QIC Guru

ISO 9001:2008 requires that an organization’s quality policy provide a framework for reviewing the company’s quality objectives. The policy should give an overall direction for the organization, and its objectives should flow in that direction. But because of outside forces such as customer requirements and market environments, business conditions can change. If  this happens, the alignment between quality policy and objectives can become off-centered. So, the standard requires that management periodically review changes to both the policy and objectives. An organization’s objectives must be measurable and its quality management system processes designed to meet those objectives.

 Aligning the quality policy, quality objectives and quality management system processes should further top management’s intent with regard to quality. There’s only one small problem: ISO 9001:2008 doesn’t address aligning the quality policy and objectives with other business goals.

 What happens when the quality policy and objectives aren’t consistent with those goals? We would like to solicit your professional experiences and share them with our readers. By sharing these life experiences we may all continually improve our respective businesses.