eCommerce - whether in retail, publishing or broadcast - requires not only some new skills but a sophisticated synthesis of existing skills. No longer can the silos of marketing, finance, operations and 'talent' (whether editorial, buying or commission) stand alone.

The new skills are a synthesis of creative, technical and operational - that much is obvious. Less obvious are the new requirements on thinking and approaches: 'object oriented marketing', 'pattern-based merchandising', production efficiencies to personalisation, experimentation and flexibility at the heart of every process... and of course every movement is underpinned by metrics, metrics and more metrics.

The challenges we now face include:
* how to train and develop staff
* what's the new 'business operating model'
* what are the 'manageable components' of a modern digital business
* how may businesses make this radical transition to a more modern approach without putting business continuity at risk.

The 'ecommerce pyramid' is a schematic that shows the main service components in an ecommerce business - within the customer stream, the product/content stream and the technology and operational stream. The top of the pyramid shows the web interface of each of these.

The ecommerce pyramid is the basis for a new Diploma/Master programme I'm developing with e-consultancy and this workshop is to hear views, challenge these assumptions and understand the extent to which this approach is enlightening and extensible.