transition points.
Prioritisation & Roadmap Definition
Building on this shared understanding, we jointly:
Prioritised business processes and affected system modules
Defined transition waves for migration into the new target environment
Identified opportunities to consolidate multiple systems with overlapping functionality
Agreed on a pragmatic, phased roadmap
This roadmap was formally aligned and endorsed by all key stakeholders.
Results
Outcomes & Impact
The jointly developed prioritisation and roadmap:
Restored confidence in the programme
Enabled constructive and fact-based collaboration with the external provider
Reduced dependency on vendor-specific know-how, documentation and methods
Clarified responsibilities, timelines and deliverables across all parties
As a direct consequence, commitment across business and IT increased significantly. There was a shared willingness to jointly develop this end-to-end perspective and to ensure that the process landscape truly reflected operational reality.
This collective understanding enabled the creation of a consistent, end-to-end process map, ensuring continuity across functions and providing a solid basis for process optimisation and sustainable improvement.
A shared conclusion emerged – across stakeholders:
What had been missing so far was a holistic, end-to-end view.
Years of rapid growth had fostered silo thinking, limiting understanding of how errors propagate along the process chain — and how they can be systematically reduced.
The programme moved from uncertainty to clarity, creating a stable foundation for the next phase and for the incoming programme lead.