Hi Guys/Gals

As said previously I am a mere fledgling in the world of ISO 9001. I have been tasked with my employer (a SME Construction company) to implement and audit the whole QMS from scratch.
The timeframe I have been allocated is unachievable i.e. 3 months of allocating 2 days per week:frust:.
I have developed a few policies however, is there a benchmark of documentation that I need to have.


Thanks

Donny

Hello Donny and welcome to the Cove :bigwave:

You will get lots of answers to a question like this and many opinions, ranging from the simple to the complicated. You may try doing a search of existing threads as this topic has been asked about many times.

For what its worth, may opinion is that you need:

A quality manual
A documented quality policy
Some documented procedures - those demanded by the standard as a minimum but probably some others too
Some standard forms to help control things

If, as you say you are a novice, I strongly suggest that you get on a training course about the basics of ISO 9001, it will probably save you a ton of time and effort.

Even President Obama can't pull that off in 3 months.

As Colpart suggested you will need to get a good grasp on the basics thru some introductory training. There's tons out there.

More importantly, to save you future angst, I would also suggest that those who tasked you with the implementation also attend the same said training.
They obviously don't have a realistic concept of the mechanism for implementation, (no offense intended).
Good Luck.

If it's just 3 months, then you should have selected (or at least narrowed down) the Registrar.

See if they have any samples of what is acceptable.

Hi Guys/Gals

As said previously I am a mere fledgling in the world of ISO 9001. I have been tasked with my employer (a SME Construction company) to implement and audit the whole QMS from scratch.
The timeframe I have been allocated is unachievable i.e. 3 months of allocating 2 days per week:frust:.
I have developed a few policies however, is there a benchmark of documentation that I need to have.


Thanks

Donny

I have some bad news for you. It is highly unlikely that you could put a system in place, audit processes/system, and complete implementation in 24 days (2 days * 12 weeks=24 days). I have 25 years in Quality, and it took me (for everything including Registration) from the ground up 8 Months of nothing else but defining, developing, writing, training, and auditing 4 facilities and preparing and Registration for ISO9001:2000.

I feel that there needs to be a reality check from Management and yourself, in my opinion.

Hi Guys/Gals

As said previously I am a mere fledgling in the world of ISO 9001. I have been tasked with my employer (a SME Construction company) to implement and audit the whole QMS from scratch.
The timeframe I have been allocated is unachievable i.e. 3 months of allocating 2 days per week:frust:.
I have developed a few policies however, is there a benchmark of documentation that I need to have.


Thanks

Donny

Donny,
Hi! Two questions come to mind from your post:
• Why does your company want/need to bee ISO 9001 registered
• Why is the three month period important

Knowing the answers to these may help you to get more resources from your employees. It may also help you to negotiate with your employer a more realistic time frame.

Phil

I have some bad news for you. It is highly unlikely that you could put a system in place, audit processes/system, and complete implementation in 24 days...
I feel that there needs to be a reality check from Management and yourself, in my opinion.

Me too.

I'm a very skilled consultant with many certifications under my belt. But if a potential client offered me this as a consulting job, I almost certainly wouldn't take it, because IMO it's not achievable.

It might (note might) possibly be achievable (barely, only just, conceivably but only if already had damned good systems in place and were already almost fully 9001-compliant (ie, doing most/everything required), and were a small enough company for the 24 days to cover the work required. And like Coury, I know what I'm doing and have done it many times before.

In many years of consulting, I've only ever come across 1 company who was!

There are 'stretch targets' and then are 'FI (frankly impossible) need a reality check' ones. This is almost certainly an 'FI' one.

If it's just 3 months, then you should have selected (or at least narrowed down) the Registrar.

See if they have any samples of what is acceptable.

I'll bet one option is NSAI;)


3 months is going to be tough....most likely we wouldn't do an assessment until they had about 6 months or so of operation under their belts.

Oh, BTW (by the way) Welcome to the Cove:bigwave:

Great name....a guy from Ireland named "Donny Gall":lol:

Hi Guys/Gals

As said previously I am a mere fledgling in the world of ISO 9001. I have been tasked with my employer (a SME Construction company) to implement and audit the whole QMS from scratch.
The timeframe I have been allocated is unachievable i.e. 3 months of allocating 2 days per week:frust:.
I have developed a few policies however, is there a benchmark of documentation that I need to have.

Thanks

Donny

If your Management is serious in adoption of a QMS and whole heartedly support the QMS, they wouldnt have given a 3 month time frame.

Btw, what is the rush :bonk:

If it's just 3 months, then you should have selected (or at least narrowed down) the Registrar.

See if they have any samples of what is acceptable.

Acceptable? That's easy. :)

It's a quality management system meeting all the relevant requirements of ISO 9001, with of course all the associated records (evidence) to be able to demonstrate to external auditor/s that it has been operating over a reasonable period of time. (Usually at least 6 months, as Randy highlights).

