Quality Management Systems Archives | Page 3 of 5 | GrowEQ: ISO systems, Process Improvement & Management

Three Guidelines for Writing Quality Policies

Yes, I can hear you groaning already. Quality policies, motherhood statements, stick them on the wall and forget about them. Correct? You may feel that way, but the standard for ISO 9001 Quality Management Systems clearly states that you must have a quality policy. It does not so clearly state what should be in it and how to communicate it. I shall explain that here. 5 Management Responsibility 5.3 Quality Policy What does ISO 9001 Say? ISO 9001 has the [...]

New Privacy Laws March 2014 – Have You Reviewed Your Policies?

The new privacy laws come into effect on 12 March 2014 so there isn’t much time left to review your privacy policies and procedures in order to comply with the new legislation. If you are found in repeated breach of these new laws, penalties can be up to $340 000 for an individual and $1.7 million for a company. What is Personal Information? The new privacy laws are concerned with personal information. Personal information is defined to include any information [...]

ISO 9001 – Management Commitment

Be afraid if your managers are giving the following signals: The quality management system is about “quality” only. They want to restrict the scope of the system to the bare minimum they think they can get away with. Goodness, why would you want the sales, marketing or finance to be exposed to problem solving and improvement??? The quality management system is the responsibility of the quality manager and quality department only. They can’t see that quality is everyone’s responsibility. That [...]

ISO 9001 – Documentation Requirements

A common criticism of ISO 9001 is that it places too much emphasis on documentation, and the early versions of ISO 9001 and the way they were audited were guilty of this. Although the requirements for documentation are still a part of ISO:2008 (the latest version), a more balanced approach is now taken. Only six procedures must be documented, for the rest it is up to management to decide what needs to be documented to ensure that good quality products [...]

ISO Management Systems – 5 Questions Auditors Ask

I have quite a few clients due to be audited soon so I thought I’d write about the things auditors tend to ask. Of course no one can predict all their questions (they are human beings after all), but you can bet that the following 5 questions will be amongst them. 1. What is your policy? Quality/OHS/Environmental/Energy/Food Safety or a combination of them into one integrated policy. This is often one of the first questions asked during a certification audit. [...]

If You’ve Got ISO Objectives You Need Action Plans

A recent newsletter was about setting meaningful objectives and targets for ISO 9001 Quality Management Systems, AS 4801 Occupational Health and Safety Management Systems, and ISO 14001 Environmental Management Systems. You know, the sort of objectives that help your business grow, reduce costs and even save lives. If you have objectives you need action plans. Action Plans are simple lists of all of the tasks that you need to finish to meet an objective. They differ from to-do Lists in [...]

3 Tips for Meaningful ISO Objectives and Targets

ISO 9001 Quality Management Systems, ISO 14001 Environmental Management Systems, and AS 4801 OHS Management Systems all require the setting of relevant objectives. Why? Objectives are goalposts and as such they drive improvement. The reason why many organisations do not reach their full potential or remain stagnant is that they don’t have this mechanism. They simply run around putting out fires, tackling surface issues, and responding to the “problems of the day” rather than addressing process performance issues based on [...]

Records Required by ISO 9001 – Don’t Go Overboard

ISO 9001 Quality Management System Requirements says you must have 21 records. For example the Standard says “Records from management reviews shall be maintained” and “Records of the audits and their results shall be maintained.” The important word is “shall” because in ISO speak shall means must. Why don’t they just say “must”? I don’t know, but the quote “Ours not to reason why, ours but to do and die” springs to mind. Please note though, that although the quality records listed [...]

Reduce Costs & Improve Performance

Many companies want ISO certification so they can tick a box on tender requests and thus increase their chances of being shortlisted for valuable tenders. This is one good reason but ISO systems can do so much more. When an ISO system is written with your business needs and goals in mind, when it is tailor made for your products, services and processes then it will reduce costs and improve performance too. In fact, it will be one of the [...]

Do I Need a Quality Management System?

The answer is . . . . it depends. It depends on your current business needs, where you want your business to be in the future, and how you want to use it. The way I see it, every business owner or manager wants to grow their business and reduce costs. Believe it or not, ISO 9001 can help you achieve just that. If you want your business to grow then ISO 9001 can help you to: Win lucrative tenders. [...]

First Name:		Last Name:
Company:		Phone:
Email:
Message: