DC Velocity - July 2019

Dr. Nancy Nix knows the supply chain, and she’s got the pedigree to prove it. From her extensive management experience with DuPont Co. and Reliance Industries to her work with AWESOME (Achieving Women’s Excellence in Supply Chain Operations, Management, and Education), an organization focused on women’s supply chain leadership, Nix has devoted her career to advancing the supply chain profession and women’s leadership across the industry.

Nix has served as AWESOME’s executive director emeritus since 2017. She also served on the supply chain faculty at Texas Christian University, where she was executive director of its executive M.B.A. program as well as director of the Supply and Value Chain Center at the university’s Neely School of Business.

Nix received her doctorate from the University of Tennessee and her M.B.A. from Temple University. She serves on the advisory board of directors for DSC Logistics and was a member of the Council of Supply Chain Management Professionals’ (CSCMP) board of directors. In 2017, she received the Distinguished Service Award from CSCMP for her contributions to the field of supply chain management.

Q What are some of the most important changes you have observed in the industry? A When I started in this industry, supply chain functions were operating in silos and seen as a necessary cost. In fact, the term “supply chain” didn’t even exist. There were a few university programs offering logistics or procurement majors, but in general, the leadership was home-grown. Most people within a company didn’t have any idea what went on in those “peripheral” functions.

Today, supply chain is a widely recognized profession, university programs have exploded, and graduates are in high demand. Advances in technology have enabled and continue to enable significant changes in the capability of supply chains to serve customers and contribute to business success. With significant changes in customer demands and delivery capabilities, the need for integration and collaboration—both within a company and with its suppliers and customers—is increasingly clear. Our discipline is recognized as a strategic contributor to both the top line and the bottom line of a business, and more and more companies are adding a supply chain role to the C-suite.

Q Are there any key fundamental aspects of logistics and supply chain that are so foundational that they have not changed?

A The basic fundamentals remain the same. Logistics and supply chain organizations are the ones that
make sure the customers have the products they want,
when and where they want them. Supply chain roles still
offer the extraordinary opportunity to work
outside the four walls of your business (with
suppliers and customers) and in a global
environment. And logistics and supply chain
professionals have always made a significant
contribution to the success of a business,
even though that has not always been recog-
nized. Supply chain and logistics roles con-
tinue to be rewarding and offer tremendous
learning opportunities.

Q Describe your continued work with AWESOME. What are your goals as executive director emeritus and what are your long-term hopes for the organization?

A Since AWESOME was founded just six short years ago, I have had the pleasure of serving as executive director for more than three years and now as executive director emeritus. Our focus is to advance women’s leadership in supply chain. Since the organization was founded, we have grown from a community of some 200 senior women leaders to more than 1,300 today. While there are still too few women in senior leadership roles, there are so many more than we knew, and it has been exciting to enable them to build connections and learn from each other. This year, more than 325 women came together at our annual AWESOME Symposium to learn and gain inspiration to make a difference—to advance women in their organizations and to advance their own careers. We are working to increase the visibility of women leaders through our AWESOME Legendary Leadership award and by increasing the number of women in speaker and panelist roles in major industry events. These women serve as inspirational role models for the supply chain leaders of the future.

We also encourage and support young women pursuing careers in supply chain. Each year, we provide funding for five scholars—young women majoring in supply chain—to attend CSCMP’s annual conference and the AWESOME Symposium, and this year we partnered with MIT to offer a high-potential woman a full scholarship to its masters in supply chain management program.

For the past four years, we have partnered with [the market research firm] Gartner to conduct a study on women in supply chain to track progress and identify practices that increase the representation of women in supply chain leadership roles. I am happy to report that this year, for the first time, we saw progress—particularly with more women at the VP level. While I am confident AWESOME will continue to play a role in promoting the advancement of women in our industry, the ideal future would be that we no longer need to work to advance women’s leadership because we will naturally have diverse representation at all levels and throughout our industry. As I heard an industry leader say recently, the ideal future will be that we no longer have to have the conversation.