A seasoned executive, Arun has over 25 years of experience managing operations for US-based and multinational companies. He has extensive expertise in all environments, including digital, retail, and omnichannel. Arun specializes in helping clients transform their business and overall customer experience by harnessing the power of technology.
Prior to joining McKinsey, Arun was president and 16B officer of Sears Holding Corporation’s home-appliance and home-services businesses. Both business units are number one in their individual market segments in the United States. During his tenure at Sears, he launched a number of important initiatives, including the 95/5 initiative which defined the service standard for the industry.
Arun joined Sears from Staples, where he served as senior vice president and general manager of global e-commerce, and was responsible for running the day-to-day business of Staples.com and Staples’ mobile properties—the second largest behind Amazon. He leveraged data science and analytics to help create actionable insights for the business and led a number of strategic initiatives for the e-commerce business, such as online- and mobile-product roadmaps and the rollout of dynamic pricing.
Arun came to Staples from Groupon. While at Groupon, he served as head of global risk and operations. In this role, Arun established and actively managed operating metrics for each business in the e-commerce segment of Groupon, following the company’s IPO. In less than eight months, he helped scale the business from $100 million to $2 billion, while developing standards and expectations that allowed Groupon’s business to be managed globally.
Throughout his career, Arun has held various operational and leadership positions with industry leaders, including Apple, Sun Microsystems, 3M, Groupon, Staples, and Sears.
Published work
“DTC e-commerce: How consumer brands can get it right,” McKinsey & Company, November 2020
“Reimagining marketing in the next normal,” McKinsey & Company, July 2020
“Building an e-commerce business: Lessons on moving fast,” McKinsey & Company, April 2020
“Fast Times: How Digital Winners Set Direction, Learn, and Adapt,” McKinsey & Company, February 2020
“A CEO guide for avoiding the ten traps that derail digital transformations,” McKinsey & Company, November 2017
“Turnaround artists: How companies can catch up to the digital revolution,” McKinsey & Company, August 2017
Past Experience
Sears Holdings Corporation
President and 16B officer, Sears home services and appliances
Staples
SVP and general manager, global e-commerce
Groupon
SVP, global operations
3M
Senior executive, international operations
Sun Microsystems
Senior executive
Apple
Product manager of OS X
VP, Apple retail
Education
Harvard University
MBA
University of Kansas
BS, finance