The Templated Quality System: Mistakes Made

Time and time again I walk into an organization to audit their quality management system and I find that the overall processes and controls are well understood and executed, but the documentation just doesn’t match actual practices. Templates are great tools to help an organization meet the documentation requirements of ISO 9001, AS9100, or any standard. The problem is, most companies buy the templates and insert the name but never modify the templates to their particular processes. The results from such miss use of this tool are non-conformances found during a surveillance or registration audit.

Templates can help save time and help an organization cover all of the requirements of the standard, but they can hurt and organization if they are not used properly. Plan your processes and understand the standard that you have chosen to become certified to. Knowing what is required and what is not can help you to modify the templates to reflect your organizations actual practices. Most non-conformances, about 90% to be exact, are written against what the organization has required of itself or documentation that does not match the processes, not the standard. So if you are thinking of buying a template system, know what you are getting into and spend the time to modify them to match your processes.

ISO 9001 Don’t Survive, Thrive!

Why is it that when times get tough most companies invest most of their time and money in short term short sited goals? The ultimate goal of any company should be more than just survival; it should be forward thinking total sustained success. How can a company reach for and attain sustained success with the economy in such distress? The best way is to invest in continuous process improvements that result in cost reductions and increased market share.

Becoming certified to the industry standards that your industry leaders are requiring is the surest way to stand out and get noticed. If your competition is already certified to ISO 9001, AS 9100, RC 1400, ISO 1400 or some other industry standard, they have a decided advantage over you and how much more business they will receive as a result of this certification. If you are certified, how well you manage your business processes can help or hurt your progress toward sustained success.

Many companies go after certification to satisfy a customer request or simply because they believe it the right thing to do. However, the majority of the organizations that embark on the road to certification, go into the process ill equip and ill informed. The result of such endeavors usually produces a business management system which may ultimately result in certification, but offers no advantages and becomes just another expense to absorb.

My advice, get educated, hire a competent business management consultant if you fell you need one, and make your business management system your own. Every business is different and so each business management system should be unique as well. Don’t waste hundreds of thousands of dollars and years of consulting fees to reach you goals. Take ownership of your system and make it a transparent part of your everyday work experience. When a well designed business management system is implemented, it is effortless and provides real tangible benefits that result in sustained success. Don’t survive, thrive.

Business Process Improvement Through Communication

All of us have been in a business process improvement or sales meeting where the speaker clicks through a PowerPoint presentation showing charts and numbers. Few people, if any, take anything away from those meetings. But put the same information in the context of a story and the point is made.

When you tell a story, people understand what the mission is and they understand how they can make it happen. If you just talk at a high level of mission and vision the reaction is, "What am I supposed to do with that!?"

So, how you communicate and what you do after that communication is made is without a doubt the most improtant part of setting the agenda for your budding AS9100 or ISO 9001 quality management system. Letting your employees know what their part is, can absolutly make your business management system a success. Get out there and show your organization this is not just another program. This is a way of doing business, and it is here to stay, so get on board.

Business Management System Tools For Today

We will devote this page of the blog to new and inventive ways to manage your business management system. We will discuss software trends and other time saving tools that will make developing and maintaining your quality management system both cost, and time effective.

You are invited to contribute your ideas and knowledge so that everyone may benefit from this blog. All though I am a consultant, I am very serious about working together with all that are interested in driving continuous improvement and the betterment of our community. If everyone who comes here, contributes just one idea, just think what we can do together.

Some small businesses cannot afford six figure consultant fees to help construct a quality management system that complies with the standard, and meets their indiviual needs. This is why these new tools are so improtant and should be shared and discussed openly.

A Time to Improve

Since the goal of ISO certification is to ensure that your company meets standards for quality management systems, your focus should be first and foremost on quality and not the certification itself. Your company should not try to get ISO certified for the sake of being certified, but rather look at it as a way to improve your company’s efficiency and quality processes. Before seeking certification, review your company’s procedures and processes. I dentify disparities between procedures and what is actually done. If what is actually done is more efficient than the written procedure, you should update the written procedure rather than conform to the less-efficient guidelines.

Any good business management system should keep adequate records, and they are essential for ISO certification. One of the required documented procedures is one for controlling records – what identifies every record, how they are stored to protect them, how they are cataloged or organized, how long you keep them, and how you dispose of them. Spend some time reviewing your procedure and examining whether your management follows it; then decide which procedure is the most efficient and appropriate for the nature of each record. This is a time when you can eliminate unnecessary processes, create new ones, identify mishandles processed and make record-keeping more efficient overall. Approaching it from a self-improvement standpoint will be much more effective and pleasant than trying to cover up mistakes that have been made before an ISO audit.

Non-Conformances Are Good Things

You want everyone to generate them and you want lots of them! Yes you will have to sort through some outlandish stuff, but underneath will be a treasure chest full of continual improvement opportunities that make the organization work more efficiently and cut costs.

You need to get comfortable with the fact that your workers probably know about a lot of the things going wrong in your organization, and that they know about some you don’t. You need to create an environment where they will tell you about them.

And here’s an even more outlandish suggestion Senior Management – they probably know how to fix many of them as well. You need to listen to them by providing an opportunity and method for them to tell you.