As important as preparing and following a budget is to the financial success of the laboratory, equally important is inventory management. Inventory management is one of the single most effective ways to reduce costs and improve productivity. Regardless of the size of the laboratory, managing inventory properly is critical to making everything run smoothly.
Inventory management is monitoring all consumables from initial purchase through usage and disposal. By being efficient in this process, productivity will increase, and costs will be reduced.
Creating a new inventory management plan (or revamping an existing plan) involves creating an SOP (standard operating plan) or procedure. This plan should encompass all processes and tasks necessary to complete developing and implementing a good inventory management plan.
The inventory management plan includes:
- creating a starting point,
- assessing stocking levels and reductions,
- locating inventory, monitoring for expired inventory,
- proper disposing of expired inventory,
- leveraging pricing, and
- placing orders.
