Part 2: ISO 9001:2015 – The True Cost of Quality

Welcome to the second in this 3 part blog series on the benefits of being accredited to ISO 9001:2015. We are going to look at the 7 Quality Management Principles on which ISO 9001:2015 is based and what benefits they can bring to an organisation.

We will take a look at each of these principles and outline their intent, as well as a few of the key benefits each of them will bring when they are fully embedded in your organisational culture and processes.

1.  Customer Focus
The Number One Priority for quality management is to meet customer requirements and strive to exceed expectations. An organisation’s continued success is dependent on retaining the confidence of its customer base as well as understanding their current and future needs.

• Increases customer satisfaction & loyalty
• Increases customer base, revenue and market share

2.  Leadership
The leaders of the organisation are tasked with creating a unity of purpose, direction and conditions in which their employees are actively engaged so that the organisation as a whole can fully realise its objectives.

• Increases efficiency and effectiveness
• Improves communication across all levels in the organisation

To quote President Ronald Reagan, „Without a vision the people perish.“

3.  Engagement of People
It is a well-known fact that for an organisation to succeed, it must invest in its employees. Through recognition, empowerment and investment in development, an organisation can create a culture where employees are actively engaged in the achievement of the organisation’s objectives

• Improved employee understanding of the organisation’s goals and objectives
• Enhanced trust, collaboration and personal development

4.  Process Approach
This is about an organisation’s understanding that its results are obtained from a set of interrelated processes working together as a single entity. This allows for more effective and efficient management of the individual activities with the overall aim of improving system performance.

• Increased consistency due to aligned processes
• Increased performance & effective use of resources

5.  Improvement
I think it’s clear to all organisations that simply maintaining the status quo will only assure success for a finite period of time. Organisations need to make a commitment to continual improvement to ensure that they enhance performance, adapt to change and can create new opportunities for growth.

• Improved process performance and customer satisfaction
• Enhanced ability to anticipate and react to risks or opportunities for improvement

6.  Evidence Based Decision Making
W. Edwards Deming, a leading thinker in the field of quality, once said, “Without data, you are just another person with an opinion”. This quote succinctly summarises this entire principle – that decisions taken by organisations must be based on logical analysis of data.

• Improves decision making processes
• Increases the ability to review, challenge and change preconceived opinions

7.  Relationship Management
For sustained success an organisation must manage the relationships it has with its interested parties, e.g. suppliers and contractors, to ensure mutually beneficial levels of performance.

• Enhanced, mutually beneficial supplier/contractor relations
• Continuity of supply of goods and services due to a well managed supply chain

So not only does ISO 9001:2015 deliver a range of general benefits, but when you get right down to its foundations you can appreciate that it has been developed from the ground up to provide real and tangible benefits to any organisation that commits to its implementation and development.

In the next and final part of this blog series we will talk about one of the key components of implementing ISO 9001:2015 and its benefits – risk-based thinking!

By Stuart Hardie, Quality Management Consultant