Education and training of laboratory staff as a part of laboratory competence

Competence of laboratory staff is an important part of the technical competence of each laboratory. Because the speed at which knowledge goes out of date is increasing, maintaining laboratory staff competence at an appropriate level can be a very demanding requirement, especially for laboratories operating in a free market with little or no financial help from the state or from the larger organisation they possibly belong to. In order to manage staff competence effectively and efficiently, a laboratory must first define its services and the processes needed for realisation of these services. Responsibility for each step in these processes can then be assigned and gap analysis of current competence can be performed. This article analyses the requirements of ISO/IEC 17025 standard and gives some practical advice and solutions how to organize and manage staff competence.