As part of its mission to conduct the test request, the laboratory may have to outsource certain operations to subcontractors. The test plan proposes a decentralized examination of the “classical” laboratory process. This is for different reasons: technical or legal, unavailability of a machine or control of the test result by a different technique. In all cases, the subcontractor’s action supplements the laboratory’s mission in order to assist it in the life cycle of the test request, from its genesis to the publication of the final test report.
In this context, therefore, it is possible to see the importance that subcontractors can have when they are integrated as stakeholders in the laboratory process. This management is crucial because the monitoring of external activity adds a problem to the current context of laboratories, namely how to manage and monitor subcontracted test requests, between internal and external actors?
Need to have access to the “full picture”
Just as the traceability of information over time is an important issue in order to improve the testing process, supplier monitoring requires transparency of the actions carried out within the framework of its mandate. Sosthènes de La Rochefoucauld said that “Trust is earned and cannot be demanded.” and because the results brought about following a test request are critical for the Design Office or the Production Department that requests them, it is not possible to leave room for improvisation to manage subcontracted shipments.
More specifically, the laboratory making the test request needs to be able to have an overview of the entire process, which is why, like document management, (Read : Documentary Management LIMS – The happiness of ordered knowledge) it requires the sharing of information in a centralized repository. Thanks to this, the actors involved can consult all or part of the test plan and thus guarantee the quality and traceability of the test, even among subcontractors.
Intangible capital, the cornerstone of competitiveness
It is a real competitive lever on which it is possible to capitalize in order to optimize your test request management process. Because centralized management of all the stakeholders involved in the test plan makes it possible to generate monitoring performance indicators and to highlight the points of slowdowns, and possibly plan corrective action.
Thus, the implementation of these indicators makes it possible to evaluate subcontractors and thanks to the integration of subcontracted information into the information system, the advantages are numerous such as facilitating audits for certifications, increasing productivity by easily finding test data and helping them to operate optimally in their own contexts.
Drawing on more than 25 years of experience in the management of high value-added technical data, BASSETTI offers its tool for optimizing efficiency in the management of test requests: TEEXMA® LIMS. This modular and configurable solution supports the management of laboratories from the test request to the validation of the test report, in order to ensure the valorisation of laboratory information and to help decision-making, by optimising the resources invested.
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