ISO 9001 for the manufacturing industry

The ISO 9001 certification is an internationally recognised standard for quality management procedures, which for very obvious reason leads itself very well to the manufacturing industry. It essentially streamlines and manages the quality control system your company has in place with the aim to increasing customer satisfaction for the manufactured product.

The methodology of the standard allows for no stone to be left unturned, companies are encouraged to plan for any problems which might occur, outline ways in which these problems can be ironed out, constantly check that the systems are working and finally re-evaluate the system if there are any ways it can be improved. Companies are also required to keep a record of all the suppliers they use and when they have had deliveries as often problems occur following a change of supplier or new delivery of a product.

Making sure your product is of the highest standard possible is not something which will happen by accident, and a conscious effort has to be made to make sure that this is the case. You have your customer’s expectations to think about and high standards lead to a heightened reputation and higher profits in tow.

There has recently been a huge increase in the number of ISO 9001 certifications given to Chinese firms – most probably explained by the number of manufacturing companies making products for the West. There are now around 1 million companies ISO 9001 certified worldwide and Chinese businesses now account for more than 250,000 of these certifications – over a quarter.  By implementing an ISO 9001 certification, they are able to prove that they monitor and make sure their quality management systems are up to the standards expected by their international counterparts. Many companies now even require it, to ensure that they are guaranteed a high quality product when delivered to their doorstep.

ISO 9001: What’s it all about?

While many organisations are told they should become certified in a number of standards of the ISO family, little information is given about what these actually concern. Most people are reluctant to spend money on something they are not well-informed about, especially when it is not only a personal risk but a business one. Therefore, let us look at the contents of ISO 9001, and how it could apply to your business.

Firstly, an ISO 9001 auditor will look at the existing quality policy of the organisation. This is a statement made formally by management concerning business and marketing aims. These aims relate to customer requirements, and how the organisation can achieve maximum success with regards to customer satisfaction.

The ISO 9001 auditor will ensure that the organisation’s quality policy is not fabricated or irrelevant, but has been drawn up based on tangible data that shows what policies elicit the best consumer response.

The audit will involve not only checking that the quality policy was created in conjunction with evidence, but also that it is continually monitored and evaluated in comparison with new data. Even if a quality policy was made to fit current customer requirements, these can change over time and the policy may require alterations.

The quality policy must be based on a number of crucial aspects. Firstly, it must make sure the organisation records its use of materials. This way, any materials founds to be faulty or dangerous can be linked to their original source and prevented from further production.

Next, the organisation must have in place a customer communication system. This should involve a simple way for customers to receive information about products and their sources, to order new products, and to give feedback or make complaints concerning previous purchases. A good way of doing this is to have a website.

Finally, ISO 9001 certification requires the organisation to effectively deal with any faulty products or customer complaints. It should do this by keeping a record of problems, so that any recurrent issues can be traced to their source, and by tackling the factors that cause such issues.

ISO 9001 becoming more popular in the creative sector…

In these challenging economic times, it is more important than ever to get ahead of your competition. One way to stand out is to become ISO 9001 certified. It is evidence that your organisation has the quality systems in place to carry out a job effecively. For the public sector, it is a large factor when choosing a supplier to award a contract to.

ISO 9001 can be applied to any firm. However, there are some industries where it has been less popular. One of those has been the creative sector. Marketing, in general, requires few quality systems. Clearly this depends on the size of a marketing company. However, considering the overwhelming majority of marketing companies are SMEs – ISO 9001 has previously not appealed to traditional marketing agencies.

Nevertheless, in these changing times, evidence has appeared from the larger ISO certification companies that more marketing agencies are becoming ISO 9001 certified. Consider this copywriting company we came accross recently – they say their ISO certification gives their clients peace of mind. While this is certainly the case, they chances are, with public sector organisations downsizing their marketing departments due to government cuts, they are looking to get on the supply list – and their ISO 9001 certification will certainly help them with this.

While ISO 9001 is a great way to win new work, it is also about the internal processes – eliminating waste and saving management time. This are undoubtedly other benefits that organisations in the creative sector will be reaping when they become ISO 9001 certified.

Understanding the benefits of ISO 9001

ISO 9001 is an international standard which shows that your organisation has been independently assessed, and has an effective framework for quality management.  In this brief post I will outline the benefits of having ISO 9001.

