Navigating supply chain crises alone? Try Community-Led crisis response

When Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022, sanctions swept across borders.  

Extensive and complex supply networks faltered with disrupted materials, halted logistics, rapidly shifting compliance rules, and a sharp increase in cyber risk. 

For Defence organisations, the stakes were clear: national security, operational continuity, and supplier stability were on the line.  

The question was not whether risk will emerge - but how quickly and effectively an organisation can respond. 

And crucially: should it respond in isolation? 

Turn crisis into coordinated action 

Organisations needed fast answers: 

• Which suppliers were exposed? 
• Where were the operational risks? 
• How would compliance and cyber threats evolve? 

But for many, responding to an international supply chain crisis means scrambling to identify exposure, manually engaging suppliers, and relying on patchwork data to make decisions. 

But JOSCAR members took a different approach. 

Within five days of the invasion, the JOSCAR Governance Group, who at the time consisted of 15 buyers, co-developed and approved a targeted set of questions designed to assess exposure and supply chain risk. These were live within five days.  

Just two weeks later, over 2,000 suppliers responded. 

No delay. No fragmented view of risk. And crucially – no supplier fatigue.  

3-steps to manage supply chain crisis at speed 

1. Identify exposure with precision 

Launch targeted questions to understand how your suppliers might be impacted - from material sourcing and logistics to workforce and cyber risks. 

2. Prioritise and communicate clearly 

Focus on your most critical suppliers. Reach out with consistent, community-agreed messaging. Make it easy for them to respond. 

3. Coordinate action, not just insight 

 Use the shared data to identify hot spots, flag potential continuity issues, and co-develop mitigation plans. 

Infrastructure built for crisis 

The rapid response to the Ukraine crisis didn’t happen by chance. It was made possible by JOSCAR’s pre-built supplier network, collaborative governance model, and scalable data collection platform. 

Buyers had access to:

• Existing questionnaires and templates 
• Conditional logic to avoid irrelevant questions 
• Dashboards showing supplier exposure, mapped by location and category 

Because the infrastructure already existed, JOSCAR members didn’t waste time on admin -they focused on action.