Intra-organizational legitimization strategies used by purchasing managers

This paper addresses the issue of how purchasing managers can develop the purchasing department's legitimacy within an organization. A qualitative exploratory approach based on six cases has been used since: (1) there has not yet been a research performed on this topic; and (2) an analysis of internal legitimization strategies must take into consideration the context and the nature of the relationships among departments. Our analysis shows that in order to create, maintain or increase the purchasing department's internal legitimacy, purchasing managers have to do very well about two complementary strategic orientations: (1) identify and attract the best suppliers; (2) identify and implement collaborative processes and coordination mechanisms that cannot be duplicated by competitors. In fact, supply managers actually develop legitimization strategies based internally and externally, since a higher level of internal legitimacy can also be supported partially by external stakeholders, who then influence the other departments' and top management's perceptions. Our study also shows that the strategies used by purchasing managers take different forms depending which legitimacy dimension (cognitive, pragmatic, or moral legitimacy) they are trying to influence. Moreover, a purchasing department's legitimacy strategy is developed based on a few important factors: (1) where the purchasing department stands at a given time in terms of the contribution perceived, similar to a "balance sheet" evaluation; (2) the purchasing personnel's technical and relational competencies; and (3) the extent of their implication in the strategic choices leading to the development of a competitive advantage for the organization they work for. It seems that any effort to take steps based on coherent legitimization strategies could help improve both a purchasing department's legitimacy level and its development level. From this standpoint, this study also shows that the purchasing department's internal legitimacy is a crucial driver of purchasing practices.