If you have ever looked into the ISO 9001 standard, you may wonder why it has some of the requirements it does. For those who feel this way, it is time to learn about the underlying principles focused on when the standard was written. This will help you better understand the requirements and more successfully implement these requirements into your own Quality Management System.
Customer Focus
The goal of a company is to provide services or products to customers. Because of this, it makes sense this would be a top element of focus. This begins with getting to know your customer and what they require. You also need to ensure good communication throughout the process and measure customer satisfaction levels along the way.
Leadership Qualities of Management
There are many situations where top levels of the management team are not behind the implementation of a Quality Management System. If this happens, it is destined for failure. Even if this isn’t always what happens, the more involved those at the top management levels are, the better the chances of success. Remember, top management controls the organization’s cash flow, so if they see the benefit of this system, it is more likely that team members will use all the features it offers.
People Engagement
Be sure that people throughout your organization offer value, especially in the competitive world. To make sure of this, your Quality Management System needs to focus on people’s competence, which will help them become more engaged in the processes, which will ensure they add value to them. When you have empowered and engaged people in your organization, it can become a driving force behind meeting your organization’s objectives.
The Process Approach
Attempting to understand, control, and then improve an entire system is time-consuming and often complicated. This may result in you failing at these efforts. However, if you look at the big system’s smaller parts and break them down into processes, you will be able to focus your new efforts on more predictable and consistent results. Improving and controlling individual processes is much easier and much more effective to improve and control your entire system.
Improvement
If your business remains stagnant in the competitive market, it will be overtaken quickly by your competition. If you want to counteract this pressure, you need to improve to reduce costs and maintain your market share. This lets your company quickly and easily react to changes in external or internal conditions and find new opportunities. The entire idea of having a quality policy with consistent objectives will help you move toward improvements.
When it comes to the requirements for this, knowing what is expected and why can help you feel more comfortable as you implement it. Being informed and knowing what to expect from the system and processes you have in place will help you achieve ongoing success in your business and ensure that your team is on board to improve the business.