How They Did it: The Purpose-Driven Supply Chain

This is an excerpt of the original article. It was written for the July-August 2014 edition of Supply Chain Management Review. The full article is available to current subscribers.

July-August 2014

LEGACY Supply Chain Services has made company culture the centerpiece of how it drives innovation, efficiency, and the creation of value for its customers. Is it a model that others should replicate?

Browse this issue archive.

Already a subscriber? Access full edition now.

Need Help?

Contact customer service

847-559-7581   More options

Not a subscriber? Start your magazine subscription.

Corporate culture is much in the news, and not in a good way. Ron Johnson’s disastrous tenure as CEO of JCPenney has been described as a clash of cultures between Johnson’s lieutenants from Apple and Penney’s old guard. More recently, a scathing internal report cited culture as the culprit behind GM’s failure to address problems with defective ignition switches that led to more than a dozen deaths. “GM Takes Blame, Vows Culture Shift” read the headline in the Wall Street Journal.

Culture is often a convenient boogey man for failure. When a company, or its supply chain, is at the top of its game, management gets the credit. When things go awry, as they did at Penney and GM, culture takes the blame. But what happens if the two are aligned? What happens if management takes the core values and mission statements hanging in every board room to heart? What if management translates those values into demonstrable behaviors that “form the foundation of their company” and are used to measure the performance of its leadership team? Can something as soft, fuzzy, and intangible as culture be a force to improve conventional supply chain metrics and deliver a competitive advantage?

The answer to all of those questions is yes, according to LEGACY Supply Chain Services, a privately-held North American 3PL with more than 2,700 employees. Headquartered in Portsmouth, N.H., LEGACY offers a full complement of warehousing, distribution, transportation, and customs brokerage services to companies in a variety of industries. In 2009, LEGACY refocused its mission to place an emphasis on a sustainable and measurable company culture model that serves as the foundation of the company, is the basis for management reviews, and is a force that can be shaped to drive performance (See Exhibit 1). While financial measurement typically drives most organizations, “culture comes first” at LEGACY, according to CEO Ron Cain.

This complete article is available to subscribers only. Click on Log In Now at the top of this article for full access. Or, Start your PLUS+ subscription for instant access.

Not ready to subscribe, but need this article?
Buy the complete article now. Only $20.00. Instant PDF Download.
Access the complete issue of Supply Chain Management Review magazine featuring
this article including every word, chart and table exactly as it appeared in the magazine.

SC
MR