The Overwhelming Job Of Processing Inventory
I know you've seen the now ubiquitous "bar codes" on foods and other items in almost every store in America. Really, that humble bar code is one of the biggest leaps taken by mankind in the highly critical world of inventory management. Without the bar code, inventory management would still be lagging behind. In fact, I would go so far as to say that there might not have been a structured field like inventory management at all! For a long time, I was under the mistaken belief that inventory management was merely a catchphrase to describe the storage activities of any business. But the complex nature of business in the present day and age makes inventory management a highly specialized science that has its own language, terms of frequent use, qualified professionals and even software.
You might have heard abut the kind of software associated with inventory management. It is better known as enterprise resource planning software (or ERP). Most ERP software has inventory management at the core of its programs. I first came across inventory management in the true sense of the term when I visited the warehouse of an acquaintance, who manufactured various automobile parts for some bigger car manufacturers. Such people, who manufacture parts of bigger orders, are known as Original equipment manufacturers (OEMs). Anyways, this OEM mad gearboxes for a large car company. Make may not be the right term as what he did was to assemble the gearboxes, made from various parts that various other companies supplied him with. This is where, I got to see inventory management at work. Since he relied on regular supply from five different vendors, this person needed similar deliveries, at similar times from all five of the suppliers to make or rather, assemble his gearboxes. Even if one of his suppliers fell behind on the schedule, his assembly could not be completed. Hence, he had installed a highly efficient inventory management tool that kept track of his rate of supplies and calculated how many pieces of the gearbox he could assemble. This tight control on his inventory management process made him efficient, and capable of delivering to the major car manufacturer as per schedule. But inventory management is about a whole lot more than just efficiently building on demand. In super markets, you need inventory management to keep track not just of sales, but also of which items are in demand and need to be replenished. In the kitchens of large hotels, inventory management can streamline the effective procurement of fruits, vegetables, meat and poultry products to equip the kitchen to function effectively. Even in the textiles business, effective inventory management can helping hassle free sourcing of various parts like buttons and zippers on time, to ensure completion of the stitching activities to facilitate delivery. Without inventory management in such and a whole lot of other industries, there would be chaos. People reliant on one part of the supply chain mechanism in order to make additional parts or to take further action would be unable to function well. So inventory management can effectively streamline the entire process flow of a business and drectly impact productivity. |
