{"id":6163,"date":"2026-08-27T21:43:57","date_gmt":"2026-08-27T21:43:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/crosscountrymovingteams.com\/?p=6163"},"modified":"2026-08-27T21:43:57","modified_gmt":"2026-08-27T21:43:57","slug":"the-supply-chain-savant-how-fedex-ceo-raj-subramaniam-leads-through-reglobalization","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/crosscountrymovingteams.com\/?p=6163","title":{"rendered":"The supply-chain savant: How FedEx CEO Raj Subramaniam leads through \u2018reglobalization\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"<div>\n<p>The FedEx CEO presides over an operation that moves roughly 18 million packages globally and generates two petabytes of data every day. The company connects 3 million shippers to 225 million consumers across 220 countries and territories.<\/p>\n<p>Read more <a href=\"https:\/\/crosscountrymovingteams.com\/?p=6161\">Grayscale CEO: Crypto winter has thawed\u2014but market watchers are still missing the point<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe are the referendum on global supply chains,\u201d Subramaniam told me in June, when I interviewed him at FedEx\u2019s headquarters in Memphis for <em>Fortune<\/em>\u2019s <em>Titans<\/em> podcast.<\/p>\n<div>\n<div>\n<div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p>\u201cI\u2019ve been doing this for 35 years, and I\u2019ve never seen a change in one year like we\u2019ve seen in 2025.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>FedEx\u2019s data shows, in real time, the geopolitical reordering sparked by President Donald Trump\u2019s tariffs and, this year, the war in Iran: U.S. imports went down, while U.S. exports went up. In Latin America, Southeast Asia, and India, FedEx experienced rapid growth.<\/p>\n<p>Subramaniam has coined a term for what he\u2019s seeing: \u201creglobalization.\u201d<\/p>\n<div>\n<div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p>\u201cThe supply-chain patterns are changing, and we are moving from one equilibrium state to another,\u201d he said. \u201cWe are in the middle of such a transition.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Meanwhile, within the $95 billion company he runs (No. 50 on the Fortune 500), Subramaniam has been navigating another sea change. In June 2025, FedEx\u2019s founder, Fred Smith, died at the age of 80\u2014leaving Subramaniam, the second CEO in FedEx\u2019s 53-year history, without his mentor.<\/p>\n<div>\n<div>\n<div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p>Taking the reins from a legendary founder\u2014as Subramaniam did in 2022\u2014is a great privilege, he told me. \u201cI always say that I can see far because I\u2019m standing on the shoulders of a giant,\u201d he said. That giant had groomed Subramaniam for the top job for years, as he rose through the ranks and served stints as FedEx\u2019s president and chief operating officer.<\/p>\n<div>\n<div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p>But as any CEO will tell you, even the most carefully planned leadership transition isn\u2019t easy. \u201cWhen the time came, I said, \u2018I can do this,\u2019 \u201d Subramaniam recalled. \u201cBut no, the whole thing changed \u2026 This is a whole different level.\u201d<\/p>\n<div>\n<div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p>As requests and demands came in from all sides, Subramaniam found himself having to say no\u2014a lot. To stay focused on what mattered most, he set aside time to create his own CEO job description and KPIs. One of those was to be a guardian of the culture that the company\u2019s founder built.<\/p>\n<p>He recounted a conversation with Smith when he stepped into the CEO role: \u201cI told him that a lot of things might change\u2014whether we have new technology, may have new people, we may buy new companies,\u201d he recalled. \u201cBut one thing that is not going to change is the FedEx culture, and that\u2019s why I came to work here in the first place. That\u2019s why I come to work every single day. That\u2019s a special thing.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Read more <a href=\"https:\/\/crosscountrymovingteams.com\/?p=6159\">\u2018Clearly, people hate data centers\u2019: Sam Altman admits Americans hate what he\u2019s wrought as his own data centers head quits<\/a><\/p>\n<div>\n<div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p>FedEx\u2019s culture has been a touchstone as Subramaniam has found himself leading the company through a multiyear transition, internally dubbed \u201cDRIVE.\u201d The initial purpose was to cut structural costs\u2014by billions over the past four years\u2014after a pandemic business hangover.<\/p>\n<div>\n<div>\n<div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p>Now, three restructurings are unfolding simultaneously: The first is a network transformation, merging the FedEx Express and Ground networks into a single U.S. network. There\u2019s a digital transformation, taking advantage of those two petabytes of daily data and AI to create an additional product line for enterprises called FedEx Dataworks. And then there\u2019s an organizational revamp to support all that change. (Subramaniam also recently spun off the trucking business, FedEx Freight, which began trading on the NYSE on June 1.)<\/p>\n<p>Dataworks is a good example of how a people-driven culture can empower workers to innovate: In late 2019, a smart young employee in the organization sent Subramaniam an unprompted white paper about the business opportunity in turning FedEx\u2019s proprietary data into a valuable product.<\/p>\n<div>\n<div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p>Subramaniam put a team of about eight in a building in downtown Memphis to build the infrastructure to make it happen.<\/p>\n<p>Then AI took off, and that data product became, in Subramaniam\u2019s description, a \u201cno-brainer.\u201d Dataworks has since struck data partnerships with Dun &amp; Bradstreet and ServiceNow.<\/p>\n<p>Transforming an organization as large as FedEx isn\u2019t easy. Revenue grew 8% to $94.7 billion in the fiscal year that ended in May, but Subramaniam still needs to prove that he can meaningfully expand FedEx\u2019s margins through sustainable growth versus cost-cutting.<\/p>\n<div>\n<div>\n<div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p>It\u2019s a challenge he is up for, thanks again to the foundation Smith built. \u201cThe great thing is that change has always been part of our culture,\u201d Subramaniam said, adding that he sees little choice in the matter: \u201cIf you don\u2019t like change, you\u2019re going to hate extinction.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cDifferentiation and driving change was always the game,\u201d he said. \u201cSo it\u2019s just the next era of change, is the way I think about it.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Read more <a href=\"https:\/\/crosscountrymovingteams.com\/?p=6157\">The $40 trillion national debt is growing while Social Security goes broke\u2014because wealthy Boomers are collecting over $100k in benefits per year<\/a><\/p>\n<p><em>This article appeared in the August\/September 2026 issue of <\/em> Fortune.<\/p>\n<div>\n<div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Tariffs, conflict, and shifting trade routes are upending the flow of goods around the world. Raj Subramaniam is betting FedEx can use the disruption to its advantage.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":6162,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[286],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6163","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-fortune-500-titans-and-disruptors-of-industry"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.7 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>The supply-chain savant: How FedEx CEO Raj Subramaniam leads through \u2018reglobalization\u2019 - Cross Country Moving Team<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/crosscountrymovingteams.com\/?p=6163\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The supply-chain savant: How FedEx CEO Raj Subramaniam leads through \u2018reglobalization\u2019 - Cross Country Moving Team\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Tariffs, conflict, and shifting trade routes are upending the flow of goods around the world. 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