What do you do if your inventory data is overwhelming and you need to make informed decisions?

1. Prioritize the data: Identify the most critical data points that directly impact your inventory management and decision-making. Focus on metrics like stock levels, turnover rates, lead times, and demand forecasts. 2. Leverage technology: Utilize inventory management software or business intelligence tools to consolidate and visualize the data. This can help you quickly identify patterns, trends, and potential problem areas. 3. Implement data analysis: Look for opportunities to optimize inventory levels, reduce waste, and improve supply chain efficiency. 4. Collaborate with cross-functional teams: Engage with other departments, such as procurement, production, and sales, to gather additional context and perspectives.

1. Engage team (identifying right people for right job) 2. Simplify data (data cleaning, trends, patterns) 3. Adopt Tech (data analysis and visualization) 4. Prioritize actions (categorise inventory) 5. Continuous improvement

If the inventory data is overwhelming, then the following is suggested: a) Do the ABC analysis of the inventory. b) Within A-class materials, do one more ABC analysis. The AA-class materials are the most sensitive. They increase the inventory carrying cost. So, if possible, appoint a purchase manager who oversees this material only. c) Do FSN Analysis. Within F-class and S-class materials, do FSN analysis. The warehouse can be arranged according to the sequence FF, FS, FN, SF, SS and SN. d) Do the VED analysis of the inventory. the non-availability of the V-class materials stops the production. The Manager who oversees AA-class material can be given the responsibility to oversee V-class material also. e) There are a few other steps also.

Find a way to put some order or categorize the data. Categorization should break down the data into more manageable segments.

When faced with overwhelming inventory data, here are steps you can take to make informed decisions: Data Cleaning and Organization: Start by cleaning and organizing your data. Remove duplicates, correct errors, and ensure consistency across datasets. Use tools like Excel, Python, or specialized data-cleaning software for this purpose. Segmentation and Prioritization: Segment your inventory data based on relevant criteria such as product categories, sales velocity, profitability, or customer demand. Prioritize analysis and decision-making based on the segments that have the most significant impact on your business goals. use also: Advanced Analytics Techniques Continuous Monitoring and Adjustment Training and Skill Development

Utilize Data Analysis Tools: Data Aggregation and Segmentation: Group your data into categories to identify trends within specific product lines, locations, or customer segments. This allows for a more nuanced understanding of your inventory performance. Consider Predictive Analytics: Explore using advanced analytics tools to forecast future demand and optimize inventory levels.

Technology is very necessary especially when your business is growing and real time accurate data is needed to make wise business decisions and to support your customers properly. But, avoid spending unnecessary money on much complex systems with additional capabilities that you may not need now and or in the near future. Simplicity rule also applies to the technology you choose for your business. Fully understand the key business requirements and then find a system that would easily and in a user friendly manner supports them.

Adopting technology can be a game-changer in managing overwhelming inventory data. Implementing inventory management software or advanced analytics tools can help organize, analyze, and visualize data more efficiently. This enables informed decision-making based on real-time insights, optimizing inventory levels, forecasting demand accurately, and identifying areas for improvement.

Use Data Inventory Management Strategies Catalog, categorize, and manage your data assets efficiently. This helps in enhancing decision-making, optimizing performance, and ensuring compliance with regulatory standards.

In my personal experience adopting technology, tagging and tracking materials makes inventory management much easier to keep track of. It allows you to assign specific areas where items are available and stored in excess as well as track them as they move from place to place whether the items were sold & need to be restocked or the items are being signed out and used or the items are being shipped from one warehouse to another. Adopting technology puts control of all of these factors and many more at your fingertips whether you’re in the office or on the go.

Set Clear Goals and Objectives: Before diving into the data, have a clear understanding of the decisions you need to make. This will guide your data analysis and ensure you're focusing on the most relevant information. Prioritize by Impact: Not all data points are equally important. Analyze the data to identify areas with the most significant impact on your inventory management. Focus on these areas first. Seek Expert Help: If the data is too complex or you lack the resources for in-house analysis, consider seeking help from data analysts or inventory management consultants.

Prioritizing actions from the data really boils down to what do you and/or your customers need. What data is relevant for their complex decisions? Sometimes this isn't even entirely clear until you spend time with the data. Remember, it is your responsibility to analyze the information and provide insights and value to your organization and your customers. When you can identify the trends, opportunities, issues, etc. in the inventory and understand their relevance, that is when you can provide value and prioritize next steps to better manage it.

Some ways to get started before going into the data directly, have a clear objective and understanding of the data and relevancy to the decision-making process. Seek to organize the data to be able to clearly analyze the data and make the best decision.

