Operational Excellence Analyst I

Primary City/State

Phoenix, Arizona

Department Name

Purchasing-Ref Lab

Work Shift

Day

Job Category

Supply Chain

Who We Are

Sonora Quest Laboratories has proven its focus on quality, recognized by numerous awards representing our hard work and commitment to patient care. We are the only healthcare company ever to receive our state’s highest quality award, the Arizona Governor’s Award for Quality. No organization has attained this award since. Other recent awards include 11 consecutive #1 Bioscience Company in Arizona recognitions by Ranking Arizona / AZ Big Media, most recently in 2022; a 100 Best Arizona Companies recognition by BestCompaniesAZ in 2022; and ten Top 40 Most Admired Companies in Arizona recognitions by AZ magazine / BestCompaniesAZ, most recently in 2021.

Did you know laboratory results impact 75% of the medical diagnostic process? As we proactively take the challenge to improve the quality of healthcare in Arizona, our Supply Chain Management team is actively looking for ways to improve cost and operational performance for the benefit of our customers. Our Operational Excellence Manager is key to building our systems and analytics foundation to unlock breakthrough performance resulting in customer service enhancements, expense reductions, inventory optimization, and operational Flow.

Who You Are

• You’re driven by meaningful, transformational change and inspired by the impact it can create.
• You’re a builder at heart—with the grit and determination to establish strong foundations that drive exceptional supply chain and customer service performance.
• You believe in the power of direct communication and prefer real conversations over long email threads to solve business challenges.
• You see the digital potential within real-world processes—data capture, structures, metadata, SQL, statistics, algorithms, and optimization come naturally to you.
• You excel at breaking down complex systems into understandable parts, quickly grasping how things work and how to improve them.
• You embrace experimentation, are unafraid of failure, and prioritize speed and action to drive progress.
• You naturally spot inefficiencies, believe in continuous improvement, and present change with empathy and respect that inspires action.
  
  

Who You Are Not

• You prefer structured environments with well-defined processes and may find the ambiguity of a dynamic workplace setting challenging.
• You’re most comfortable communicating via email and may not enjoy frequent face-to-face collaboration with teams and leadership.
• You prefer detailed project plans to be fully developed before starting work and may be uncomfortable with iterative approaches or learning through experimentation.
• A fast-paced, dynamic environment may feel overwhelming, and high levels of personal accountability might not align with your preferred work style.
• You tend to favor established best practices from larger organizations, even without fully analyzing their relevance in new or different contexts.
• You prefer clear, known pathways over exploring "what if" scenarios and may not naturally gravitate toward curiosity-driven problem solving.
• You believe improvement is best achieved through enterprise-grade tools and may be hesitant to explore more lightweight or unconventional solutions.
  
  

Core Functions

• Analytics & Reporting: Generates automated and ad-hoc reports for data requests from the Supply Chain Management team and other internal customers. Provides basic statistical analysis to aid in sourcing negotiations, competitive bid processes (RFI, RFQ, RFP), return on investment (ROI) calculations, capital or operating budget needs, product standardization efforts, or any other activity that supports cost reductions and/or process improvement in the supply chain.
• Process Engineering: Participates in process improvement projects to optimize efficiency and productivity within the department and the organization. Monitors process compliance and appropriate key performance indicators (KPIs) to measure current state and track changes after new processes are implemented. Measures performance efficacy in regular reports and identifies areas of opportunity. Maintains documentation including policies and standard operating procedures (SOPs) for new and existing SCM processes.
• System Support: Supports ongoing maintenance and/or design and implementation of electronic Materials Resource Planning (MRP) system and other Supply Chain systems. Supports all secondary database connections associated with MRP. Provides support and training for application users.
• Data Management: Supports maintenance of databases associated with systems included above. As needed, performs daily file transfers, reviews data imports, and performs month-end close procedures. Updates MRP information such as item pricing, supplier information, and client utilization limits. Maintains other electronic files as records. Performs routine cleanup of data.
  
  

Position Summary

As a key contributor role in Supply Chain Management (SCM) at SQL/LSA, this position is responsible for performing data-driven decision-making and serving as a domain expert for the laboratory supply chain. This position supports critical information needs in Sourcing, Procurement, Fulfillment Center and/or Supply Chain Coordinator job functions. Performs all functions according to established policies, procedures, regulatory and accreditation requirements, as well as applicable professional standards.

Knowledge, Skills And Abilities

• Ability to effectively communicate through clear and concise verbal and/or written communication.
• Effective time-management and task prioritization skills.
• Excellent collaboration skills.
• Supply Chain analytics, data modeling and forecasting.
• Problem-solving and decision-making abilities to identify actionable, statistically supported recommendations from complex data.
• Proficiency in Microsoft Office (Excel, Word, etc)
• Ability to thrive in a dynamic, rapidly changing business.
  
  

Minimum Qualifications

• Bachelor’s Degree or equivalent experience in Supply Chain Management, Business, or related field.
• Excellent communication and collaboration ability
  
  

Preferred Qualifications

• One (1) year of continuous improvement experience with knowledge of multiple methodologies (Lean, Six Sigma, TQM, Kaizen, process re-engineering).
• Experience with using reporting and analytics such as SQL, MS Access and/or Excel, or other business intelligence (BI) platforms.
• Laboratory operations and/or supply chain management experience.
• Additional related education and/or experience
  
  

EEO Statement

EEO/Female/Minority/Disability/Veterans

Our organization supports a drug-free work environment.

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