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From: Dan Crowl <crowl**At_Symbol_Here**MTU.EDU>
Subject: Re: Small college chemical inventory management
Date: Apr 2, 2008 19:31 UTC
Reply-To: <6.2.5.6.2.20080402141648.03296008**At_Symbol_Here**wabash.edu>
In-Reply-To: <6.2.5.6.2.20080402141648.03296008**At_Symbol_Here**wabash.edu>
Hi Julie, The basic problem with inventory systems is the ownership for maintenance of the inventory. Frequently, when the inventory is centralized, the ownership is inadvertently taken away from the lab owner. This causes the entire inventory system to fail. What you need is a central inventory that still is capable of maintaining local ownership. Not an easy thing to do. Industry succeeds in doing this by providing the management systems to insure that the inventories are updated monthly by the lab owner. Universities frequently lack the disciplined management to make this happen. Dan Crowl Michigan Tech University Julie Olsen wrote: > We are looking for information on how small colleges handle their > chemical inventory and MSDS information. We have several academic > departments that are maintaining their own inventories and MSDSs and are > considering using a common inventory system. We would like to hear from > other schools about what they do and how well it works. > > Julie Olsen > Assistant Dean of the College > Wabash College > Crawfordsville, IN 47933 > 765-361-6206