Start with a clear action plan focused on key metrics to guide your analysis. Identify these metrics based on their relevance to your business goals, such as turnover rates or fulfillment accuracy. With these metrics in mind, segment and categorize the data to create a concise and understandable illustration of the inventory situation.

If your inventory data is overwhelming, you can start by organizing it into categories or segments to make it more manageable. Then, use data analysis tools or software to identify patterns, trends, and outliers. Focus on key performance indicators (KPIs) relevant to your goals and use visualization techniques like charts or graphs to understand the data better. Additionally, consider implementing inventory management systems or seeking assistance from data analysts to streamline the process and make more informed decisions.

Data Visualization and Summarization: Leverage Data Visualization Tools: Don't get bogged down in raw numbers. Use data visualization tools like charts, graphs, and dashboards to identify trends and patterns. These tools can reveal insights hidden within spreadsheets. Focus on Key Metrics: Don't try to analyze everything at once. Identify key metrics relevant to your decision-making process. This could include stock turnover rates, lead times, demand forecasts, or product profitability.

Inventory data is most overwhelming when the counts in your WMS/ERP are incorrect. The best way to solve this is to reinforce immediate entry of all transactions in handheld scanners. If a scanner isn’t available, then the Team Member should immediately enter the transaction(s) into the computer before starting the next task.

01- Organize Your Data: Start by organizing your inventory data into manageable categories. This could include sorting items by type, quantity, value, turnover rate, etc. 02- Collaborate Across Departments: Involve stakeholders from different departments such as sales, procurement, and finance in the decision-making process. Collaborative efforts facilitate a holistic understanding of inventory challenges and foster alignment towards common objectives.

As the data is good enough. Need to evaluate on matrix risk and benefits analysis. The best decision to be performed l. And it will give the desired outcomes.

I just use the export data from the software used in inventory dept and simply use basic of ms Excel and verify it manually with store. This will give the concrete data for audit. The same is rectified in sap mm

Establish performance goals and metrics. Set performance goals and metrics to track progress in reducing excess inventory. This may include metrics such as inventory turnover, inventory turnover rate, and obsolescence rate.

Nothing can be perfect in this regular progressive world you can't be settled at any point you have to make a move towards the improvement to make it more efficient and effective

Regular routines and meetings sometimes lead to the same questions being asked week after week. For example: "Will this program be in a good position to markdown during X week?" To get on top of this, try to adjust your weekly reporting to account for those questions and address those concerns before they come up. Not only will you save time, but your team will appreciate the proactiveness and additional clarity. For example: "I've calculated the estimated weeks of supply for this program which means it will have X WOS at markdown. Is X WOS acceptable?" Sometimes this requires improving on a shared report owned by the team - always talk to the other functions before making changes so they can offer their perspectives!

From my own experience, having a solid database to start with is the key. Information can give you a lot of insight into different costs and areas that need work and improvements but your data has to be sorted out in an ideal way that can support your goals. Excel is your friend in such cases and if you don’t have a good database or a clean one then most definitely the first step is to build one. Start categorizing your items/products in a way that is efficient for your business and vision for the information that you need from it so you can easily get the most of it. The most important step though would be, is to set your reporting goals before you start this cycle. Otherwise, it’s not going to be effective.

I personally prefer consolidating all relevant data into a single sheet for decision-making. I achieve this by using Power Query and pivot tables to combine multiple data sources into one sheet. Additionally, I connect this sheet to Power BI for further analysis. This technique saves time and ensures accurate data retrieval, streamlining the decision-making process.

A major item that has been overlooked in the steps is business knowledge and direction. A key factor in data analysis is: what question are you trying to answer with the data? You must first understand the business goal to formulate questions that the preceding points are making. This direction will allow for the greatest gains with a limited workforce. Consider the objective. Simplify the data Ask the data specific questions in the correct order Expose opportunities Take action Repeat

First categorize your inventory, analyze shortages and generate ageing report. Define your objectives clearly e.g. zero shortages, reducing inventory days etc. Formulate action plans to achieve the objectives and assign tasks to team members. Schedule periodic meeting and monitor progress. Leverage predictive and prescriptive analytics for continuous improvement and avoid such scenarios in future.

In my view, the parameters which define the informed decisions on Inventory management, has to be finalized devoid of the data volume. Once these parameters are defined, appreciate tools/templates should be developed with automated data upload and analysis capabilities to crisply provide for the requisite control metrics. Elements of predictive analytics, AI can also be reinforced. This system can be calibrated when needed. Thus, irrespective of the data volume, informed decisions can be taken in practical scenario.