Archive for April, 2009
Does ISO 9001:2008 Have Additional Requirements Beyond ISO 9001:2000?
This latest (4th) edition of ISO 9001 contains no new requirements compared to the (3rd) year 2000 edition, which it replaces. What it does is provide clarification to the existing requirements of ISO 9001:2000 based on eight years experience of worldwide implementing of the standard and introduces changes intended to improve consistency with the environmental management system standard, ISO 14001:2004.
The clarifications and changes in ISO 9001:2008 represent fine-tuning, rather than a thorough overhaul. It focuses on changes that organizations might make to better comply with the spirit of the standard without adding, deleting, or altering its requirements. The changes are minor in nature and address such issues as the need to clarify, provide greater consistency, resolve perceived ambiguities, and improve compatibility with ISO 14001. The numbering system and the structure of the standard remain unchanged. As a result, the new standard looks much like the old standard.
So don’t let the new standard scare you away from you iso 9001 certification plans. If you are struggling with whether or not the time is right for your company, there are many business process management tools to help you along. If you are sitting on the fence, now is the time to act before the economy really gets going again. Just a question: Who would you rather buy from, a company with a proven quality system or one that doesn’t have a clue and isn’t willing to learn? The whole world can’t be wrong.
Quality and Safety
As the economical and financial environment becomes harder, organizations with robust Quality structures that ensure that productive and effective processes are used will survive. Similarly Safety Management becomes a feature as staff members get frustrated and fearful. Quality and Safety should be the backbone of any program that senior management will use to keep their organization and business functioning to emerge stronger as things turn around.
There are many reasons for addopting a sound quality management system, but the best one I can offer in this day and age is just staying in the game. Companies that make the investment now will be around long after those that haven’t.
Importance of an Internal Audit
When it comes to operating a cost effective and efficient business, performing regular internal audits is necessary. While not necessary for smaller businesses, all businesses can benefit from an occasional internal audit. Most of the time a thorough audit will reveal processes that can be improved and places where money can be saved. Having an internal audit on a regular basis makes businesses function better. While some of the time an internal audit can seem like a complicated process, there is a lot of software available that can identify concerns with any business. There are also a number of consultants that can assist with performing an internal audit.
Business owners will be amazed at what a thorough internal audit will reveal about a company’s internal processes. The largest companies in the world hire an entire team of auditors to work towards continual improvement; smaller businesses would be wise to take the hint from the big guys!
Good Practices for Budding Businesses
It’s hard to be the new kid on the block, especially when it comes to business. Often more important than avoiding all those pitfalls that cause the downfall of small businesses is continuing to research better ways to advance and improve. When it comes to improving as a small business, quality management is key. It’s important to be aware of all those processes within the business that cost money, and how those processes can be improved to prevent excess expenses. It’s a good idea to have an internal auditor or perform internal audits even for small companies. Having an audit can improve efficiency and also help the business devise plans for the future.
For businesses that are too small to hire a specific person to perform quality management assessments on the business, it’s possible to do this yourself with the right software and a little knowledge. With the right quality management service, small business owners will be amazed at the savings they can find in cutting down expenses and improving efficiency of workers.
The Calibration Conumdrum
All Quality management system standards uniformly have requirements for controlling the equipment and devices used to measure, verify, test, and accept product and monitor the processes used to achieve specified results. As a third party auditor it seems like almost everyone misses something. It’s almost unavoidable. Clearly it’s because this process is generally referred to as “calibration” and the mental image it invokes is associated primarily with things like micrometers, depth gages, and comparators. The process is often much more complicated, addressing appropriate consideration for gages, thermostats, software, jigs, timers, CMM’s etc. Controlling monitoring and measuring devices must, therefore, include multiple aspects.
What are some of the features of a good calibration management process?
- Identifying equipment
- Defining frequencies
- Indicating status of equipment
- Alternate methods of “control”
- What to include in the procedure
- Certificates of calibration
- Outsourcing calibration services
- Storage and preservation
- Recall programs and contingency plans
Whether implemented manually or electronically, calibration control is crucial for a management systems success. There are as9100 software calibration systems designed to manage and simplify control of calibration requirements including repair, maintenance and recall. Some may also manage tests/inspections that must be done on a periodic basis such as a monthly inspection. When determining whether your system will be manual or electronic, it is always wise to first know your own capabilities, manpower, and processes. Do you know where your system stands?
