ISO 9001 ? Quality Assurance

by MATEUS_27:24&25

ISO 9001 ? Quality Assurance

ISO, of course, stands for the International Organization of Standardization, a worldwide organization responsible for the development of many different kinds of standards. ISO 9001:2000 is the most recent version of their Quality Management System Standard. It consists of a collection of documentation that describes how a company should implement their quality management system. To achieve certification, a company must produce both a Quality Manual and a Quality Procedures Manual. This is no light undertaking. These manuals must be audited by a registrar for compliancy, and renewed at the end of each 3 year period. The larger and more complex your company, the more difficult the process will be.

One organization might generate sales orders as evidence of successful review and acceptance of customer purchase orders. In this case, the above ISO 9001 requirements apply directly to that organization’s sales orders and to their respective customer purchase orders. Review activities resulting in accepted sales orders are also subject to these requirements. Since order review and acceptance is evidenced by the generation of sales orders, sales orders are regarded as quality records and must be maintained accordingly. In this case, the above ISO 9001 requirements may be construed as follows:

He ISO 9001 Standard requires that you maintain a documented procedure describing the method for conducting an internal audit process. This is not a recommendation but a requirement.

The reason for this is that consultants never fully appreciate the scope and depth of your company, and cannot be expected to share the urgency of your plight to get it right the first time. For this reason, choosing the right in-house person to head the job may be the best option for your company. Perhaps, even, that person is you. If so, you definitely have your work cut out for you, particularly if you work for a company of any real size. The benefit, and it is a big one, of having been tasked with preparation for ISO 9001 certification is that your personal value to the company is going to be cemented–no, it will be cast in iron–by a successful conclusion to certification.

It stipulates a system of assuring quality, meaning that the processes involved are defined and operations of these processes are controlled to a suitable degree to assure quality.