Does inventory management sometimes feel like a waste of time? Learn how to maximize your inventory management process to use it as a tool for making important business decisions.

Inventory management is a critical component of supply chain management, addressing how much inventory should be carried across the supply chain, where to carry it, and how much safety stock is required to meet the organization's cost and customer service objectives. Now, there's an authoritative and comprehensive guide to best-practice inventory management in any organization. Authored by world-class experts in collaboration with the Council of Supply Chain Management Professionals (CSCMP), this text gives students and practitioners a thorough understanding of each leading approach to managing supply chain inventories, and the variables that drive decisions about inventory levels. It discusses the fundamental need for inventory, how product value affects inventory decisions, how to determine inventory levels, how the number of inventory locations affects inventory levels, and new approaches to reducing inventory. Coverage includes: Basic inventory management goals, roles, concepts, purposes, and terminology, including periodic inventory, perpetual inventory, safety stock, cycle count, ABC analysis, carrying and stockout costs, and more Key inventory management elements, processes, and interactions Principles/strategies for establishing efficient and effective inventory flows The critical role of technology in inventory planning and management New approaches to reducing inventory including postponement, vendor-managed inventories, cross-docking, and quick response systems Understanding essential trade-offs between inventory and transportation costs, including the impact of carrying costs Requirements and challenges of global inventory management Best practices for assessing inventory management performance using standard metrics and frameworks

Stock management and control is a critical element to the success and overall financial well-being of an organization. Through the application of innovative practices and technology, businesses are now able to effectively monitor their operations and manage their inventory by evaluating sales patterns and customer preferences. The Handbook of Research on Promoting Business Process Improvement Through Inventory Control Techniques is a critical scholarly resource that examines optimization techniques, data mining concepts, and genetic algorithms to manage inventory control. Featuring coverage on a broad range of topics such as logistics and supply chain management, stochastic inventory modelling, and inventory management in healthcare, this book is geared towards academicians, practitioners, and researchers seeking various research methods to get optimal ordering policy.

In addition, the book explains how to solve a wide range of typical problems, exploit the potential of information systems, reduce damage and loss, and improve warehouse safety.

This handbook begins with the history of Supply Chain (SC) Engineering, it goes on to explain how the SC is connected today, and rounds out with future trends. The overall merit of the book is that it introduces a framework similar to sundial that allows an organization to determine where their company may fall on the SC Technology Scale. The book will describe those who are using more historic technologies, companies that are using current collaboration tools for connecting their SC to other global SCs, and the SCs that are moving more towards cutting edge technologies. This book will be a handbook for practitioners, a teaching resource for academics, and a guide for military contractors. Some figures in the eBook will be in color. Presents a decision model for choosing the best Supply Chain Engineering (SCE) strategies for Service and Manufacturing Operations with respect to Industrial Engineering and Operations Research techniques Offers an economic comparison model for evaluating SCE strategies for manufacturing outsourcing as opposed to keeping operations in-house Demonstrates how to integrate automation techniques such as RFID into planning and distribution operations Provides case studies of SC inventory reductions using automation from AIT and RFID research Covers planning and scheduling, as well as transportation and SC theory and problems

The goal of Inventory Management will be to explain the dynamics of inventory management's principles, concepts, and techniques as they relate to the entire supply chain (customer demand, distribution, and product transformation processes). The interrelationships of all functions will be defined. The book concentrates on understanding the many ramifications of inventory management. In today's competitive business environment, inventory management has proven to be most critical, and this book is directed to the management of inventory to assist in better understanding the body of knowledge required to operate in a competitive world. Almost all functions such as sales, engineering, and accounting have an impact and are impacted by inventory management. The book will assist in the training of students as well as APICS CPIM (Certified in Production and Inventory Management) candidates. As such it will not only be a textbook, but also a desk reference for those employees responsible for controlling inventories, and thereby assist in reducing cost, improving customer service, and maximizing capacity. Each chapter concludes with a case study and suggested solution. The case studies tell the story of a growing company, Smith Industries, and the related inventory management problems it had to address. The problems addressed relate to the subject matter of the chapter.