ISO 9001's Growth

There are many ISO certifications in the family but ISO 9001 is the fastest and most popular certification of them all. This particular ISO standard has been in existence for over 20 years and continues to grow in popularity. Over one million companies worldwide now hold the certificate making it the world’s most used management system. More recently a very rapid growth has been seen in China – accounting for around 250,000 of the million ISO 9001 certifications.

ISO 9001 is an international standard which basically controls and monitors the quality control and management procedures within an organisation. This may explain the sudden increase in the number of certifications in the Middle East which has been an expanding area for the manufacturing industry. By proving that they value the importance of quality management, with this internationally recognised standard, the likelihood that they will be able to secure valuable deals from the West is much higher.

Especially in the manufacturing industry quality control is of utmost importance, and anyone who is experienced in this sector will be able to explain to you that a high quality product isn’t just something that happens it has to be a planned process. ISO 9001 helps businesses to implement this process. The certification process for an ISO 9001 standard facilitates the implementation of quality control procedures. It works to a ‘plan, do, check, act’ methodology which means nothing is missed. You have to prove that you have planned for any problems, put procedures into place to stop these problems, check they have been solved and finally act if there are any issues to iron out.

The ISO 9001 certification won’t dictate the quality of your product or service – you decide that but will simply help you to live up to your management’s and your customer’s expectations. The procedures put into place by the international standard means that customer satisfaction can be improved and enhanced, and more happy customers generally means a better reputation and higher sales.

Meeting ISO 9001 requirements by responding to problems

ISO 9001, as a quality management system, ensures that businesses effectively respond to customer requirements. During the process of becoming certified, an auditor will compare your business quality policy with the criteria of the standard. Despite every business having unique goals, a high level of customer care is always necessary, and dealing with problems effectively is one of the best ways to achieve this. By improving in this area, your business is more likely to meet the requirements of ISO 9001.

A common problem within businesses is faulty products, and one way of handling this problem is to record the sources of all materials used. This means that any time a product is found to be faulty, or elicits a customer complaint, rather than panicking you can simply identify the product’s source and terminate orders from that source. This not only results in minimal disruption to your business, and therefore minimal financial loss, but it may also serve to protect you from being legally liable for any harm caused. For example, if a car company orders rubber from another company in India, and a batch of this is found to contain dangerous chemicals, by having a record of the source of the material they can prove they are not responsible for failing to control the quality of a product they have manufactured themselves. As soon as a complaint is made about the product, the business can immediately stop purchasing from the rubber company.

Dealing with faulty products or dangerous materials is not the only way of responding to customer complaints. Another issue, especially when a business posts products to distant locations, is product arrival times and keeping track of postage. By providing customers with contact details, they can inform you if a product has not arrived by the time you gave them. By tracking all your orders, you can then respond quickly to customers by letting them know where their package is, or can offer a refund or send another product if you find the package has been lost. Being constantly aware of problems by maintaining up-to-data records and effective customer communication can help you become ISO 9001 certified.

What is ISO 9001 and what are its main criticisms?

In this post I talk about ISO 9001, and discuss the main criticisms sometimes made of it.

ISO 9001 provides your organisation with an outline of how to introduce, execute, evaluate and improve a quality management system. It applies to the procedures your organisation uses in order to manage and make products/services and aims to streamline and optimise these. The standards are worded in a generalised manner, so they can be applicable as many varying organisations as possible. There is often a slight misconception with the use of the word “quality”; some assume that having an ISO 9001 certification is evidence of an organisations high quality service or product. What it actually means it is that the organisation can make a consistently high standard of quality and meet customers’ needs. So theoretically you can make a substandard product and get ISO 9001 certified as long as you do so consistently, this is one of the criticisms of the standard. One of the other major criticisms pertaining to ISO 90001 is that it can be a costly and overly lengthy process to become certified. There have even been accusations of consultants taking advantage of the fact they get paid hourly (about £250-500 per day) and dragging the process out using red tape and bureaucracy. Consultants have also been known to take a generic approach to organisations of a certain type (i.e. treating all freight forward businesses the same), when the ISO says each business should be considered on an individual basis. A final major criticism is about the amount of time it can take to become certified; it can take several months. 

The Development and Growth of ISO 9001

ISO 9001 is an international standard of quality management systems which is currently being used in over 175 countries. The standard relates to the procedures a company has in place to manage and create services or products. It aims to make them more efficient and improve them on a regular basis through monitoring them. Although ISO 9001 is recognised in a large number of countries it’s growth in each of them is variable, for example it is particularly popular in the UK, whereas in the USA it is still very much in the begin stages. This being said, with more and larger companies such as major vehicle manufactures becoming ISO 9001 certified and making it a requirement for their suppliers to do so, it seems ISO 9001 may become more common place within the USA. As for its relative popularity within the UK, still only fewer than 100,000 organisations are ISO 9001 certified (this is less than 5% of all UK businesses). Most of organisations that are certified within the UK are large or medium in size; this could be part why it is not further spread because it is somewhat of a costly procedure and this may be off putting to smaller organisations. It does seem to be becoming a trend that companies are making being ISO 9001 certified a requirement of working with them. This was not the original intention for ISO certifications and it is not supported by the British Standards Institute or the Department of Trade and Industry. 

