ISO 9001 is based on seven Quality Management principles. Adhering to these, will guarantee that your organisation will be best placed to give continuous value add to its clients. In addition, implementation of a Quality Management System (QMS) will be more seamless.
These foundational QM principles are:
- Customer Focus
- Leadership
- Engagement of People
- Process Approach
- Improvement
- Evidence-based
- Decision Making
- Relationship Management
ISO 9001 Background
ISO 9001:2015 comprises ten sections aka clauses, each with supporting sub-sections or sub-clauses. In addition to forming the basis for a successful implementation, Clauses 4-10 make up the requirements that must be applied to any QMS.
Clause 0-3 – Introduction and scope of the standard
Clause 4 – Context of the organization
Clause 5 – Leadership
Clause 6 – Planning
Clause 7 – Support
Clause 8 – Operation
Clause 9 – Performance evaluation
Clause 10 – Improvement
Skills & Competencies
Implementing a QMS will help businesses to:
- Understand and assess the context of their organisation, thereby enabling them to define interested parties, their expectations and requirements. This will in turn, enable an organisation to set clear objectives as well as identify new business opportunities.
- Prioritise their clients. In so doing, they will make sure that their needs are constantly met and expectations exceeded; this will ultimately lead to repeat, new and increased business.
- Increase efficiency as a result of process alignment. By ensuring everyone within the organisation has a better understanding of the business and its objectives, an organisation can expect better morale, increased productivity and efficiency, and resultant reduced internal costs.
- Achieve compliance by meeting pertinent statutory and regulatory requirements.
- Expand into new and emerging markets; today, ISO 9001 is a pre-requisite for trading in many sectors and with many businesses.
- Identify and address Risks – both positive and negative!
Availability?
There is no time like now! And in the case of ISO 9001:2022, sooner is definitely better than later. Organisations need to kick off upgrade proceedings without delay if they’re to avoid the upcoming, last minute certification traffic jam!
There are several ways in which to implement a QMS. For more in-depth advice, contact our ISO consulting team on +353 (0)1 620 4121.
For now, here are our top #readysteadygo tips:
Tip 1: Define the objective(s): What does your organisation wish to achieve through implementing the standard?
Tip 2: Leadership engagement: It is imperative that all employees from the top down are fully engaged in and supportive of this initiative. Clear and open communications will ensure everyone is singing, if not in tune, from the same hymn sheet.
Tip 3: Identify the core processes that will ensure both objectives and customer needs are met; these will form the basis of your QMS.
Best Fit?
Certification to ISO 9001:2015 while not mandatory, is advised. As stated above, today many organisations insist that a prerequisite for working with partners, vendors, service providers etc, is that they are certified to this and other standards within their relevant discipline(s).
If your organisation does choose to get certified, the first step is to find a certification body as ISO does not perform certification. This is where CG Business Consulting can help. We can provide your organisation with the expertise and guidance needed to underpin seamless implementation. Our friendly and client-centric consultants will work with your core QMS team to ensure certification and implementation are closed out within defined timelines.
