The Office of Supply and Warehouse Management (OSWM) administers the Social Security Administration's supply and logistics management programs within the Office of Publications and Logistics Management (OPLM). Our team oversees the movement and storage of benefit payment and services forms, publications and other information serving millions of Americans. We manage more than 2,000 line items using a warehouse management system, handheld wireless bar code scanners and related technologies.

Our main supply building warehouse is an 80,000-square-foot building at SSA headquarters in Baltimore. It is supported by two nearby warehouses, giving us a total of 380,000 square feet and more than 50,000 bin locations. These locations process 100,000 to 130,000 line items each year, with an average daily volume of more than 400 line items.

We have coped with the same problem facing all logistics managers—attrition of personnel (primarily through retirement)—with the use of modern materials handling technologies and supplementing our staff with a third party logistics (3PL) services provider, SoBran. We made sure the 3PL meets the 9001:2000 methodologies we specified to ensure the integrity of all materials stored in our three warehouses. This includes equipment containing sensitive information or precious metals and hazardous materials.

We have embedded redundancies into our logistics procedures to ensure security when receiving, processing and storing sensitive items. That means taking frequent inventories of our sensitive items and reconciling our records so we can track the usage, storage and shipping of these items.

Even with economic constraints, we established a superb chain of custody that is second to none for handling our sensitive items. At the same time, we are always looking at new technologies. We also benchmark, attend professional conferences, and network with local government agencies to evaluate similar technologies or test new and improved ones. I recommend that approach to anyone seeking continuous improvement.