Archive for June, 2009
Supplier Management Software Solutions
Controlling Your Supplier Base Using CIS – Large corporations may not have a need for CIS Software for their own applications because they generally have an integrated information system that has been in use for many years that meets their requirements for management and quality assurance. However, their system does not integrate with their supplier base and does not provide for a complete control over their suppliers other than simple reporting of nonconformities, engineering approvals and purchasing.
Most larger corporations have a supplier control department that will audit and approve suppliers to ensure that the suppliers are capable of meeting their stringent requirements. Additionally, the supplier control department will monitor and perform periodic audits of the suppliers to ensure continued conformance to their specifications.
This approach, although effective in controlling the quality, is very expensive when the travelling expenses and time to audit is factored into the overall cost.
CIS Software offers the larger corporation as well as small business a solution that is more effective and far less costly. If the suppliers to a large corporation are using the CIS Software, then the supplier control department can perform electronic audits of their systems far more often without the huge travelling expense. CIS will also offer immediate reporting of supplier issues and their resolutions.
What is A Quality Policy?
Section 4.1.1 of the ISO 9001 standard requires that management “shall define and document its policy for quality, including objectives for quality and commitment to quality . . .” It goes on to say that the policy “shall be relevant to the supplier’s organizational goals and the expectations and needs of its customers.”
what is a quality policy? It is a concise document that defines organizational goals and objectives with regard to your overall quality management system, a commitment to meeting stated requirements, and an undertaking to drive continuous improvement throughout the organisation’s activities. It must be suitable for the organisation and provide a framework for establishing, communicating, and monitoring performance against agreed quality objectives.
One may ask, Why write a quality policy? If you have a quality policy it can formally demonstrate your commitment to comply with legislation, international standards, and meeting customer requirements. It sets a benchmark for your organization, so that you can measureyour own performance. If such commitments are informal, then your organisation as well as the senior management cannot be held to account! So what does your quality policy say about you?
How has your organization satisfied this requirement? We would like to know so we can use your success as a good example to others.
What are Quality Objectives?
Quality Objectives are the practical outline of the Quality Policy. They are an expression to aim for meeting certain requirements like zero defects for a certain product or a response time below a specified limit for a certain service.
Quality objectives should be measurable, and should be relevant to the various functions within your company. When thinking about what your quality objectives should be, try to think about what ways you want your company to improve your customers’ satisfaction. A good quality objective should include where you are at present state, where you wish to be in the future and when you plan to complete the objective. Example: “We will improve our on time delivery from 85% to 98% by December 2009″.
Quality objectives should be written specifically for your company, and should be relevant to your particular situation.
Quality objectives can be achieved by continual improvement of your organization. The value of having an ISO9001-2008 quality management system is that you should be continually improving your operation.
What are some of your objectives and how have you measured your success?
We’d like to hear your comments on this post.
Preventive Action When and How
A preventive action is a change implemented to address a weakness in a business management system that is not yet responsible for causing nonconforming product or service.
Preventive Actions cannot be determined until the direct, causative, and root causes have been identified. When determining a solution, remember that there is no single right answer. The solution should be chosen on its effectiveness, feasibility, suitability to the company, and the company’s budget. Solutions should not be rushed into. Rushing can cause additional problems. It is best to think about alternatives before choosing a solution. Good tool for exploring and determining the best alternative is called “The Five Whys”. Five Whys is the Japanese philosophy of repeatedly asking why to find not only the direct sources of your problems, but also the root of those sources. It’s about thinking long-term and looking both ahead and behind, not just in the present. It is also important to correct the process from a long term perspective instead of focusing on the short term. If the solution is only focused on the short term, there is no point in performing a corrective action.
Candidates for preventive action generally result from suggestions from customers or participants in the process but preventive action is a proactive process to identify opportunities for improvement rather than a simple reaction to identified problems or complaints. Apart from the review of the operational procedures, the preventive action might involve analysis of data, including trend and risk analyses and proficiency-testing results.
The focus for preventive actions is to avoid creating nonconformances, but also commonly includes improvements in efficiency. Preventive actions can address technical requirements related to the product or service supplied or to the internal management system.