Vision Part 2
Strategies to help us all become visionaries for business process improvement are as follows:
A good start is to review the current processes and challenge them. See yourself as a change agent with a mindset of innovation and a catalyst to move the organization forward. Consider radical departures from the past. Consider doing things that no one has ever done before. Moreover, be prepared to take some risks.
Take the time to imagine the process in the future and free your mind of rigid constraints. Often rigid constraints are economic. However, do not stop because you believe the economics do not work. Imagine for a second if Henry Ford never created the assembly line in 1908 because of economics. More likely than not, the pay back will justify the expense.
As your vision becomes clear to you, you should expand it to others. You must be passionate and articulate the future. See yourself as a person who “focuses the projector”, no matter how much input others have in shaping the vision, the visionary must articulate it!
In a Business Management System, we have tools provided for this purpose. One tool is the Preventive Action Process while another is Root Cause Analysis and their recommended solutions.
Therefore, part four of Managing Challenging Expectations will focus on preventive action and root cause analysis.
Vision Part 1
When using the term vision for managing an organization, to vision is to look into the future and imagine how much better it can be. After all, is that not what continuous improvement and preventive action really is?
Managers who practice visioning will be the company leaders of the future who drive business process reengineering. Furthermore, a company without visionary leadership will continually struggle to survive. Even ISO 9001:2008 emphasizes the importance of management leadership to meet the customer’s needs and quality objectives.
It is clear in today’s economic challenging times to see those companies who have vision are also those companies not suffering or threatened by bankruptcy. So how do we as managers’ vision? We often think that visioning is a character attribute that certain people are born with. Often we believe that very few people have this attribute and therefore leave the visioning to them. The truth is that we all can vision the future if we set aside the time on a daily basis just for that purpose.
Managing Changing Expectations: Part 2
It was clear to me when at the height of the fuel prices I drove by two automotive dealers in my small town. The GM dealer’s lot was full of large SUVs, Pick-up Trucks and Cadillacs while the Toyota Dealer’s lot was full of the Yaris, Corolla, Prius, Matrix and very few Pick-up Trucks and SUVs.
While consumer’s expectations had changed, Toyota had the products available that met their expectations. In fact, I myself only buy American and called the GM dealer asking about the new Malibu Hybrid that was advertised and the sales person told me that they have not even seen one and do not know when they will receive one.
I believe that it is the attitude of management and the lack of visioning that resulted in this type of crisis. This scenario is not limited to only larger corporations and in fact, it is more critical in small business management systems that do not receive financial assistance when they fail.
Attitude is something that starts at the top of an organization and flows down to the very bottom. The following are two examples of how attitude can make such a huge difference:
- 1. Every quality/management system includes an element for corrective action. How often do managers resent or even become aggravated and angry when a corrective action is issued to them? Their attitude often suggests that receiving a corrective action reflects negatively on their performance within the organization. However, this is not the case! In fact, it is quite the opposite. When a problem occurs, management establishes key personnel who they feel have the skill sets, experience and management focus to address the problem, determine the root cause and implement an effective long-term solution. This speaks to itself. Therefore, rather than having a negative attitude when receiving a corrective action, managers should understand that the reason they were selected to receive a corrective action is that the executive management has the confidence that they can resolve the issue. That is a compliment and not a negative benchmark on their performance.
Managing Changing Expectations: Part 1
Often we forget the most important attributes of achieving success and focus solely on our quality management system. In some instances, the compliance process engulfs us to a point where we believe that success is predicated on satisfying auditors and having our Certificate framed on the entrance wall.
In part one of Managing Changing Expectations, I would like us all to consider two important attributes required for success that are rarely documented in a Quality Management System.
- 1. Attitude and
- 2. Visioning.
Both of these attributes will clearly decide the success of an organization. This never became as apparent as in the last five months during the huge increase in gasoline prices. Customer’s expectations changed as the price of fuel went up. Furthermore, environmental pressures started to make headway in the consumer’s choices.
I am certain that every automotive manufacturer has a quality/management system that is in compliance to internationally accepted standards. Therefore, what is the difference between the profitable companies and the companies in need of financial assistance?
Managing Changing Expectations!
I feel very strongly that the word “expectations” clearly state everyone’s definition of quality. In fact, a quality management system is ultimately designed to manage expectations at all levels:
Customer expectations;- Supplier expectations;
- Employee expectations;
- Regulatory and Government expectations;
- Community expectations;
- Organizational expectations.
In addition to managing expectations, one other powerful word constantly challenges us. The word is “Change”. Change is a relentless factor that throws monkey wrenches into our management plans as if to poke fun at us.
When we put these two words together, we get closer to reality.
Managing Changing Expectations!