Hi Guys/Gals

As said previously I am a mere fledgling in the world of ISO 9001. I have been tasked with my employer (a SME Construction company) to implement and audit the whole QMS from scratch.
The timeframe I have been allocated is unachievable i.e. 3 months of allocating 2 days per week:frust:.
I have developed a few policies however, is there a benchmark of documentation that I need to have.

Thanks

Donny

Hi Donny,

Let me guess...your company is bidding on a job, and one of the stipulations is to be ISO 9001 certified..... Or, your competitors are certified and Management wants to catch up... Or Management has absolutely no clue about how to implement an ISO 9001-based quality system.

By the way, is your curriculum vitae (http://jobsearch.about.com/od/curriculumvitae/Curriculum_Vitae.htm) ("resume" in the USA) up to date?

I wish you wisdom, determination and courage my friend! :agree1:

Please do come back often; your support system is here at The Cove Forums...;)

Stijloor.

In addition to my earlier post, what prompted your BOSS to go in for a QMS - is it recommended by your Customers ?

On another note, 6 momnths should be a realistic timeline for QMS implementation of a SME if you are strating from scratch.

I am guessing that you need ISO certification due to a pending bid / grant / customer requirement. My fathers (2 person company) had to be certified so they could receive government grants.

I agree with the earlier posts that you would need 6 months of data prior to being certified so a three month time frame is not reasonable. I would propose that you make the following proposal to management:

1. You will work on developing a system in the next three months and implement the system.

2. At the end of the three months run through a cycle of internal audits (you could do this provided you receive some training or hire an outsider). These audits will generate a bunch of corrective actions and preventive actions.

3. A month later hold a management review session. You will have some audit data to present and some CAR, PAR data to discuss as inputs.

4. At the end of five months conduct another series of internal audits. Determine your status and decide when you want to proceed with certification. If all looks good you could try and go for certification at 6 or 7 months.

This plan will not get you certified in 3 months but it demonstrates a plan to get certified. This may be enough for management to go to the customer and say we can't receive certification in 3 months but here is our plan. This plan is still very ambitious.

I hope this helps. Feel free to PM me if you have any specific questions or post back here.

Best of luck,

Andrew

To all posters who have suggested that ISO 9001 certification can be achieved in 6 months - what company size, process complexity and management commitment is necessary for successful certification, given that it's just the OP who is available for 2 days per week?

In my experience it is not the development of a quality system that takes most time, it is the implementation.

An experienced quality manager/consultant can produce a procedure in very little time. It is getting people to work with it, comment and refine it that takes the time.

In my experience it is not the development of a quality system that takes most time, it is the implementation.

An experienced quality manager/consultant can produce a procedure in very little time. It is getting people to work with it, comment and refine it that takes the time.

I agree. It's mostly the getting it working well that takes the elapsed time, not creating doco.

3 months?? Not possible if you want anything useful.

We just completed the process ourselves. We wrote, edited, tested and debugged nearly 1600 documents over the course of about 9 months and the whole organization was intensely involved in the process. Our business includes construction and we were audited at one of our jobsites as well as at our manufacturing facility and our offices.

As other commenters have stated, you and management should take an intro course on the standard and the philosophy behind it, then set realistic goals.

If you complete the process thoroughly, your organization will be much better off. Else, the whole thing will be an exercise in frustration and a total waste of time.

Hi Guys/Gals

As said previously I am a mere fledgling in the world of ISO 9001. I have been tasked with my employer (a SME Construction company) to implement and audit the whole QMS from scratch.
The timeframe I have been allocated is unachievable i.e. 3 months of allocating 2 days per week.
I have developed a few policies however, is there a benchmark of documentation that I need to have.

Thanks

Donny


Hi Donny & the Quality team here:

A lot many members have replied to your query, and their recommendations, suggestions, comments were very realistic. I would like to know the comments of the original query poster. Guess she hasn't yet replied after so many posts. Her reply might give some good insight into the subject.

Thanks.

SAM

Can the original poster please give me a heads-up on the type of construction the firm is involved in , "QMS please in 3 months, and ya got 2 days a week to dedicate to it". I'd like to avoid whatever it is that's being "constructed". The foundations may need repouring on that QMS, to coin a phrase.
~Mike~

Whist I am not as experienced as some of my learned colleagues, depending on the size of the company, (SME upto 250 employees - so in theory it could be 10!), what processes you have currently in place, when they were last reviewed, the managements buy-in to the whole process and how well you engage with the staff will remit your time frames.

Its more than writing a document, its understanding the inputs, outputs and associated elements, how these are measured and monitored, how they can be improved and how do you reduce the risk of something going wrong.

I dont know what you produce or how many people are in your organisation, but I am in agreement - 3 months - very very tight.:mg:

Can the original poster please give me a heads-up on the type of construction the firm is involved in , "QMS please in 3 months, and ya got 2 days a week to dedicate to it". I'd like to avoid whatever it is that's being "constructed". The foundations may need repouring on that QMS, to coin a phrase.
~Mike~

Hopefully they only work in Ireland, so we're safe here.