The first thing to understand is that, ISO 9001 is a very widely recognised standard; being used in over 175 countries worldwide and 1,064,000 organisations. Some companies even have being ISO 9001 certified as a requirement of working with them, so it can be very beneficial to gain this certification; it opens you up to an international market and at the very least gives you an edge over your competitors. Becoming ISO 9001 certified will highlight any of your procedures which are outdated or ineffective, meaning you can update them and therefore become more efficient and productive. Furthermore becoming certified will mean that you have mechanisms in place so your procedures and their effectiveness is continually being monitored and you can therefore be constantly improving and optimising them. This is very much a part of the ISO “plan, do, check, act” philosophy, striving for continual development. When you become certified you have to outline your procedures, which is helpful in a number of ways; it means all employees are clear on what they are and it is easy to see any flaws and if there are any new employees they may be able to pick up the procedures quicker due to the clarification. Not only is becoming more efficient and productive an advantage within itself but it will also most likely result in costs being lowered due to there being less rejected work and waste. There are many various benefits to becoming ISO 9001 certified and it is worth serious consideration.

The Origins of ISO 9001

In this short post I will outline the origins of the ISO 9001 certification – in addition to discussing its rapid growth throughout the developed world.

The very start of ISO 9001 can be traced back to just after the Second World War and the Ministry of defence. This may seem a somewhat unlikely origin; however the ministry of defence adopted quality standards for systems to ensure that the suppliers of military equipment did their job consistently. The standards they developed (known as the AQAP and defence standards) were so successful they were picked up by other departments and were most found to do the best in engineering and manufacturing. It was in 1979 that the BSI (British Standards Institute) made the decision to take up these standards and expand their applicability to other manufacturing environments. They called this standard BS 5750 – specifications for design, manufacture and installation and they replaced the other quality guidelines of the time.  In the 80s this standard flourished and became the most broadly recognised and used standard across the UK.  The BSI revised the standard in 1987, due to user experience in the UK and made it an internationally recognised standard (ISO 9000). Various updates and altercations were made to the standard during the early 90s, including sections intended for clarification, broadening the applicability to service based businesses (like dentistry and catering) and extended to include businesses which develop computer software. In 1994 two more significant changes were made; that simply “corrective action” was replaced with “corrective and preventative action” and the second change was that it was it to be known only as ISO 9000 (it was known by three differing names depending on where you lived). It has continued to be revised and improve and is now known as ISO 9001 (as of 2000).

Why would your business benefit from an ISO 9001 Certification?

An ISO 9001 Certification is a whole lot more than a shiny certificate to put up on your office wall, it opens up opportunities to improve your business by improving your internal standards for quality management and ultimately driving higher profits.

Your company would initially benefit from the improvements the assessment process would make to your internal business procedures. In order to achieve ISO 9001 a business must meet certain requirements. In order to achieve this status an assessor would visit your business and suggest areas for improvement to achieve the required level of quality.

Secondly with the ISO 9001 standards in place the quality of your service or product provided for your customers is higher. This high quality of service means that your customers are happy, they will give you better feedback, will be more likely to recommend your service to other people leading to a better reputation and higher profits.

When looking to work alongside other organisations an ISO 9001 Certification is a distinct advantage as often organisations with the standard will only work with other certified organisations so that they can ensure the quality of service to their existing customers.

Finally the ISO manual presented to you after completion of assessment is extremely useful when you expand your business. It  not only outlines to all staff members the internal standards you expect them to keep but can be used as a staff handbook so when a new employee comes on board they can read the manual and sign that they agree to work within these quality assurance parameters.

ISO 9001 For Large Organisations

While ISO 9001 is a quality standard that can be gained by SMEs and sole traders, it is also incredibly beneficial for large organisations. This blog post explains why.

ISO 9001 is a standard for quality management that is recognised internationally. It involves a company or organisation being audited to ensure that it is adhering to a certain level of internal quality management. This allows companies of all sizes to make sure that their processes are running smoothly, and that their time can be better spent on growing the business rather than administrative processes.
While ISO 9001 is not only for large organisations, it can greatly benefit them. It is not only just for private sector companies, but also charities and public sectors organisations too.

ISO 9001 works so well in large organisations because targets and work to be done can easily be delegated to different departments. In small organisations, one person may be responsible for a wide variety of jobs – often taking on several roles that include both administrative and fee-earning tasks. In large companies, there are generally different departments assigned to different roles. This means that the responsibility of each process that needs to be put in place can easily be shared. Also, if one person is away, the entire department or team will still be able to be accountable for the job that they have been delegated.

In addition, getting processes in place for large organisations can make or break a business. Large organisations such as city councils or the Post Office are renowned for losing vital documents, or forgetting to call people back, but if you make sure that all your company processes are in line with ISO 9001 then there is a much smaller chance that anything can go wrong. This will mean that you gain the trust and respect from your customers and won’t have to work as hard to keep existing customers with you.

Finally, company growth is far easier once ISO 9001 is in place. The processes that it involves will be at the core of your business so once they have been instigated, it is much easier to grow around them. ISO 9001 can open up doors to opportunities with other industries and business sectors as many other larger organisations – especially in the public sector – only work with other companies that have the accreditation.

ISO 9001 is a great way for large companies to grow and stand out from the crowd. It is a only a small investment that can bring great returns.