ISO 9001 for large businesses

The ISO 9001 standard is recognised internationally and allows companies of all sizes to ensure that their processes are running smoothly by auditing their level of internal quality management. ISO 9001 is beneficial for all businesses and while ISO 9001 is not only for large organisations it can greatly benefit them.

Having all your company processes in line with ISO 9001 means that the likelihood of a lost document lost or a forgotten phone call is reduced because the ISO 9001 puts processes into place which means there is a smaller chance of something going wrong. This efficiency and smoothness of these basic processes mean that trust and respect is gained from your customers and so the relationship between the business and their clients is easy to maintain.

The integration of ISO 9001 into a large business also works well. In a small business one person may be responsible for a wide variety of jobs where as in a large company you generally find that different departments are assigned the different roles. Therefore the responsibility of integrating ISO 9001 is can be shared through the departments.

And lastly company growth is far easier with ISO in place. The processes it involves will be rooted into the company, right at the core meaning that it is much easier to grow around them. It also opens up opportunities to work with other businesses as many larger organisations will only work with other companies with the ISO 9001 accreditation.

In a big sea of businesses an ISO accreditation allows a company to stand out as a big fish. This small investment can bring great returns.

3 Ways To Use Your ISO 9001 Certification Effectively

ISO 9001 is an internationally recognised standard for business and organisational quality management. Many businesses, large and small, choose to invest in an ISO 9001 not only to improve the quality of their internal processes, but also to show potential clients and competitors that they uphold certain standards.

But once you have achieved your ISO 9001 certification, how can you ensure that you use it effectively?

1. Set Targets
Set targets that you want to achieve over the next year. These might be new processes you want to put in place, processes you want to improve, or even financial targets that you want to hit as a result of improving your processes. The aim of  many of the processes you need in place is to free up your time and therefore your capacity to focus on your business and making more sales. By setting targets, you can easily measure whether ISO 9001 was a good investment for your company and you can see where it is making a difference.

2. Involve Your Team
Keeping on top of your certification and ensuring that the processes you put in place don’t fall to the wayside will be made far easier by involving your team. Set departmental targets if you work in a big company, or assign individual ones if it’s a smaller company. This not only spreads the workload around so that no one person is left with the responsibility of keeping processes running smoothly, but means that your staff and team have more to aspire to and the project is far more likely to succeed.

3. Review
There is no point in setting targets if they are not going to be reviewed on a regular basis. Diarise the time well in advance of when you are going to review and set reminders a month and a week before so that you can prepare. Otherwise, it is all too easy to say you’ll review one day, and then a year passes and nothing has been done.

These three steps will help to make sure that you get the most from your ISO 9001 certification.

Achieving ISO 9001 Certification

Gaining ISO 9001 certification is a widely recognised achievement for any business, as it accredits the quality of business service you provide. It also can open up business avenues as many companies will look to work with other businesses with ISO 9001 certification.

ISO 9001 is an International Standard for Quality Management. It is certified to companies and proves that an organisation meets the internal standards which have been set by the company themselves. These internal set standards have to comply with International Standards.

The timeline of achieving certification depends on the nature of your business. You may already have some Quality assurance procedures in place, or other aspects which accredit towards certification such as checklists, documentation, and feedback systems.

Essentially, ISO 9001 certification is about ensuring you maintain your business and the service you provide, and not about changing the nature of your business.


How do you get accreditation?

Initially, your business should ideally have an outline of objectives and the benefits gained by achieving ISO 9001.

The procedure for obtaining ISO 9001 certification is through a company which certifies or audits. There are a number of companies available which provide varying certification. It is best advised to contact a company which assesses and certifies – this also makes certification achievable for small businesses.

There are a number of stages with gaining ISO 9001 certification which involve documentation procedures, training of your staff depending on their responsibilities, and auditing your business operations.

One of the main requirements with gaining ISO 9001 certification is to ensure that the certification company you chose suits your business. The process involves an assessor visiting your business, and interviewing you and reviewing your business and quality procedures.

Reviewing your business will most likely give you the realisation that you may already have some procedures in place, and it identifies areas which require improvements and focus to meet the ISO 9001 standard. Any improvements suggested by the assessor will fit within your business functions and procedures.



You’ve achieved ISO 9001 certification, what’s next?

After achieving certification, you will be provided with an ISO 9001 manual which outlines internal quality standards and a wall plaque and certificate which you can copy and send to customers and clients.

Gaining ISO certification benefits your business and your customers. It improves customer satisfaction, and shows a dedication to quality management. It also improves stakeholder relationships. Essentially it benefits all aspects of your business.