How a supply chain team is changing the flow of information and products at one of the nation’s largest healthcare systems
What does industrial engineering have to do with supply chain management? Quite a bit.
Sometimes referred to as “optimizers,” industrial engineers enlist natural science, mathematics, computer engineering and other skills in an effort to improve or simplify systems, which could be manufacturing, customer service, supply chain, etc.
They plan, they conduct simulations, they problem-solve. Then they continually educate the people on their roles in those systems.
Steve Pohlman has a degree in industrial engineering (as well as an MBA). Prior to beginning his career in healthcare supply chain in 1997, he worked in manufacturing in the auto and welding industries. Is it any surprise, then, that he is transforming processes at Cleveland Clinic, where he serves as senior director of materials management?
Pohlman and his team are in the midst of changing the flow of information and products at one of the nation’s largest healthcare systems. Cleveland Clinic consists of the main campus in Cleveland (1,400 beds, over 100 operating rooms and 60 buildings), 10 regional hospitals and more than 150 outpatient locations in northern Ohio.