Improving Business Processes
Both small and large businesses can continue to benefit from improving even the most mundane business processes. When a business is built from the ground up, there are often dozens or even hundreds of expenses that are taken for granted. This is even more apparent in governments, which are like massive businesses with thousands of different arms and subsidies through which funds are funneled. But even the smallest businesses will have a few processes that can be improved upon. To identify these processes, it’s best to implement quality improvement software, and task an individual (inside or outside the company) with finding business process improvement opportunities. Often finding processes which can be improved upon involves auditing to find costs that could be irrelevant or put towards better use in other areas of the country.
It’s important to note that marketing and research and development are the two forces that drive a company to succeed; these are the two forces within all companies that provide an increase in revenue rather than serve as an expense. Quality improvement can find more funds to dedicate to these two sources, and even help run the business smoother.
What is a Quality Management System?
ISO 9000 is a family of standards for quality management systems. ISO 9000 is maintained by ISO, the International Organization for Standardization and is administered by accreditation and certification bodies. The rules are updated, the time and changes in the requirements for quality, motivate change. Recently, on November 15, 2008, has made changes to the requirements of ISO 9001.
Some of the requirements in ISO 9001 (which is one of the standards in the ISO 9000 family) include
- a set of procedures that cover all key processes in the business;
- monitoring processes to ensure they are effective;
- keeping adequate records;
- checking output for defects, with appropriate and corrective action where necessary;
- regularly reviewing individual processes and the quality management system itself for effectiveness; and
- facilitating continual improvement
A company or organization that has been independently audited and certified to be in conformance with ISO 9001 may publicly state that it is “ISO 9001 certified” or “ISO 9001 registered”. Certification to an ISO 9001 standard does not guarantee any quality of end products and services; rather, it certifies that formalized business processes are being applied.
Quality Management Principle (# 8 Mutually beneficial supplier relationships )
An organization and its suppliers are interdependent and a mutually beneficial relationship enhances the ability of both to create value
Key benefits:
- Increased ability to create value for both parties.
- Flexibility and speed of joint responses to changing market or customer needs and expectations.
- Optimization of costs and resources.
Applying the principles of mutually beneficial supplier relationships typically leads to:
- Establishing relationships that balance short-term gains with long-term considerations.
- Pooling of expertise and resources with partners.
- Identifying and selecting key suppliers.
- Clear and open communication.
- Sharing information and future plans.
- Establishing joint development and improvement activities.
- Inspiring, encouraging and recognizing improvements and achievements by suppliers.
Quality Management Principle (# 7 Factual approach to decision making )
Effective decisions are based on the analysis of data and information
Key benefits:
- Informed decisions.
- An increased ability to demonstrate the effectiveness of past decisions through reference to factual records.
- Increased ability to review, challenge and change opinions and decisions.
Applying the principle of factual approach to decision making typically leads to:
- Ensuring that data and information are sufficiently accurate and reliable.
- Making data accessible to those who need it.
- Analysing data and information using valid methods.
- Making decisions and taking action based on factual analysis, balanced with experience and intuition.
- Stronger quality management systems
Quality Management Principle (# 6 Continual improvement )
Continual improvement of the organization’s overall performance should be a permanent objective of the organization.
Key benefits:
- Performance advantage through improved organizational capabilities.
- Alignment of improvement activities at all levels to an organization’s strategic intent.
- Flexibility to react quickly to opportunities.
Applying the principle of continual improvement typically leads to:
- Employing a consistent organization-wide approach to continual improvement of the organization’s performance.
- Providing people with training in the methods and tools of continual improvement.
- Making continual improvement of products, business process management an objective for every individual in the organization.
- Establishing goals to guide, and measures to track, continual improvement.
- Recognizing and acknowledging improvements.
Quality Management Principle (# 5 System approach to management)
Identifying, understanding and managing interrelated processes as a system contributes to the organization’s effectiveness and efficiency in achieving its objectives.
Key benefits:
- Integration and alignment of the processes that will best achieve the desired results.
- Ability to focus effort on the key processes.
- Providing confidence to interested parties as to the consistency, effectiveness and efficiency of the organization.
Applying the principle of system approach to management typically leads to:
- Structuring a system to achieve the organization’s objectives in the most effective and efficient way.
- Understanding the interdependencies between the processes of the system.
- Structured approaches that harmonize and integrate processes.
- Providing a better understanding of the roles and responsibilities necessary for achieving common objectives and thereby reducing cross-functional barriers.
- Understanding organizational capabilities and establishing resource constraints prior to action.
- Targeting and defining how specific activities within a system should operate.
- Continually improving the system through measurement and evaluation.