Hello,

At this moment we have several production locations world wide with individual TS 16949 certificates.

A part of our sales managers are not located at the production facilities and in this respect a remote location for the production location were they do their sales activity.

In the future we will centralize several departments functioning under a corporate office.
This includes also the current sales managers.

At this moment this corporate office is not included in any QMS because each individual plant is TS certified.

The current structure, each individual production plant with its own TS 16949 certificate must in my opinion being changed to a corporate certificate and probably a multi site certification / registration.

To stay flexible and lean, I think we must have a corporate TS 16949 manual with responsibilities, structure and a few common process flows for the processes which effecting the whole organisation. Via this way every production location need to link this set up with their system and adopt this corporate manual in their QMS as leading.

Based on some organizational discussions, I like some feedback, comments and or examples.

Thanks
Wil

To stay flexible and lean, I think we must have a corporate TS 16949 manual with responsibilities, structure and a few common process flows for the processes which effecting the whole organisation. Via this way every production location need to link this set up with their system and adopt this corporate manual in their QMS as leading.

I am all for a 'common' system. I put common within inverted commas because in practice, it may not be 100% achievable. If we have the usual 4 level set-up for our documents, we may have commonality up to level 3 and give some flexibility in level 4 to cater to differences in people, technology levels and issues, maturity in quality systems and thoughts, etc.

Bear in mind that your system and certification are 2 different issues. It does not mean that you need to have corporate certification just because you have a 'common' system. If it is me, I would go for common system but individual 'country' certification under a selected & same CB. Many CB are international and would have offices in the majority of countries to serve you.

What are the advantages of a common 'corporate' certification? I can't think of many. What are the advantages of separate or country specific certification? I think they out-weight common certification - cost are in local currencies, cost can be offset from tax benefits, investment incentives, etc, etc.

If you are skeptical about how quality issues may develop in other countries, my question would be - what are your corporate auditors or corporate quality departments for?

Regardless of whether you have a corporate-wide QMS, or not. As each manufacturing plant is audited, your corporate HQ will have to audited (as it relates to that plant... sales, engineering, management, etc). Also, the corporation cannot have a stand alone certification to TS. So, having a corporate-wide QMS will not affect registration that much. But as you say, it could support your efforts for lean and standardized work. One caution, however. Your system also need to allow flexibility at the local level, when appropriate. You may find that trying to force all your manufacturing locations to do things exactly the same might cause mor problems than it resolves.

"At this moment this corporate office is not included in any QMS because each individual plant is TS certified." How can this be?

The corporate offices have nothing to do with the quality system, business, system, whatever you want to call it?

The sales offices are included as remote but the corproate office isn't? What do they do at corporate that has no interaction with the rest of the facilities?

"At this moment this corporate office is not included in any QMS because each individual plant is TS certified." How can this be?

The corporate offices have nothing to do with the quality system, business, system, whatever you want to call it?

The sales offices are included as remote but the corporate office isn't? What do they do at corporate that has no interaction with the rest of the facilities?

Corporate office is at this moment Group Finance and Strategic items.
Structure and set up is fully accepted by external TS 16949 auditers group companies.