In the news. Fast Company reports that physical retail is shifting toward experience as the primary competitive lever, with emotionally connected customers spending up to 140% more. Stores are evolving beyond points of sale into hubs for discovery, guidance, and community. With personalization now a baseline, retailers are deploying in-store AI tools—such as conversational assistants that help shoppers find and choose products—to build trust. Brands are also designing stores around fandoms and shared cultural identities, using events, exclusive drops, and creator-led experiences to drive engagement and repeat visits. [Fast Company]

Convenience-driven consumers often know what they want to buy before they leave home. ... Once they’re in the store, they seek an easy experience and product availability.

On McKinsey.com. AI is redefining the role of physical stores, turning them into adaptive, hyperpersonalized environments that integrate seamlessly with digital channels. McKinsey’s Colleen Baum, Molly Squire, Tyler Rose, and Joshua Reuben highlight how leading retailers are using advanced analytics and generative AI to optimize assortment, tailor promotions and recommendations, and equip store associates with real-time customer and inventory data. The opportunity is significant: By 2030, US B2C retail could see up to $1 trillion in agentic commerce revenue, with global projections reaching $3 trillion to $5 trillion. Retailers that embrace this shift can unlock growth, efficiency, and loyalty.

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In the news. The largest increase in healthcare costs in over a decade is pushing CFOs toward more aggressive action. According to The Wall Street Journal, costs are expected to rise by about 9.5% this year, and executives are raising employee premiums, redesigning plans, and exploring self-insurance models where employers pay medical claims directly rather than relying on insurers. Traditional levers offer only limited relief, forcing companies to consider more structural changes as underlying cost pressures persist. As a result, costs are increasingly being shared with employees or offset through trade-offs in wages and benefits. [WSJ]

On McKinsey.com. With mental healthcare funding under pressure, expanding access may require broadening who delivers care. New research from the McKinsey Health Institute highlights task-sharing programs, which redistribute certain clinical responsibilities to trained nonspecialists to ease cost and capacity constraints. Despite mental disorders accounting for roughly 15% of the global disease burden, they receive just 2% of health budgets. McKinsey’s Erica Coe, Javier Valenzuela, Kana Enomoto, and Clara Gianola outline how scaling these models could address provider shortages, reduce bottlenecks, and improve outcomes at lower cost if supported by sustainable financing, clear care pathways, and appropriate oversight.

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Agentic AI infrastructure shift

In the news. According to The New York Times, AI coding tools are creating a “code overload,” with software output rising faster than organizations can manage. One company increased monthly output tenfold, generating a backlog of code that requires review and testing. While productivity gains are significant, the strain on engineering, security, and oversight functions is growing. With nonengineers now able to generate applications, demand for experienced reviewers is surging, and new risks are emerging. The challenge is shifting from generating code to managing it at scale, ensuring quality, security, and accountability across the organization. [NYT]

On McKinsey.com. A shift to more flexible, “mesh-like” architectures could enable AI agents and tools to collaborate reliably across enterprise workflows. Rather than layering AI onto legacy systems, this approach redefines IT infrastructure as an active enabler of how work gets done. As agentic AI scales, infrastructure must evolve to support coordination, reliability, and speed across systems. McKinsey’s Arnaud Tournesac, Arun Gundurao, Ling Lau, and Pankaj Sachdeva explain how this shift gives C-suite leaders an opportunity to redesign technology foundations and fundamentally change how work is executed.

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